For many writers, the hardest part is just getting through the first draft. There are so many pieces of advice out there about just finishing it and then making it good later. I think it's hard, when you're passionate, to let go enough of the desire to make it good from the jump. It's only natural to want to pour ourselves into the process of creation, to make the best possible thing we can.
But, in my mind, that's kind of like jumping straight to rendering art without drawing a sketch. It's an incredibly difficult goal to set, to try to make a finished product without any kind of foundation for what that finished product ought to look like. Inevitably, the process will demand refinement. Doing it in the moment is, as I've mentioned before, a recipe for disastrous levels of frustration, that ultimately might lead to having nothing to show for all that work.
On September 23rd, 2025, I officially finished my first draft for Grant Costa and The Court of Bad Vibes - AKA Bad Vibes. There was a feeling that came with being done I wasn't expecting. I thought I'd be ecstatic about it, but mostly, I was just relieved. It was such an... exhale kind of moment. It was done. I'd done the big task that I'd never managed to accomplish before, and finished a draft for a novel. My work. My book. A fucking novel.
It's taken its time to sink in. There's still so much work to do. I now need to go through my first round of developmental editing and revisions, which is a two step process that's going to take time. But goddamn is it good to be at that step. I'm excited to do it. Me. Excited to do editing. Finally finishing it, having the whole manuscript printed and in my hands, a physical, tangible, real product of months of labor is here and it's ready for me to massage it into the best book I can make it into.
I think having the finished draft makes the prospect of editing seem more hopeful than it does daunting, because the hardest part is done. And man did I learn so much throughout the process of doing it. About myself. About writing. About how to reflect and refine and use my discovery moments more effectively.
Buckle up, friends... I'm about to go off on a long one.
I wanted to take some time to discuss why I feel I was successful this time, when in the past, I always petered out and lost motivation to finish pieces in the past. Because that's part of the point of this blog, to document my process, to share my experience, and to maybe give ideas to other creative writers out there about things that might help them like they helped me.
So. First things first. The real secret sauce here, was taking the time to prepare in advance. In the past, I'd always seen this step of like. Outlining, writing things down, doing world building, having character profiles, etc. as something that got in the way of doing the writing. I was a dedicated Discovery Writer who kept flying by the seat of their pants and anyone who's been following along, knows I realized this doesn't actual work for me.
The outlining process, for me, was where I let myself fly by the seat of my pants. I simply sat down and started writing up everything that I wanted to happen, in order. In a lot of ways this was the OG draft. An Alpha First Draft, if you will. I iterated on my ideas on pen and paper, updated, went back, scratched things out, added new stuff, kept working at it, until I'd completed a somewhat detailed outline of a series of events with a progression and pacing I felt satisfied with.
I also gave myself all the dopamine a person could want by buying new notebooks to write various things down in and fancy pens I liked using. I decided to work with my ADHD brain and didn't try to limit the way I spread my information out. But writing it down, by hand, was a massive help in the process of just getting things done. I could do it anywhere as ideas came. I could change up the color of my pen to give me a sense of refreshing things. I kept that stack of notebooks nearby for when I felt like doing some world building, when I wanted to work on the story outline, when I wanted to write up character profile stuff.
I also took in education on the topic of writing, watched lectures and interviews with successful writers, read books, faffed about doing Market Research and what the Querying Agents is like. I got more information about the tedium of getting published to prepare myself for, not just writing, but the entire roadmap from creation to submission.
And lastly. I put an end date on when I had to stop working on this stuff and get started writing. It would be all too easy to get lost in the sauce making this cool world and all these characters for ages and never get around to writing.
I finished up the outline ahead of schedule! Which was awesome!! Being playful and organic about it, not placing too many restrictions on myself, gave that creative urge to run wild somewhere to go and in the process, I created a solid foundation for my book.
And then I added structure. I typed up the whole outline into Scrivener. Aaaaaand....
Yeah. It was way too fucking long. By doing research ahead of time, I knew I needed to try and limit my wordcount to about 100k if I wanted to get traditionally published. I wasn't going to be too strict about the content, but I did want to keep in mind the things that make a book from a new author more enticing to agents as well as new readers. The content wasn't going to be determined by this, but how I packaged it needed to take into consideration what the landscape I was going into actually demanded.
Looking at my 75 Chapter, 300k outline... I was setting myself up for failure. I could see it clearly. I had to pivot. Which sent me back to the drawing board. I revised my outline and broke it up. The three acts of my original outline became three possible novels. And I fleshed out Act I to be more complete on its own.
Even with this in mind, going back to the drawing board, starting over, writing yet another outline, I still got started on my book earlier than anticipated.
The next major thing that helped me be successful was truly internalizing and embracing the concept of Kill Your Darlings. I knew that because I was in the process of writing a First Draft and no one was going to be waiting on updates or expecting consistency from the get go, I could change things in major ways at any time. Knowing that I was allowed to Discover things that would make the story better and could embrace them without any risk made making decisions to scrap things so much easier.
It also meant that I wasn't chained to my Outline. The major beats were guidelines. Places I needed to reach but the how and what that went between these major, necessary points could flex and shift as the story demanded.
Because I did this, I didn't find myself in the place of Sunk Cost Fallacy even once with the story. I never committed to anything so rigidly that I kept working at something that wasn't actually working.
Twice, I made major changes to the story structure to better serve the narrative and make sure that the book had a more satisfying beginning, middle, and end. When I noticed problems, I was free to solve them. I wasn't locked into anything that I couldn't write my way out of. The framing of the story changed, the depth of that framing device became its own narrative, and so many amazing little changes found their way into my work in the process.
