Commitment Issues?

Maybe you're a bit of a perfectionist, and you don't think you'll be able to do the 'good' bit justice, so you leave it until you feel you can, but you never ever pass that point.

Sometimes I just need to skip a part, and write out of order.

Or maybe the story isn't right for you. Maybe you feel like you don't have enough experience or knowledge to do it justice.

My mother always used to say, it's much easier to edit a really terrible draft than edit a blank page. I think the only way is to write whatever, and edit it afterward.

I know how it feels though!

Self-discipline works wonders.

And perfect is the enemy of good.

That isn't to say something can't be very, very good, but if you wait for it to be perfect, you let yourself off the hook for getting it done. Sometimes that's easier. The part you would have written can always remain perfect in your head.

It can happen for a number of reasons, from lack of planning to boredom.

My advice is to plan the story. Outline it so you knwo where it's going. Then sit down and set yourself a goal like 'today I'm going to write this scene' and do it.

Don't be afraid to write out of order either, it can really help to keep you interested.

Also, try writing in different ways. I like to write long hand so I can see the pages stack up and that makes me feel like I'm getting somewhere. Other people have word count goals that keep them going.

I'm not so sure you're a perfectionist. I don't hear that from your post. It may be, that going to the next level in your story is too daunting, or even too personal. You don't say what it is your working on.
In my third book a man is murdered in a very public way. His murder was filmed, along with is pleading for mercy. The whole scene was aid out for me, all I had to do was write it. In the end I couldn't do it. I don't mean words failed me, my heart did. There are many reasons why authors stumble over their work, and some abandon certain works all together.
Perhaps, you should quietly examine why, this is happening to you. You've already accepted that it does, so the next step is why, and if you wish it, how do you get around it.

ass in chair.


maybe you're a perfectionist, maybe scared, maybe even just lazy (writing IS work, King himself said nobody was as good at avoiding work as a truly smart person) but in any and all cases the therapy/treatment is the same: you either sit your ass down, or you fail to do so. Maybe making a specific appointment time each day will help, or refusing to eat supper until you've finished five pages, or whatever, but those are just tricks to force your own hand and get you back to that chair.

Quick

Perhaps you've yet to accept the sad truth that what's on the page will never equal the sheer glory of what's in the head. Drag the story out screaming and dirty. You can pretty it up later.

Try a glass of wine. Your fav. music on headphones. Your loved ones/partner/whoever are all AWAY for the day. (Or lock them out of your fav. room.)

Then sit and let your fingers fly. Listen to your characters. They'll carry you.

Works for me.

butterfly said:

T
How can I transfer a mental picture into words that I'm happy with?

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How about by doing it in several steps? eg - just get the big ideas out on paper. Include notes to yourself in the text. Maybe even make it messy on purpose.

Then, once the ideas are in place, revise - for the big picture first. Save beautifying the language for last.

butterfly said:

This! This is it! I watch the movie play in my head - the background with color and subtle action, the inconsequential characters, the clothing, grass color, and noise. I can practically smell the air. I watch my characters do their thing, hear them speak and gesture, and when I go to capture this, it doesn't do it justice. I get so excited but when I read what I wrote, it sounds empty and rushed.

I read some short stories I wrote a few years back, and they are well-paced and full of description and emotion. Have I been away too long? Am I losing my joy?

It is easier to walk away then sit down but I love this story so much and want to finish it, I need to finish it.

How can I transfer a mental picture into words that I'm happy with?

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Either slow down, or speed up! It sounds like you're so wrapped up in your lack of ability to make it perfect that you won't let yourself go forward at all. Fact of the matter is, you're likely not going to get it right the first time. Or the tenth time. And you can't expect yourself to nail it right out of the gate. Very few writers do. So either you need to immerse yourself in the scene and just keep rewriting it until it works (which may not necessarily be what is in your head), or you should blast through it, call it a sh*tty first draft, and then go back and rewrite when you've got the draft done.

Writing has always been an integral part about who I am, and it's always something I fall back on, but I can relate this. But it's more like if I stop writing even for just one day, I will not be able to write for a long time. Strange, right?

butterfly said:

I definitely think need to slow down, not speed up. I'm not worried about getting it right the first time, I just want to see it through to the end.

