Some goodness from Seth "Mr. Clean" Godin:

The thing most people miss most is that they no longer have an excuse. Without a publisher/editor/boss to blame, your writing is your writing. Your followup is your followup. That means some people become trains without tracks. They just sit there.

He's speaking specifically about blogs, and how bloggers have the opportunity and inclination to cut through the B.S. and just say what they're thinking. Because there is no editor to pass through. As he points out, a lack of structure can then equal a lack of forward momentum.

That's where I am on DAHT, in case anyone was wondering. It is a train without a track.

It's also why I find it easy to commit to a pretty full schedule with Write Act Rep (I'm directing a pretty big play there this year: 20+ puppet characters, very epic) because there is a schedule. And plenty of folks to kick my ass if I miss any deadlines.

In my younger days, I was very willing to throw off the constraints of form and structure and just forge my own path. When you're a naive pipsqueak with more balls than brains, it's easy to hack your way through the self-imposed jungle you create for yourself. As I gather more life experience, I find that the truly remarkable artists, such as Mozart and Da Vinci, continue to study form and structure even as they are creating masterpieces. Mozart studied orchestral scores in his "spare time." Da Vinci's anatomical studies are very famous.

Even a guy like John Mayer, who could probably do nothing more than "Your Body is a Wonderland" for the rest of his life is a scholar of rock and blues, absorbing the strengths of great guitar players like Clapton and Jeff Beck.