What do most people think of when they hear organic? By definition, organic means “of, relating to, or derived from living matter.” In the nutritionists world, organic means eating foods derived from plants and animals in its purest form, i.e., no chemicals, antibiotics, preservatives, steroids, and the list goes on. And to go along with organic food, we have organic cookware!

The movement toward using more organic products also includes clothing, laundry soap, body soap, shampoos and deodorants, lawn care products, home cleaners, paper products, food containers, and when you finish using all those daily items, you can finally sleep on your organic mattress.

Whoa! To my surprise, organic has infiltrated the writing world. How can this be? I find such a “novel” phenomenon interesting because, by definition, it’s something I do naturally. Perhaps that’s why they call it organic--writing in a more natural form. Meaning, the writer doesn’t tie himself down to a strict outline or format when creating his novel. Instead, he lets the story develop from scene to scene in a mysterious unfolding of goals, conflicts, and resolutions through reactions, dilemmas, and decisions in an unpredictable, flowing context, as if the characters are in charge and the writer a mere instrument recording their journey.

But doing so doesn’t come with perilous consequences. The writer must have a story arc, no matter how detailed or vague. Without it, the story has no path. There has to be a guide from point A to point B to point C, etc., until the denouement. For those writers who despise the tedious process in outlining, organic writing makes sense.

Personally, I am one of those writers who has tried a scene by scene outline, going so far as to chart each goal and conflict on a separate sheet of paper with precise details on what characters will dominate the scene, what the character wants, what he or she will or will not get, all the way down to the scene’s nitty-gritty details.

Then, guess what happened to my outline by the second and third chapter. You guessed it. The story found its own life and presented twists and turns I had not appreciated or expected. The events grew into more exciting and interesting subplots than my original plan because as soon as the characters came to life, they demanded their own choices. 

Now, not every chapter succeeded, and it has been an excellent learning curve in which I found it’s still necessary to dissect every scene upon completion to make sure it has the three points needed to move the story forward—goal, conflict, and resolution. Writing “organically” can be a liberating and surprising technique. It can present possibilities a stringent outline doesn’t always capture. But a writer still has to know the crux of the story and keep it contained. A short synopsis, a brief description of the story’s purpose, or sketch is still necessary, just not as confining as a detailed outline.