I'm in the last week of my self-imposed
writing challenge to write every day in July. For Week 3, in lieu of
a normal blog post, I wrote a story for Elise Valente's blog.
“The Fourth Instance”
is a scifi story about what happens when you procrastinate on your current WIP. Um, oops, no. But that's actually how I wrote this story. Never underestimate my ability to
procrastinate by doing something “useful” and “important.”
But I digress.
I worked that short story up one side
and down the other (is this just a southern saying?) and still never
quite got what I was looking for in the pacing and the voicing. Then
there's always the conflict of “what I originally imagined” and
“what something turns out to be.” Why is it that even if
something is going well, if it doesn't look like our original plans
we feel a little upset, striving to get to that original view?
Working through some of these feels
generated other feels. I most epically don't have all this figured
out, but some of the things that are helping me right now might help
others, so here goes.
When Your Story Isn't Turning Out “Right”
Consult an expert. This may look
different for each person. I'm a verbal processor, so I don't even
know what I'm thinking until I've had the chance to talk it out.
Sometimes all I need to do is try to explain my situation to my
husband and then stuff becomes clear.
Put the offender in time out. Take
a little time away from whatever is misbehaving and do
something else. You can ignore the troublemaker for a couple minutes
to give yourself some new perspective. Or, if it's really stuck, put
that story/piece of art/song/whatever in time out and come back to it
tomorrow. Take the weekend off for that particular project and write
something else just for fun. Read something new. Don't let the story
tangle you up inside.
Remember that you can always change
things. I am a compulsive hoarder of words. I save old drafts as
a safety net in case I do irreparable damage. Just knowing that I can
change things, to refer back to old notes for some ridiculous minute
detail, helps me have courage to go for big changes.
Roll with it. Who says that this
new thing that your story is morphing into isn't going to be cool? Or
better? Maybe it won't be what you originally expected, but maybe
it's going to be way more awesome, deeper, and more colorful.
Stop judging yourself. Yeah, I
know. I just said for you to build a life size Empire State Building using only
Cheesewhiz and a prayer. What you write today is setting the stage
for what you will write tomorrow – figuratively and literally. You
don't know the full effect of the experience you are gaining as you
put together every blog post, short story, novella, or novel draft.
Stop judging yourself, part 2:
Everyone has to start somewhere. Give yourself permission to suck. My
friend John Adamus (Twitter, Blog), masterful writer-editor-encourager, changed the way I
think with just that one phrase: “give yourself permission to
suck.” It's ok for things to be “rough,” but the point is that
you can learn from it and get better.
Do you know what for me the most comforting part of having my stuff not turn out “right” is? This means that I am writing, creating, and working. I'm actually doing something. I'm making progress.