The third thing that allowed me to be successful was imposing limits on myself. I set deadlines, I set wordcount quotas, I didn't allow myself to keep going too much when I was in a groove. I paced myself, I didn't beat myself up over not writing, or not hitting quota. Placing limitations as well as goals helped keep me from burning out during the process of writing. It helped me maintain motivation more steadily, as well as work through low motivation days. Having a roadmap, and quantitative goals/limits, meant that I knew what had to be done on any given day and I could simply do it to the best of my ability.
I'd make it good, later. Just get it done.
Watching things come together bit by bit and evolve as the story progressed on the page was its own source of motivation and satisfaction.
#4 - ACCOUNTABILIBUDDIES. I tapped people around me to be my source of accountability and motivation. People who I knew would encourage me and celebrate with me as I worked. This was key. I needed feedback and the rush of people telling me "good job" so damn bad. Writing is fucking lonely, man. It really is. Hours spent in a room with nothing but your own words can be a serious fucking grind.
The Fifth Element in the Secret Sauce of My Success: Getting out to socialize, telling people about what I was doing, and embracing my job as an actual job. Self-identifying as a writer was so important. Taking myself seriously, telling people "I'm a writer. I'm currently working on an urban fantasy novel." as a completely legitimate thing to be and do, that... That did something to my brain. It shifted my perspective. Cognitive Behavioral Therapy for my fucking Imposter Syndrome. Yeah, I'm not published. But I am a writer. I am going to be published. I am working.
I think the combination of mentally treating this as a career made me more effective as a writer. I didn't let myself get totally swept away into the whirlwind of creation without considering the technical aspects of what I was doing. Because this is my job. I'm a writer. And writers think about their work as objectively as they can in the process. Move things around, add, subtract, change. This is part of the process. I'm not writing serial fanfiction right now, I'm writing a novel I intend to publish, I have the space and the freedom to say "no this thing needs to be like this instead because that will make X better" and yeah. It was really satisfying.
The moments in the process where I said "This needs to happen sooner. No, I don't need to stick to my plan and put that in book 2, that should happen now because it will make the pacing better, it will make this narrative flow." or "This isn't as impactful as I want it to be so I should go back and look at foreshadowing opportunities. I should add a scene that does X so this hits harder." -- These moments were so fucking satisfying. I felt like a badass. I felt legitimate. It might seem like that's so simple, so easy, but it wasn't for me. Not for a long time.
I discovered that there's a big difference between writing serially and writing a novel. I can't apply the same methodology to these two processes. Even if I have an outline for something I'm publishing serially, once it's out there, that's that. No revising. If I came to realize something down the line in the process that would have been good to add way back when I can't do that. Not having an outline while writing serially means no roadmap, more likelihood of simply losing focus or motivation or losing track of the through-line of the narrative. Fizzling out is inevitable.
When writing a novel, there is a different kind of freedom I didn't anticipate having. The room to breathe was incredibly refreshing.
In the end, I tweaked my outline and wrote up new details more than once as the demands of the story became clearer. There was no way of knowing until I was doing just what this story was going to ask of me. Being able to answer the questions as they came, iterate on my foundational ideas, and make changes on the fly made the whole process of finishing the first draft feel just as much like Pure Discovery Writing as doing it without an Outline, except I did have an Outline, and it was there for me to lean on throughout the process so that no matter the changes, I reached my destination in the end.
My Outline was a Map Quest print out I'd read ahead of time and kept in the car, just in case I got lost. I was familiar with the route, the landmarks I needed to look out for, and the system of roads I was driving on. (These are metaphors for the general idea of the story, the big beats I needed to hit, and general knowledge of storytelling structures.) Because I'm a pretty good driver (I think you get the metaphor by now...) I was able to get where I was going without needing to follow a turn by turn guide. I felt my way through based on the general directions in my Outline. I took the detours that road construction threw my way, I ventured down avenues that seemed more enjoyable, but were still heading in the general direction of my intended destination, and I enjoyed the ride all the way to the end.
I implore you, if you don't use outlines ever, and find you struggle to finish things and maintain motivations, try again. You might discover a hybrid process that works for you and allows you to capitalize on your passions alongside your potential.
The Result.
Now that I'm done with the first draft, the story looks like the bigger, beefier sibling of the story I set out to write. It's got better fashion sense and personality. It knows who it is and who it wants to be. If you were to read this draft and then I showed you my outline, you'd probably be surprised by how different the two ended up being in the end. Half the things that wound up in the finished product weren't things I'd known the story would need when I wrote the outline. And having the freedom and confidence to make those changes was a new experience for me. Something I valued and learned a lot from.
The most exciting part, I think, is I already have some thoughts about further changes. Further additions and subtractions. Different ways I could make my Second Draft into an even better novel than the first. I have been saving copies of this story as I've gone along, just so I can look back at that evolution for myself and learn from it. But after I do this round of developmental edits, I might print one copy of this version, just for me. Something I can look at for the rest of my writing career, to remind myself that I did it. The thing that had been so impossible and unreachable, I grabbed it. I made it happen.
Something that I was recently asked about on my main blog was "How do you plot your stories?" and boy is that a long-winded answer!
In most of the creative writing spaces I've been involved in over the years, Plot has often been talked about with this air of almost mysticism. Plot, for many, is hard. Coming up with ideas? Simple enough. Fleshing them out into a story? Woof. Much more difficult. I've found this particular sentiment in fanfic-centric spaces, writing groups, all of the internet. The place where I've heard it the most has often been when hanging around fellow Fic Writers.
I think in some respect, there's this disconnect between what plot Is or Can Be, and what the colloquial term for plot has become in a lot of these spaces. We think of plot as Events That Happen in a story and while that's part of it, that's not entirely how I view it.
