Plagued with indecision!

Hey Zoe, I know where you are. I have been there too.

How do you write? Are you a pantser or a planner? I love pantsing and seeing where a story takes me, and I'm all for the organic creativity, but sometimes I do have to step back and do a little planning. I often find it does calm me, because when I get stuck, I go back to my plan. I also write some character bibles... a little bit of background. These also help for plumping up backstory subtly, and for helping me know who my characters are - what decisions they've made because of something that happened in their past - or didn't!

I don't know if I'm helping, or just sounding off. The above techniques have worked for me. Plus, the other thing that also works for me is (dare I even say it) word count deadlines for the day. This forces me through my indecision, and I just have to get the words on the page. I might delete a load later (the next day), but at least they are there - and sometimes false starts are good for seeing where a story shouldn't go. Even Donna Tartt takes missteps, I saw an interview where she said she'd gone on an 8 month detour on "The Goldfinch". She deleted 8 months of work and started again when she realised it wasn't working.

I think what also calms me is that I have actually messed up on a whole book before. I rewrote it several times, and being stuck on one book took many, many good writing years of my life, however, I'm still writing and loving it and being frustrated with it and getting better (I hope) at it. I've got a very different, but more marketable book than the one I set out to write, and I learnt a lot along the way. I suppose I'm trying to say that nothing is ever lost, and that in the pitch darkness of the struggle, we can't always appreciate that "this too shall pass".

As for the choral music, and the beam of light (ha ha), I don't get that ever. There is sometimes a little frisson of "certainty" I get when I've written a good scene - the downside to that is when it's a scene an editor or beta recommends you cut. Oh, killing your darlings.

Oh, and I adore your dog! I think he/she is one of those with a purple tongue?

Ok, I recently had this happen. Thankfully, I only got about eight chapters into the book I'm writing and I wasn't feeling like it was going where I wanted. I really felt unsettled and I kept thinking "Oh, this should happen" but I hadn't set it up properly, earlier on in the book. There was also a character whose role I felt needed to change. Anyways, I decided I wasn't on the right path and went for a re-write with a bunch of new ideas in my head. I created a chart-type outline and wrote down all the new stuff I wanted to include/ things I wanted to change. I'm on chapter 5 and everything I've written feels "right" and I feel like the book is chugging along in the direction it's supposed to go. There was no ray of light from the clouds but I'm more confident in my manuscript now.

I'm a plotter. I used to be a pantser. I started plotting about four years ago and never looked back. It is a lifesaver and has made the writing and editing process so much easier. I plot my entire story out before writing it. Some don't like plotting claiming it messes with their creativity but it doesn't for me. I have lost no joy or excitement with writing since plotting in fact I am even more engaged in my stories now because I already know where I'm going and how to get there. I used to just start writing as I go and would always get stuck in the middle and couldn't get through it until days and days of pondering. I decided to try outlining and the positive changes amazed me.

Also, outlining helps with foreshadowing and allows you to see what isn't working. It's amazing how much of your story you can analyze just by looking at the outline. You can tell what works and what doesn't. Some say they don't wanna "stick to an outline". You don't have to stick to it. An outline isn't law. It's just a guide. Sometimes I will start writing a book and when I get to certain plot points in my outline, they no longer work or I think of something even better. Some stories, I've abandoned most of my first outline once I started writing because my mind went in another direction so I might input the new stuff in my outline and just disregard the previous one. An outline doesn't mean you don't have choices and can't change your mind later. Sometimes you just don't know how a story will work until you start writing it whether you outline or not.

Here is how outlining has helped me:

My first drafts are much cleaner than they were before plotting so I don't have to do as much editing
Writing speed has increased dramatically
I now have more confidence in my stories before I start writing them due to plotting
Plotting has helped me be even more creative
By plotting, you eliminate the slower parts in your book that you might not can decipher until you plot it out first

I'd suggest anyone struggling with blocks consistently or who have trouble finishing projects should at least try plotting once. It might be the thing you need. Everyone is different though. Some people are better pantsers and others plotters and some are both. Doesn't hurt to try plotting though. I'm so glad I did!

cool pop said:

An outline isn't law. It's just a guide. Sometimes I will start writing a book and when I get to certain plot points in my outline, they no longer work or I think of something even better. Some stories, I've abandoned most of my first outline once I started writing because my mind went in another direction so I might input the new stuff in my outline and just disregard the previous one. An outline doesn't mean you don't have choices and can't change your mind later. Sometimes you just don't know how a story will work until you start writing it whether you outline or not.

