Minimalistic Writing Guide
Salutations, everyone.
Over the past few months, I’ve been optimizing my writing process and I finally worked out a system that works best for me. I will be detailing this out step by step for those interested in trying it out. If it works for you, cool. If it doesn’t work for you, I hope you find another method that helps.
Now, let’s dig in.
Step One: Find the heart of your story.
Whenever I’m writing and I forget why I’m writing what I’m writing, it helps to remember the heart of the story.
This might be similar to a logline if you know what it is. [I’m not experienced with them, so don’t quote me on that.]
Here’s a general layout that I use for this:
[blank] wants to do [blank] so he/she/they can [blank] or else, [blank].
And in example form, it looks like this:
Bob wants to get a glass of water so he can stop being thirsty or else, he will die of thirst.
Step Two: Craft a skeleton.
Now that we’ve got a heart, we need a skeleton. I’m a plantser, so I like creating outlines. This is the step where you’d break out your outline making skills using whatever plot structure you like. The one I personally use is the following:
https://wrenarrior.tumblr.com/post/188107231227/avelera-useful-if-this-is-how-you-think-though
For each turning point, I plan out what event I think should happen. I go through each one by one and outline my whole novel this way. It’s, of course, subject to change, but knowing where I’m going makes the writing process easier.
Step Three: Pick a word count goal.
This is a bit arbitrary, so if it doesn’t help you, you can skip this step. I like picking word count goals because Scrivener has this neat feature where you can put in a goal and it tracks your progress for you. It also gives daily goals!
For those without Scrivener that wish to track their word count goals, I offer two alternatives:
a) you can use a spreadsheet (there are a few here)
b) you can use this site (which I used before I got Scrivener)
Step Four: Aim for a deadline.
Just like step three, this is also a bit arbitrary. For my current novel, I set my goal to be March 31st since Camp NaNo happens in April and I’d like to ideally start a new project for it. Scrivener auto-adjusts my word count goal based on my deadline and gives me daily targets to shoot for in order to meet my goal by my specific deadline. I write as much as I can and if I don’t meet my goal, that’s okay because I can try again tomorrow and it recalculates everything.
Step Five: Write.
I know, I know. Easier said than done. However, for me, once I’ve done the previous four steps, I feel comfortable enough to start writing. I’ve got the heart and the skeleton and now, I can add meat and all the other vital organs that a story needs. As I write, I do worldbuilding and character development to make sure my writing comes to life. Scrivener helps a lot with this. I also refine the plot, get more specific with my outline, and so much more to develop the story!
Well, there you have it. That’s my process.