The best way I can put it, is that I view Plot as its own living, breathing character. It behaves in certain ways, has a mind of its own at times, and everything important, characters, events, genre, tone-- Those are all there making up the whole of The Plot itself.
I told the asker that I could probably go on for ages about plot, it's my favorite part of writing. I do love a good character driven narrative, but I don't do a whole lot of work that could truly be constituted as Character Study. I have always been Plot Focused, ever since I wrote my first book when I was 9 years old. It was for a school project and during that project, I realized it was all I ever wanted to do with my life ever again.
The deep desire to tell stories is part of me. I developed a general sense for plot very early on. Going back to look at that book I wrote in the 3rd grade, I knew what plot ought to look like. I was such an avid reader, and I read books for adults as soon as anyone would let me have them. I had to teach myself to enjoy reading and focus on it (hello undetected and undiagnosed ADHD) but once I did, I was all in.
The first step to learning Plot for me, was consuming as much of it as possible, and coming to love it. To the point that now, when I read a plot I really love I find myself saying "Why doesn't this plot exist with more queer characters!? I want this plot but gayer!!" which is how I wound up working on my current book, which aims to be the first in a series of... at least 9?
My first book was a 20 page hand written and hand illustrated urban fantasy story. It was about three girls who find magical rings in the parking lot of a Hardee's that transport them to different fantastical places. It's also about the narrator in his sound booth who's telling you this story, and how he keeps getting interrupted by smurfs climbing on his audio equipment.
Those are plots. But that's not all that plot is.
When I think of Plot as its own character, and abstract it to a structure, I see it as a body. It is comprised of bones, meat, and gristle, supported by a skeleton of concepts. It's with this kind of structure in mind that I build my plot. There are lots of great plot structure devices out there (Heroes Journey, The Story Circle, etc.) and depending on the kind of story you want to write and how much outlining you like to do, you might find more success with one than the other. But those also look at Plot as Events in a way that just doesn't fully vibe with how my brain works and feel far too rigid for me. Too specific. Too timeline focused. Plot can follow those structures like a roadmap.
But I have to know who my Plot Is before I can even consider structure and story beats.
Over the years, and after analyzing my own works a lot, I've come to view my own plot structure like this: The Spine, The Legs, The Hands, The Heart, and The Head. Once the character that is The Plot is built, then I put it into the 3 Act structure to help me with pacing. I think about the events the Plot will experience and plan them out, because by that point, I know who my Plot is and what they're likely to do. The point of the structure beyond that is to make sure I hit the right beats at the right time.
Generally speaking, what I'll call The Plot Character might work better for people who lean more heavily into Discovery Writing than Heavy Outlining. I do a lot of Outlining. It's extremely helpful. But once I'm in the process of working toward the things in that outline, the story begins to move. The Plot is its own being, just like the characters that fit inside it, and it might take me in a different, but similar direction.
Beneath this cut, I'll walk you through my entire process. At the end, there's also an exercise you can try that might help you build up your Plotting Skills. Strap in! It's gonna be a long one!
THE SPINE:
The Spine of the plot, you could call the Overarching Plot. The single point that everything else attaches to. I usually find my Spine by having a type of character in mind, and a thing I want them to go through. This became the norm for me back in the days of "flinging plot bunnies" on LJ. I'll use one of my most recent fanfics as an example. In Between the Fourth and Fifth Rib, the Spine is "Emmrich and Lucanis fall in love in the wake of Rook's Death". On its own, that's a plot, but there's not much going on with it.
A plot does not have to be an event, either. Depending on the focus of your story, it could look like this:
Character A must overcome their trauma, and find happiness.
Character A learns to cope with [Concept].
Character A accidentally starts the apocalypse.
Or maybe it looks like this:
A criminal and a detective must work together to solve a murder.
A damsel in distress has to save her knight.
Oooor....
Someone's turned off all the magic in the world. Character A needs to turn it back on, before reality falls apart.
During a Heist Gone Wrong, Character A discovers they have the ability to read minds.
These are all solid Spines for a story to hang on. The concept should always be simple, succinct, and make a promise about at least one of, but ideally more than one of the following:
What the genre is going to be.
What the tone of the story will be.
Whether it's External Narrative Focused, or Internal Narrative Focused (more on this in a minute...)
When you have your core idea, it gives you a starting point to work from to build out the pieces that you need to further flesh out your Plot Character. Any good plot is really just several smaller plots in a trench coat trying to get into an R-Rated movie.
So. Now that we've got the Spine, that brings us to...
THE LEGS:
In order to find the plot's legs, you need to know where you want the movement of the story to come from.
That's why we look at External Narrative and Internal Narrative. You need to know which one is carrying the Spine.
This can be determined by asking yourself one question: Is your plot driven forward by your character doing things to change themselves that impact their world/the people around them, or is your plot driven forward by things happening to your character that force them to act and change?
To extrapolate further; where does the conflict primarily come from? While any good story will have some of both, most plots are given the majority of their momentum by one or the other.
In stories like Buffy The Vampire Slayer, James Bond, Sherlock Holmes, or The Dresden Files, your major sources of conflict are external forces acting on the main character. Villains doing bad things, chaos happening all around them, a mystery that needs to be unraveled before the clock runs out. These are all plot points that act upon your character and force them to be proactive, grow, and change. If the main thing the character must overcome is an external antagonist or situation, your Legs are moving with External Narrative Momentum.
In stories like Pride & Prejudice, Anne of Green Gables, The Great Gatsby, or Lord of the Flies, the characters drive the plot forward through their own changes, choices, and development, causing the events to unfold as they do. If this is the kind of story you're telling, then your Legs are moving with Internal Narrative Momentum.
In all of the above examples, you will find a little bit of one in the other, but the primary focus is different for each.