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This! Second and third and fourth that.

And many times I've found a story dragging me off in a slightly different direction than the one I plotted, and it's been exciting seeing it (cliche alert!): take on a life of its own.

Zoe R said:

How do you all know when you've made the right choice?

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When the effort of rewriting it is too great for a rewrite to be justifiable, despite your qualms.

I don't know about you, but in my writing, I basically have to get a 'proto-novel' written and out of the way to get at least a loose idea of what I'm doing. Then, while working on my first draft, I just keep writing no matter what. If at some point I decide to change the backstory, I just keep writing the rest but as if the backstory was the new one, and not what I have actually written.

The second draft is where I address inconsistencies resulting from this method, among other things.

Make a copy of your current story, give it a different name and put it in a separate folder, then flip a coin and make a choice about how to proceed, and work on the copy. You won't lose anything (presuming you have a sensible backup procedure). Go forward, see what happens.

caw

I second blacbird, I've done a lot of saving different drafts and then going back to find a scene that would actually work in a later draft!

I agree that clever plotting upfront can be daunting, but I always calm myself by realising that plot holes and inconsistencies can be sorted out when you're done a draft and doing an edit. Also, it might be an idea to find a beta reader to give you feedback in the early stages? I had one beta give me great feedback on something that wasn't working very well. Sometimes a new set of eyes can really help. I do find that a combination of plotting and pantsing really works for me - it means that my books tend to take longer to write, but I'm OK with that. I guess I'm learning to enjoy the roundabout journey. Domestic thriller queen, Gillian Flynn, tends to not to plan too much - it's worked pretty well for her. Here's the link for the Flynn article if you're interested:

https://www.thedailybeast.com/gillian-flynn-how-i-write

And here's the quote from the article:

"Daily Beast: Do you like to map out your fiction plots ahead of time, or just let it flow?

Gillian Flynn: I let it flow, although that makes it sound more jazzy and less despairing than the actual process often is for me. I wish I could plot more efficiently or stick to an outline, but I just can’t. Partly it’s because, for me, the plot is the least intriguing part of a book. I start writing because of certain characters or themes or events I want to explore, but I’m often not sure what form that will take. So I do float along a bit. I probably write two novels for every one I end up with—lots of deleted scenes as I try to figure out what it is I’m really interested in, what it is I’m actually writing."

Okay, I might sound like a crazy person now, but... why don't you write both/all versions and see which one you like better? That's what I did.

A few months ago, my current MS was done. I had nothing but polishing ahead of me... or so I thought. Then something inside me went "but what if the characters did THIS at Important Plot-turn #3 instead of the thing I already had them doing?" This question hijacked the story, dragged it off into a version where the third act was entirely different. "Madness," I thought. "I can't rewrite such a huge part now! It's gonna take too long!" But the new version haunted me until I decided: screw it.

Cut to several months later. I now have two complete but very different versions of my MS and I haven't regretted the decision one bit. Did it take a shitload of time? Yes. But with both products in front of me, it's so much easier to decide which one feels right. It means I can proceed with revisions without wondering what could have been.

Maybe none of this is applicable here. You need to get over your fear of rewrites, and silence your inner perfectionist, for it to work. But maybe it can help "unlock your brain", so to speak. I found that it was so much easier to write--and write fast--when my goal wasn't "this had to be right", but "this had to get done, so that I can see IF it's right".

Anyway. That's just my two cents.

Oh yeah, and I second blacbird and Qwest as well! I'm up to version 15 of my MS, not because I've written 15 different versions, but because I've grown addicted to copying the file and doing revisions in the copy. There's just something liberating about deleting whole paragraphs and know they're still safe in a sister-document.