I want to quit a03 and just delete all my current fanfictions, i haven’t updated any of them in months. I’m tired lol. The main reason why is I haven’t been getting a lot of interactions on my recent stuff and Ik that’s not the point of writing fanfics but idk it’s a nice from motivation. I’m an attention whore, sue me.
What i’m asking i guess is how do u stay motivated??? I have a lot of ideas for things but no drive to make them a reality.
(You probably can tell who i am from this lol but its kinda embarrassing so i wanted to keep it anon)
Oh dude I absolutely get it, for real. While we ultimately write for ourselves, a lack of engagement is REALLY discouraging! I’ve said before that I went through a REAL mental struggle writing The Webs In The Rafters specifically, and that still stands. I had a lot of super nice commenters, and that helped a lot, but it was so, so, sucky to see no engagement other than the same six people. As grateful as I was for them, I really wanted more interaction. I’d see the comment count go up, but no new kudos, and I’d feel like I was failing.
I almost dropped that fic. The only reason I didn’t was my dearest boxwinebaddie regularly doing cartwheels in the comments and messaging me about the story. Encouragement from an author you admire helps SO MUCH and I want to be that person to someone someday!!! The community of ao3 can be toxic, for sure, but it’s so kickass to see the same handful of people in someone’s comms every time you read something from a certain writer!
And man, I am absolutely an attention whore. I thrive on attention. I may be an agoraphobic asshole with no friends other than my partner irl and I may literally panic so bad that I faint when I get spoken to, but we are HUMAN!!! Validation is fucking NICE!!! Being a person sucks absolute ass and confirmation that we’re doing something right helps a lot!
The only advice I have on staying motivated: I’m just fuckin insane. And I’ve said before that the ONLY reason I started writing was bc I had an extremely specific set of tags I wanted to see. I wanted to see more style injury recovery and at the time, a lot of the style fics out there were literally just boring high school aus or Stan being suicidal and I was like helll no let’s switch it up! So I assumed my mission of renovating that ship tag. I wanted sot style h/c with an ungodly amount of comfort? I was gonna have to write it. And that expanded to all aus. I developed the OrangeJuiceVerse specifically with the message of healing as the central theme. And it means so much to me. What I’m getting at is that your work really does have to have something there that’s important to you. If it’s just all random drama with no reconciliation, it’ll be really draining on you and fall flat in your mentality surrounding it.
Another thing is: if you don’t feel like updating, DONT! It’s fanfiction. It’s something you’re putting on the Internet for free. If you aren’t 100% happy with a chapter, there is no obligation to post it! Also, if you aren’t feeling up to working on a wip, mentally or physically, you don’t have to! Come back to it when you are!
On obligation, something I struggle with is my own self imposed habit of daily updates on multichapters. I usually go really wild when I start a new au, and I’ll write for it every day. But for instance, right now, it’s been a couple since I’ve posted a new chap on In The Truly Gruesome. And I have felt some guilt about that, bc I’ve sort of garnered this reputation as someone who updates frequently on multichaps, but I haven’t been feeling so great, so writing isn’t my top priority. A couple lines here and there are what I can manage, and that’s okay! Again, it’s fanfiction. Ultimately, it matters to us as the author, the story can mean the world to us, but we shouldn’t feel obligated to update, because above all we are PEOPLE with LIVES!!!
It’s also important to remember not to treat ao3 as social media. Yes it’s kickass to form a community of like minded authors who all support each others stuff, but it isn’t something that should be expected. And I CANNOT stress enough how important it is not to feel obligated to work on something just bc someone wants you too. I’m a hypocrite, yeah, considering I had no intention of continuing my TFBW oneshot “We Did It We Are A Good Team” until I had someone commenting on my unrelated works asking for a second chapter. I don’t regret writing ch 2, btw, like im really happy with it, but I did cave under pressure to some degree. And that’s not something we should do when writing. Write for YOURSELF and (unless you’re doing an ask book or something) NO ONE ELSE!!!
That’s what I got my dude. If you feel strongly about what you’re writing, by all means write it. If you don’t, don’t feel obligated. I hope this helped!