One is at the wheel of the story, and one is battling their car sickness. Both are important, but you need to know which one is the main source of inertia in order to know what your Legs are and what they're doing. Let's break it down by adding some legs to a couple of the above Spine examples.
Internal:
Spine - Character A must overcome their trauma, and find happiness.
Legs - Character A has started pushing people in their life away because of their trauma, and they stand to lose their closest friends, along with their marriage because of this.
External:
Spine - During a Heist Gone Wrong, Character A discovers they have the ability to read minds.
Legs - Character A knows they heard the traitor's thoughts among the crew, but everyone's pointing the finger at Character A.
In each of these examples, the Legs represent a driving force. A problem to be overcome that builds on the concept that starts in the Spine.
In the Internal Narrative example, the problem is Character A. The momentum that will drive the story forward is dealing with themself, and the problems they're causing in their own life with their behaviors.
In the External Narrative example, the problem is Character A's crew. There's a traitor among them, and everyone has turned on Character A. The plot will be driven forward by them confronting and solving this problem.
So the next question we must ask is this: How does our character Solve The Problem?
Well. They need hands for that.
THE HANDS:
The Hands are the summary of primary actions your protagonist takes to work through the problem their plot presents. We use our hands to build things, to dig into the dirt and unearth hidden gems. Every good Plot Character needs a strong pair of hands. Knowing that, let's carry on with our two plot examples and give these guys some good Hands.
Internal:
Spine - Character A must overcome their trauma, and find happiness.
Legs - Character A has started pushing people in their life away because of their trauma, and they stand to lose their closest friends, along with their marriage because of this.
Hands - With all that they hold dear on the line, Character A seeks out a therapy group for trauma survivors.
External:
Spine - During a Heist Gone Wrong, Character A discovers they have the ability to read minds.
Legs - Character A knows they heard the traitor's thoughts among the crew, but everyone's pointing the finger at Character A.
Hands - Using their new powers, Character A begins the search for the evidence they need to clear their name, and root out the real traitor in the group.
As you can see, the whole plot is really starting to take shape. We know what the overall story is, we know what conflict moves it forward, and we know what our characters have to do. So now we move on to The Heart.
THE HEART:
The heart is the emotional soul of the plot. It is how the protagonist interacts with other characters within the story, and how those interpersonal connections help shape their motives and their actions. This is what you might have heard called a "Relationship Plot". When considering The Heart, think about who is around the protagonist, and how the protagonist's interactions with these characters connects to the Spine. Is The Heart going to harden by the end or swell with new love? Maybe it's a little of both.
With that in mind, we move on to a little organ implant.
Internal:
Spine - Character A must overcome their trauma and find happiness.
Legs - Character A has started pushing people in their life away because of their trauma, and they stand to lose their closes friends, along with their marriage because of this.
Hands - With all that they hold dear on the line, Character A seeks out a therapy group for trauma survivors.
Heart - Character A grows close to Character B, another attendee of their new therapy group. As they bond, Character A drifts further away from their spouse, but also starts growing beyond the pain of the past and learning to live again, alongside Character B, who understands Character A's struggles in a way that makes them feel less hopeless.
External:
Spine - During a Heist Gone Wrong, Character A discovers they have the ability to read minds.
Legs - Character A knows they heard the traitor's thoughts among their crew, but everyone's pointing the finger at Character A.
Hands - Using their new powers, Character A begins the search for the evidence they need to clear their name, and root out the real traitor in the group.
Heart - While on the run from former friends who are now out for their blood, Character A begins to unravel the mystery of the betrayal, discovering that Character B, the one in the group Character A trusted most, is the one who turned on them all. With no one left to trust, Character A must find new allies, and bring Character B's betrayal to light, even though Character B was once their closest friend. And Character A must do this knowing it will cost Character B their life.
As you can see, these are starting to sound like Proper Plot Summaries at this point. And if you wanted to, this could be a great jumping off point to start thinking about what your Plot Character is going to do, utilizing the 3 Act structure (or any other you like!) but there's one more thing that I think is important.
It is not always necessary, but most good stories have this last piece, and the way I see it, you need to know where you're going in order to get anywhere.
THE HEAD:
The Head is simple. What does your protagonist learn by the end of your story? When going through so much, whether internal, or external, your character is likely to learn something along the way. This is the point of growth that can be a really useful way-point for how they ought to engage with situations the plot presents throughout the course of the narrative. This will also help you pick out specific events that help teach the character the lessons they need to learn to get to that end point.
We're gonna add one more little tidbit to these Plot Characters.
Internal:
Spine - Character A must overcome their trauma and find happiness.
Legs - Character A has started pushing people in their life away because of their trauma, and they stand to lose their closest friends, as well as their marriage because of this.
Hands - With all they hold dear on the line, Character A seeks out a therapy group for trauma survivors.
Heart - Character A grows closer to Character B, another attendee of their new therapy group. As they bond, Character A drifts further away from their spouse, but also starts growing beyond the pain of their past, and learning to live again, alongside Character B, who understands Character A's struggles in a way that makes them feel less hopeless.
Head - Character A learns that while change can be painful, and growth is a slow-going and never ending process, happiness is found in that process, not at the end of it. With Character B, they learn what it means to live for something, instead of in spite of something.
External:
Spine - During a Heist Gone Wrong, Character A discovers they have the ability to read minds.
Legs - Character A knows they heard the traitor's thoughts among their crew, but everyone's point the finger at Character A.
Hands - Using their new powers, Character A begins the search for the evidence they need to clear their name, and root out the real traitor in the group.
Heart - While on the run from former friends who are now out for their blood, Character A begins to unravel the mystery of the betrayal, discovering Character B, the one in the group Character A trusted the most, is the one who turned on them all. With no one left to trust, Character A must find new allies, and bring Character B's betrayal to light, even though Character B was once their closest friend. And Character A must do this knowing it will cost Character B their life.