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Then speed up! Blast through a lousy first draft! FASTER! FASTER! It does help sometimes. Of course, what you don't want to do is say "I'll fix that later" to everything, but you have to give yourself license to not be perfect. Once you have a draft, then you can perfect it. I was talking to a writer friend yesterday who's working on a script for a show and all she wants to do is get 55 pages of something typed so she can start the real work.

Jamesaritchie said:

Self-discipline works wonders.

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Self-discipline is a wonder.

I struggle with this at times as well. I never stop thinking about it though. I may go a week without touching my current WIP, but I'll think about it until my head nearly explodes and I HAVE to write some more. With my new job, I have found it increasingl difficult to force myself to sit here for a couple hours and hammer it out.

Hopefully I'll get back into the groove. Best of luck to you!

I knew a boy who wanted to write and who had some raw talent. I told him write every day. EVERY DAY. Even if it's just one line. He told me he'd do that if he had the time, but he had school, a job and a girlfriend.

Years later he told me wanted to write, and he 'envied' me the time I had to write. (I had no more hours in a day than him, plus three kids, two jobs, blah blah...) I told him to write every day and now that he was in college, it was the right time to get started. But he had classes, papers to write (for class), a girlfriend and a job.

Then he's a young man, a father of three, and again he says some day I'm going to write that novel, that story, that play. But I have kids; I'm always rocking one or changing one, and I'm a teacher now and I have papers to correct, and by the time I find the time to write a few words, the last thing I want to do is look at more words. I told him to write in his head while he rocked his children, and after he puts them to bed, jot his writing down in a notebook, his PC, anywhere.

Now he's middle-aged. He hasn't written yet. But he still wants to.

This is a condensed, true story.

My friend had a girlfriend once who was afraid to orgasm. She said it felt too much. She said she was scared she'd pee and make a mess of things... literally. I was friends with both. When they broke up, she told me: 'I was just protecting his feelings. He wasn't any good.'

Dr.Gonzo said:

My friend had a girlfriend once who was afraid to orgasm. She said it felt too much. She said she was scared she'd pee and make a mess of things... literally. I was friends with both. When they broke up, she told me: 'I was just protecting his feelings. He wasn't any good.'

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This is a hilarious story, but it was kind of your girlfriend's friend's responsibility to tell her no-good boyfriend how to do it better.

The point here being, excuses are jim-dandy and all, but in the end we need to be responsible for our own orgasms. So Butterfly, it's great that you've identified that you're afraid your big awesome scenes won't be as good as the movie in your head, but now it's time to write them anyway and to use the movie in your head for a template. How close to awesome can you make that scene? Be responsible and find out for yourself. Write it.

jaksen said:

Now he's middle-aged. He hasn't written yet. But he still wants to.

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I think this guy might be helped by a copy of "The Artist's Way". I know it's hard to take seriously a book about art written by a person who looks like a Mary Kay lady, but the writer is really spot on with some things about people who chronically defer their creative impulses.

butterfly said:

This! This is it! I watch the movie play in my head - the background with color and subtle action, the inconsequential characters, the clothing, grass color, and noise. I can practically smell the air. I watch my characters do their thing, hear them speak and gesture, and when I go to capture this, it doesn't do it justice. I get so excited but when I read what I wrote, it sounds empty and rushed.

I read some short stories I wrote a few years back, and they are well-paced and full of description and emotion. Have I been away too long? Am I losing my joy?

It is easier to walk away then sit down but I love this story so much and want to finish it, I need to finish it.

How can I transfer a mental picture into words that I'm happy with?

Click to expand...

You might try to convince yourself that, while it will probably never be as good as that "movie in your head", it can still be pretty darn good in it's own way. Don't let one vision of perfection get in the way of a different, equally valid, kind.

butterfly said:

This! This is it! I watch the movie play in my head - the background with color and subtle action, the inconsequential characters, the clothing, grass color, and noise. I can practically smell the air. I watch my characters do their thing, hear them speak and gesture, and when I go to capture this, it doesn't do it justice. I get so excited but when I read what I wrote, it sounds empty and rushed.

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Allow yourself to write a shitty first draft No one sits down and writes a masterpiece on one fell swoop - writing is a process and to start that process you need to get ass in chair and thoughts on screen/paper. Until you can do that you will not be able to finish a story.

I have found that what works for me is to sit down everyday at the same time and write for 2 hours. Sometimes I get 10 words down and others I get 1,000. Either way it is more than I had the day before and it is progress Find what works for you and as Nike says - just do it.