leftwhat.blogg.se - Sample rough draft

No matter how much you plot, outline, or plan your work beforehand, you can’t comprehend it’s mysteries until you put pen to paper. You Don’t Understand Your Story Until It’s Written If the thought of it doesn’t scare the bejesus out of you, then you’re wasting your time, effort and energy.īottom line: All kinds of doubt and fear are part of the creative process. Fear is a bizarre, but useful gauge to show you how important this piece is to you.

The good news about fear is the more you love your story, the more negative emotions you’ll experience while writing it. Self-doubt, perfectionism, procrastination…whatever keeps you from writing are just fancy words for fear.įear will do anything and everything to stop you, make you start your book over (and over again), or quit altogether. Give yourself the time and space to let your story be far from perfect in the beginning. New York Times’ Bestselling author, Nora Roberts, says, “You can fix anything but a blank page.” ( Share that on Twitter?)īottom line: Perfectionism is the enemy of creativity and productivity.

Go for a walk (or any repetitive activity) and stage a conversation between two characters in your mind and see what they reveal.

Open a new file on your laptop and list possible solutions to your plotting problem (1-2-3-4).

Switch to free-writing in a notebook and interview a character to see what information they hold.

If you find yourself stalled and don’t know what happens next, try other methods for a breakthrough: Some people are truly linear thinkers and MUST write the story in chronological order. It’s fine if that's you. Ten years ago, the perfectionist in me would have never allowed myself to cut loose like that. It also let me understand my story better.īy the end of that session, I rearranged those chaotic, unfinished scenes into semi-order. It was a hodge-podge of confusion, but it was still twenty new pages that gave me solid bones to my book. When I hit a wall with that particular scene, I immediately switched to whichever scene struck me next. I typed as fast as possible, writing as much as I could about the characters, their dialogue and setting, but I also typed phrases like: describe the cemetery more here, research huffing hairspray later (I know, I’m sick and twisted). That first day at my laptop, I wrote tiny snippets of at least a dozen different scenes. This is true whether it’s novels, short stories, memoirs or how-to’s. Perfectionism KILLS Creativity and Productivity

Let’s discuss three pitfalls I’ve learned with rough drafts.

I’m trying to apply what I’ve learned in the past to remain more sane this go-round. It sounds so simple, but writing rough drafts can be so difficult to actually accomplish.įortunately, I’ve completed four other novels and will publish book number four later this year. I just require about 70,000+ more words to fill in the blanks and have a finished rough draft. I’ve started a new novel-as in a blank “page one” in need of 275 to 400 more pages to be complete. I’m lucky, because this book is second in a series, so I already have the plot and framework in mind (sort of ).