Head - Character A learns to fully utilize their telepathic abilities. But, crushed by the weight of betrayal, they also abandon loyalty and learn to embrace pragmatism. The lesson they take away from all of this is that people are easily swayed by money, and trust is cheap. From now on, they work alone.
WHEW. We made it. Our Plot Characters are standing, walking, feeling, and thinking. This is the whole picture in a nutshell of what these Plots are. And because we now know them like full beings, we can begin to ask them questions!
In these structures, there are a multitude of points to be explored, and in exploring them, you can find your major events.
When considering the Internal Plot, we could ask things like:
"What was this trauma that happened to your character, Plot?"
"How long has your character been dealing with these feelings?"
"Was the Spouse understanding at first?"
"When did that change and why?"
"What does Character B do for Character A that makes them begin to see things differently?"
"How do the people in Character A's life react to Character B?"
"Does Character A resist change at first? How do they deal with therapy group and how does that change over time? Why does it change?"
And in the External plot, we could ask some stuff like:
"Why did Character B betray the group?"
"Why did Character B single out Character A?"
"Do the other members of the group get involved in this? Can Character A win them over?"
"What lengths does Character A have to go to in order to show everyone who Character B really is?"
"How does Character A's power play into this?"
"Does Character B have powers, too?"
Asking these questions and fleshing out the answers will help you find Plot Points. The connective tissue that holds all of the rest of the structure together.
For the sake of this explanation, since it's what I use, I'll talk about placing your Plot Character in the 3 Act Structure.
When I think about the 3 Act Structure, I like to simplify it as much as possible. I really resonated with the way Jim Butcher uses this structure and find that it also works for me.
A story needs a Beginning, The Big Middle, and the Conclusion. Once you have those things in mind, you can shape your Acts around these things. If you're a discovery writer, you probably won't want to dig much further than this, and let the Plot show you what it's doing. You can fix so many things in post. Foreshadowing is easiest to do once a story is finished. Internal consistency is easier to hammer down when you've been writing something for a while and can look back and see where you've veered off initial promises you made about your story. The biggest thing is just to get the Plot moving on the page, and then you can go back and course correct once you see where it's taking you. But you should at least have the Big Pit Stops planned for your journey so you don't wander too far off course.
The Beginning is simply the inciting incident that kicks off your story.
The Big Middle is a tried and true concept used by many storytellers. It's the Climax before the Climax. A big thing that happens toward the middle of your story that sets the entire Conclusion into motion. Your Big Middle should be the first domino that falls that will set off the chain reaction of things that lead to your Conclusion.
The Conclusion is how the story ends.
Looking at our Plot Characters hanging out up there, we could maybe have something like this:
Internal:
The Beginning - Character A is confronted by their friends about their growing pattern of behavior. It's an intervention. They need to start making changes. So they find the Therapy Group and start going.
The Big Middle - Character A is making positive strides in their outlook, but how close they've gotten to Character B is a tipping point in their marriage. The Spouse and Character A have a big fight and The Spouse threatens Divorce if they don't find a new therapy group and start dedicating less time to Character B.
The Conclusion - Character A has grown and changed beyond who they were when they got married and accept it's time to move on. They suggest the divorce and move forward, starting a new chapter of their life with Character B.
External:
The Beginning - Character A touches a strange artifact their crew has been hired to steal. Upon doing so, they awaken new telepathic abilities and realize they've been betrayed. They can hear the thoughts of a SWAT team and a Traitor among their crew. With the job botched they all have to flee.
The Big Middle - Character A has a showdown with Character B, during which Character B reveals to Character A that they're the one who betrayed the Crew. Character A narrowly escapes with their life, knowing who betrayed them, and what they have to do next, even if they don't want to.
The Conclusion - Character A has pushed themselves to limits they never thought they were capable of, and is able to bring Character B's betrayal to light. In the end, they shoulder the responsibility of taking Character B out, and decide to never work with another crew ever again once it's all over.
AND WE'RE DONE!
All of this is a great place to either get writing from if you do more Discovery Writing, or, the solid basis for a well crafted outline. For me, I do the well crafted outline and then wind up Discovering Things anyway that force me to go back and edit that outline. But my process does not need to be yours. I can't say I recommend it. It gets a little hectic.
I know this was A Lot. And it should go without saying, take from this what works for you, if anything, and leave what doesn't. Any decent writer will tell you that the only writing advice that's worth anything, is the advice that helps you write the stories you want to tell.
I'll leave you with one last thing.
If you're struggling with the very concept of coming up with ideas for Plot to begin with, there's a little thought experiment you can do from time to time to help with that.
It is no secret that I love an AU. If you look through my AO3 history, you'll see that I am constantly taking characters and planting them in different universes or making them into something else. It's an EXCELLENT teacher for building plots. This is also something Brandon Sanderson recommends in his lectures, and I was tickled to hear him talk about it, as it's something I've been doing for fun for basically over a decade. It has truly helped me, and I hope it might help you.
Here's an Exercise to build that Plotting Muscle:
First things first, I recommend doing a little research. It doesn't have to be anything major. And I've definitely given this advice before. It helps any time your stuck with your writing. Revisit some of your favorite stories and use those to shape something New.
The First step in the exercise is to take the Spine of one of your favorite stories (books, TV, movies, comics, video games, it's all up for grabs!).
Step two, snatch up your favorite Main Character from a different story of a different genre, and break them down to their Archetype/Occupation (Are they an anti-hero? Asshole with a heart of gold? A painter, a gunslinger, a professor? Find these two traits).
