Keeping Motivated

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scmcc16

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The biggest struggle which I have been faced with is keeping motivated in writing my book. I know the topic and have the outline done along with a number of chapters complete. However, I am struggling with finishing the last few, along with expanding on them all. I'm currently only at 17,000 words and figure I'll finish around the 22,000 or so mark. Which is way too short IMO. However, I seem to have gotten a new wind as of yesterday and should be finishing up another chapter in the day or two. Which is always motivating.

Any tips out there on keeping motivated?
 

StuToYou

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The biggest struggle which I have been faced with is keeping motivated in writing my book. I know the topic and have the outline done along with a number of chapters complete. However, I am struggling with finishing the last few, along with expanding on them all. I'm currently only at 17,000 words and figure I'll finish around the 22,000 or so mark. Which is way too short IMO. However, I seem to have gotten a new wind as of yesterday and should be finishing up another chapter in the day or two. Which is always motivating.

Any tips out there on keeping motivated?

firstly, I'm sure there is a number of tips re motivation on this sub-forum, so I'd suggest typing in the word 'motivation' into the search facility.

Secondly, 22k is a novella, and it seems to me, that there is a resurgence of interest in this manuscript length - check out the Grinder or similar. The Novella is a well regarded category in many major writing awards.

Thirdly, practically every writer has difficulty with the ending of a piece, because it generally needs to bring a lot of components together - the central idea, the emotional resolution, the plot resolution etc. So that's fairly standard. These end chapters tend to be heavily tied to motivation, so your issue is common enough.

Fourthly, motivation is derived from different elements, as mentioned eg, clarity of the central idea resolution, emotional excitement, and so forth.

so I'd suggest taking time to remember your initial excitement/ concept/ image which started the work, and to spend a bit of time 're-cognizing' ( and re-imagining that initial moment(s).

ETA: Actually Sc, this may be the wrong forum for your post. I'd suggest PM-ing one of the mods to place it in the right forum - I'm not sure exactly which one myself offhand. You'll get more response then. :)
 
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scmcc16

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firstly, I'm sure there is a number of tips re motivation on this sub-forum, so I'd suggest typing in the word 'motivation' into the search facility.

Secondly, 22k is a novella, and it seems to me, that there is a resurgence of interest in this manuscript length - check out the Grinder or similar. The Novella is a well regarded category in many major writing awards.

Thirdly, practically every writer has difficulty with the ending of a piece, because it generally needs to bring a lot of components together - the central idea, the emotional resolution, the plot resolution etc. So that's fairly standard. These end chapters tend to be heavily tied to motivation, so your issue is common enough.

Fourthly, motivation is derived from different elements, as mentioned eg, clarity of the central idea resolution, emotional excitement, and so forth.

so I'd suggest taking time to remember your initial excitement/ concept/ image which started the work, and to spend a bit of time 're-cognizing' ( and re-imagining that initial moment(s).

ETA: Actually Sc, this may be the wrong forum for your post. I'd suggest PM-ing one of the mods to place it in the right forum - I'm not sure exactly which one myself offhand. You'll get more response then. :)

Thanks for all the info! Regardless if this is in the right section or not at least I got one excellent response.

As for going back to why I originally starting writing this piece, that's a great idea. As well, telling me that the length isn't a huge issue is probably going to be more motivation to me. I was seeing all the work which I had done and figuring that it just wasn't enough. Maybe I'm wrong.

In the end the length will be the length. I realized that I can't try to stretch it out just because. So it's all good. Thanks for the reply again! :)
 

StuToYou

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No prob. There's an 'Outwitting Writer's Block thread. You should also check that out. Keep truckin'!
 
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