5:17am. The sky is yet to be illuminated by the winter sun. The soft snores of my slumbering boys are the only sounds in my otherwise silent apartment. I’m curled up on the living room couch with a pen, a notebook, and a steaming cup of coffee.

I got into the practice of writing morning pages several years ago when I first read The Artist’s Way by Julia Cameron. They’re supposed to be three pages of stream-of-consciousness writing, done by hand, first thing every morning. In an ideal world, I would be able to maintain this practice the way it’s intended to be.

Here’s the reality.

My children have a complicated relationship with sleep (which is very typical of kids on the autism spectrum). Dylan will often be up later than any child his age logically should be. Shawn usually wakes for the day between 3 and 5am. And several times a week at least one of them will wake up for several hours in the middle of the night. All of this means that there’s no guarantee that I’ll wake up early enough to write three full pages every single morning.

The inconsistency of it all used to dissuade me from writing altogether, until I realized that I was suffering because of it. Writing helps me slow down my constantly racing thoughts. It clarifies answers to questions that have been puzzling me. It helps me figure out my course of action when I’m plagued with indecision. It makes me a calmer, happier, less-anxious person.

So now I no longer think of them as morning pages. I think of them as sanity pages. And I write whenever I get the chance. First thing in the morning. When Shawn is busy with his therapists. When both boys are at school. A page. A paragraph.

If you’re like me and you spend too much time stuck in your own head, I can’t recommend enough the transformative practice of regular stream-of-consciousness writing, no matter when or how much you write.