The final step is to then plant them in one of your favorite universes of yet another different genre.
Now, you've got something to work with to do the construction I laid out above.
But, to lay it out in practice, it goes a little something like this.
Say, you really like the Spine in True Blood: Young Woman with the ability to hear everyone's thoughts discovers she can't hear the thoughts of Vampires. She gets embroiled in their world and all the complications that come with it.
Now let's say, you absolutely love the Cranky Single Father of a clever child, who lost his wife and works as a Private Eye from Nice Guys a lot. (Ryan Gosling is just. Excellent. Also I love Shane Black, I think I might've mentioned...)
And then finally, let's say you fell in love with the world of Mass Effect.
You take all of these things you like, smash them together, and re-imagine them as one cohesive unit. Think about the various plot points and character interactions from the different stories you're taking from and see how you can fit them together. This will help you get used to conceptualizing Plot.
The Result:
Character A is a single father and Private Eye who works on an Inter-Galactic Space station. As an Ex-Space Navy Special Operative, he's acquired a lot of useful skills over his career, but after the death of his wife, he needed to make a career change that kept him close to home, paid the bills, and utilized the only skills he's got.
While he served in the Space Navy, he was part of an experimental biological enhancement project where they gave him an implant that allows him to hear people's thoughts. It comes in handy on the job, allowing him to close cases quickly and dismiss ones that he knows are a waste of his time.
Until now.
Character A gets a client who's thoughts he can't hear. Maybe it's a quirk of their species, or maybe it's something else jamming his implant's signal, either way, it complicates things.
This Client wants Character A to investigate the murder of their business partner, but all the evidence is pointing to The Client. Character A can't hear their thoughts, can't know for sure if The Client is telling him the truth. The Client has both Character A's interest, and his suspicion. As he tries to work the case, his precocious child seems determined to help him solve it, and seems to think that The Client and Character A would be a good match. Murder, mischief, and possible matrimony area all distinct possibilities, as Character A does his best to keep his head on straight, see his Client for who they are, and get his kid to bed on time.
Most of you, if not all of you, have followed me here from Fanfiction/Fandom spaces. Doing this particular exercise will help you utilize some of those fanfic habits and instincts to build up the skill of creating plots. At the end of the day, all writing is stealing what you like from other creatives and their stories, but it's the amalgam of these thefts and what you do with them that makes something yours. I hope you found something useful here and that you keep on creating awesome stuff!
If you're enjoying my blog and wanna help fuel my work, I do have a ko-fi account where you can leave me tips. I also offer a Critique/Constructive Feedback service for pretty cheap if you want me to help you with a project. Writing full-time right now does not currently pay any bills, but I do hope to get there. In the meantime, your support, liking and sharing my work, means the world to me. I hope to drop some snippets from my current project and do a Q&A on this blog soon!
Y'all ever try to do something nice for yourself, and really need that lil win, and then some stupid clusterfuck comes along and ruins it?
I ordered myself a hardbound copy of my first draft of my book as a keepsake for myself. This was a major milestone for me. I designed a really simple color block cover, made the back blurb...
And today it arrived. And I was so excited...
Look at it. It's so simple. It was so special. My lil elevator pitch back blurb for the book is there and everything.
And then I opened it.
WHAT. PRAY, TELL, THE FUCK!?
What is this bullet journal nonsense I did not ask for what the fuck is happening. GODDDDDDDDD.
I'm so fucking annoyed.
Anyway. Enjoy the back blurb. Lol. I'm gonna stew in my irritation.
I'm in the process of quitting nicotine now that my adderall dosage appears to be correct, as my inclination toward it is naturally declining since I don't need to self medicate anymore. But I think I'm a little stressed. Just. A smidge. Y'know?
As I've been working on this project I've found myself repeatedly succumbing to the terrors of what happens after I'm done. My brain likes to latch onto the ambiguous aftermath of finishing my first draft a little too hard for my liking. Every project I work on, be it an original one or a fanfiction, I always reach a point where doubt starts to creep in and stress me the fuck out. And when that happens, the devil on my shoulder starts whispering to me "hey you know what would help? halting all progress to do a bunch of editing right the fuck now" and that's a trap.
When I think about finishing my project, it can lead to a lot of second guessing myself about what I'm doing and wondering if I'm making the right decisions. Should I lean into this thing more? Should I take that thing out? Is this section too verbose? What if my pacing is wrong? It all piles up and tempts me to start looking back at what I've already done. To tinker. To edit. And this inevitably will suck me down into a hole that's really hard to dig myself out of.
I have a few friends who work in production for movies and television, and there's a phrase that they all hate hearing: We'll just fix it in post. Generally speaking, when working in screen production, the person saying this is the Director or the Cinematographer. Rather than doing the most they can during the filming to make sure that shots look and sound the way they should, or as close to that as possible, they decide to offload that to the post-production team. They say "We'll just fix it in post" and saddle a different team with the tedious work of color correction or CGI or ADR or any number of other things that might need to be tweaked to get things ready for release.
This is generally Not Great. But Screen Work and Writing are fundamentally different creative processes.
I've said "Fix It In Post" plenty of times on this blog now, and unlike screen production, when it comes to writing, this mindset is actually a really good one. There are a lot of reasons career writers say time and time again, do not edit as you go. But for me, I have to actively work against the urge. I'm better at avoiding this habit than I used to be, but I haven't broken myself of it entirely and I'm not sure I ever will.
I don't think I'm at all unique in that regard. Almost every writer I have met over the course of my life says "Oh, I know you're not supposed to edit as you go but I do". They say it and laugh about how they're breaking the "rules" because they just can't do it any other way. Except they can. I can. Anyone can. People do it all the time! But I honestly think quitting nicotine might actually be easier.
