The more I read, the more I need to write.

As some people are probably aware, I'm an external processor: I understand things by communicating them. Or, as I've put it before, I learn by hearing myself speak. It look me a surprisingly long time to figure this out, but I guess that's because I didn't talk to myself enough.

The upshot of this is that the more information I take in, the more I need to spit it back out. That's one of my primary motivations for kicking this blog back into gear. The problem, of course, is that the more time I spend digesting books, TV, movies, etc., the less time I have to reflect on it, write about it, and truly absorb it. This is frustrating to say the least.

I haven't come up with a perfect solution to the problem yet, but one that does seem to be working for me is putting limits on what I expect myself to take in. For example, I've set a goal of one chapter of The Civil War each week. Once I finish my weekly quota (which isn't too difficult), I've given myself permission to set the book aside, which gives me a chance to think and write about it. (The side benefit is that it also lets me fit in a few other projects in parallel, which is something I've always been bad about.)

I've been fond of the saying "How do you eat an elephant? One bite at a time." Now I have to learn how to talk with my mouth full.

This morning, I put together this mindmap for the roleplaying game design that I'm kicking around.

Thanks to Chuck Wendig for pointing out FreeMind. It's helping me get masses of ideas out of my head into more useful forms.