I was one of those people who wore it like a quirky badge of honor for a long time. It came free with my "I never outline anything!" superiority complex. (Another habit I have since tried to actively break myself of.) I still struggle to Not Do That, even after 20+ years of writing almost every day of my damn life.
Editing as I go is a trap, I know it is. It doesn't work for me. I have evidence to prove that to myself, because as soon as I stopped doing that, and started outlining and editing after I finished my first draft, I was completing projects left and right. I wrote 55 fics in two years and completed all but like. 3 of them?
And, yanno, maybe for some people Editing While Writing really is the best way for them. They edit as they go and it works out just fine, it doesn't stress them out, doesn't slow their process to a crawl, doesn't create more work, and they produce good stuff because of it. For every rule there is an exception. For every process that by and large, does not work well, there is someone who thrives in it. But the drawbacks I've come to notice that come from editing as I go far outweigh whatever sense of Perfection I would get from doing so.
The thing is, editing an incomplete picture means that I miss things anyway. How can I know what actually needs changed, added, taken away, or fixed if I don't have a complete picture? How can I spot problems in continuity that haven't happened yet? I can't. And trying to is an exercise in added stress and frustration that is totally avoidable!! So what the hell am I doing it for!? You'd think that knowing all of this would make the urge to edit as I go vanish, but boy howdy, the self-doubt about my own creative capabilities works fucking overtime and never takes a day off.
Constantly stopping my forward momentum to backtrack and change something starts to suck me into the black hole of re-reading things and doing work that I will still have to inevitably edit again. (If you're one of those people who is able to do this and not be bothered by it please teach me your secrets, I need to be less bothered.) Editing like this creates more work. And ultimately, less cohesion and satisfaction. Add to that how much it slows down the process, and it's a recipe for burnout.
If that wasn't bad enough, there's this thing that happens when anyone looks at their own work a whole bunch. The human brain fills in gaps without us ever realizing it's doing it. We can get so familiar with our work that our brains just slide off stuff we should be catching. Meaning that all this extra work of going back again and again and again isn't even useful half the time. But the anxiety!! The stress!! The desire to make something GOOD right away is so all consuming it's nearly impossible to ignore. If you feel me can I get an F in the chat or whatever? I don't go on twitch much.
Anyway, I know why I shouldn't do this to myself. I know why it doesn't work. And I really know that I need to stop piling on, because the whole process becomes more and more stressful and in the past, the culmination of all of it was a bunch of stuff I'll never finish that makes me feel bad about myself. And generally speaking? All the things I did manage to finish that I edited as I wrote... I still wasn't happy with what I created by the time I finished. I'd go back and see glaring errors in my work that I'd kick myself over. Every single time.
All this to say. I'm fucking struggling.
I had to throw out almost everything I wrote today because it wasn't working. I was so distracted by doubts and going back to poke at things that what I managed to get done didn't amount to much forward progress.
I want Bad Vibes to be good. I really do. I'm doing my best to just get words on the page right now, and trying to tell myself I can make it good later. There are so many things I like about it already! There are good things happening! But not good enough...
That nagging little voice is always there, inducing levels of anxiety about the quality of work and narrative decisions I've made, and yesterday it caused me to spiral into full blown writers block. I tried to work through it. But it amounted to a lot of stuff that was not good. Stuff that made the block worse, and ultimately had to be abandoned. And that's a problem.
I have daily quotas set for myself, and a deadline. That Deadline is October 15th. That is 55 Days away, as of writing this post. Just under 2 months.
At a quota of 3,000 words a day, that's more than doable. I know myself and I know what I'm capable of. I set these achievable goals to feel like I'm making strides because the hallmarks I used to use to motivate myself are not part of this current process. And one of the only ways to overcome writers block is Motivation. I have to want to keep writing even when writing feels like drilling into my own teeth. Usually I'd be getting positive feedback and people excited for what comes next as a carrot to dangle before myself that would get me through the block.
But with no carrot, and the creeping, festering dread of making something Bad hanging around... Ugh. It's so sneaky. Sometimes I don't even realize I'm doing it until I'm like "why do I have chapter 3 open. I'm on chapter 11!!" and I've wasted away an hour re-reading and tweaking and editing. And that's... Not progress. It's stagnation.
A first draft, no matter how much editing I do to it as I go along, will still be a first draft that needs yet more editing when I'm done so how is it that I keep falling into this punji pit of wasted effort? It feels so unfair.
Today I caught myself doing this. Editing. And I got stressed and angry at myself. It's like opening up a can of "but what if" flavored worms. No matter what I do now, I know it'll never be perfect. The best chance I have at making it good is by having it Done.
There was a time when I embraced the slog and let myself succumb to the guilt that came with losing my momentum to the Edit Stress Machine. I have learned to at least notice when it starts to happen so I can try to snap myself out of it. Part of learning and growing as a writer was learning what parameters would actually work for me to balance my bouts of insecurity and my need to keep making progress.
For this project I've put some things in place that, so far, are helping me with it.
The first thing I decided was that I needed to Compromise. Compromising with myself is how I am trying to keep "what if just a little edit as a treat" from turning into "what if editing but too much" and... It's pretty straightforward.
What I am Not Allowed To Do:
Go back and re-read and re-edit entire chapters instead of working on new ones.
Do any major editing if I haven't hit my daily quota.
Edit for more than 30 minutes at a time.
Beat myself up for backsliding and doing any of the above from time to time. I'm only human.
What I am Doing Instead:
I can go back and edit entire chapters once an entire Act is completed. I even get to print that Act out and read through it and make little notes. Make an event of it.
I can go back to throw in a foreshadowing piece in prior chapters that I need when they occur to me. One or two lines at most. Nothing more.
I can make notes in one of my many notebooks about things I realize I need to address with revisions as they come up so I don't forget about them later.
By placing these parameters on myself, if I catch myself in a Edit Stress Spiral, I can remind myself that there is a plan to get to it later. I am not forbidding myself from "editing as I go" entirely, but rather, structuring it in such a way that it doesn't start to swallow me whole.
And when all else fucking fails, the mantra is: YOU CAN FIX IT IN POST. STOP LOOKING AT IT. FIX IT IN POST.
It's not a perfect system, nor am I able to fully divorce myself of decades long habits that are sourced from my desire to make Good Art. I frequently slippery slope my way into breaking my own rules but there's a comfort in knowing I've got a plan. I won't miss things. I'll get to them when it's time. Sometimes that time is right the fuck now, because it'll take like two minutes. Most of the time, however, it's an item that should be noted and earmarked for later.
Today went sideways on me. I got caught in the editing trap and stressed myself out. It feels like such a setback and wasted time, but I know it's not that simple. I am a squishy creature of habit, trying to make better habits. I'll get there.
In the meantime, one fun thing to come from my Editing Parameters, is that I have a sneak peak of my book coming for all of you! I will be putting up a preview from Chapter 2 here on my blog for all of you on Saturday!
After that, you can expect to see me talking more about the story, the universe, the characters, writing with sensitivity, and how this single novel concept spiraled into a trilogy, and from there, into a series that now has a 9 book roadmap.
Inshallah and the creek don't rise, I'm going to tell the kinds of stories I have long wanted to read.
Hello and welcome to my writing blog. I just needed a place to collect my thoughts and document my process as I make a real attempt at a career in writing books. I've been writing for over 20 years at this point and it's all I've ever really wanted to do. Between some of the comments I've started receiving on my fanfics over the past couple of years, learning what my process is by writing so much more than I ever thought possible, and hearing Nick Nocturne telling me I can do it over and over again... I really started to believe it was possible for me.
For those of you who know me, you know I'm disabled, I'm a parent of one very zippy little kiddo, and that I've recently been diagnosed with ADHD. I stay home full time, supported by my husband and partner, and I am in a place where my peripheral worries are all largely taken care of. So I don't really have much of an excuse not to go for what I've always wanted to do.
The process began in June. I told myself that this year, when my kiddo went back to school, I was going to treat writing my own work like a job and that I was going to bust my ass to get published. Since then I've written multiple outlines, reworked my project, done research, watched Brandon Sanderson's 2025 Lecture series on YouTube, and generally nuked my brain from orbit trying to absorb everything I can to help me be successful in this process.
So now it's down to getting words on paper and this is the tricky part for me, I think. I am a social creature. I need people. I want to connect, that's part of why I write. So creating all alone in a void feels pretty abysmal. The idea of just documenting the process in a blog to have something out in the world was something I thought might help me along. It has a couple of purposes.
1.) Keeping Me Accountable (A sort of Show Your Work, thing.)
2.) Making the transition from being a full time fanfic writer to a professional writer less jarring.
Over the years I've always talked about my projects on my blog or my livejournals back in the day. Sometimes I'd share snippets of writing and what I was struggling with and I always enjoyed doing that. So if you're a fan of the writing process, a fellow writer working toward the same goals, or someone who's followed me here from fan spaces, welcome in. I'm doin' a thing. Please come along with me on this ridiculous journey that I expect is going to be a long one.
You can expect at least one post a week here from me about what I've been doing, where I'm at in the process, my wins and my struggles. There might be more than that. I cannot follow back, of course, but I'm here, doin' the thing.
Please feel free to ask me questions about my work and what's going on at any time. I love talking to people. And everyone needs distraction now and again to break up the monotony of nose-to-the-grindstone work on a solo project.
Listen, I love writing. I really do. But refining ideas and distilling the messiness of a first draft into something better, more coherent, more enjoyable-- It's a killing my darlings by 1,000 cuts.
In my first draft, the first five chapters alone were 15k. Not exactly ideal. As of this afternoon, I've started on my re-write for chapter 8 and finally hit that 15k mark. And the bonkers thing here is that there are two entirely new chapters that weren't there before and the word count economy is still better.
This is what everyone means when they say "you can make it good later" but what I didn't know at the time, because I've never done this Properly before, is that making something "good later" doesn't mean everything was bad to begin with.
A lot of the things that I've had to cut from my manuscript so far were... Fine. Some of it fun, flavorful text that I liked. Cutting it away sucks unwashed ass. The thing about these sections that I've hacked off, is that they committed the singular sin of... not doing anything for the story.
Maybe they were interesting in a character study slice of life way. Maybe there were lines that could, in a vacuum, be great, but when taking a step back and looking at them objectively... They were taking up space I needed to give to something more important. Something that serves more purpose. Something that makes the story itself, better.
I have so many versions of my manuscript saved at this point I've started to lose track. I think it's 11. And then there's the print version I've slashed at with highlighters and pens. And even when I did my initial developmental editing read... I was still more generous with what I'd already written than I know I need to be.
Seeing the big picture and knowing what my story lacks has allowed me to see that some things just don't... matter. Like I want them to. The purpose I thought they served isn't the best way to do so. And these little scenes are taking up space that prevents more important relationships from developing, having room to breathe, to be seen properly on the page, so that the emotional payoff lands right when time comes for the climax.
By Chapter 8 in my first draft, I spent 21,000+ words not letting the reader see what Grant and his best friend Charlie are like together. Not giving the relationship between Grant and his sister Hope a chance to really be seen. Not taking the time to foreshadow the big moments properly.
But now, I've done that in 15,000 words and the story is better for it. I'm not wasting my reader's time with superfluous descriptions or interactions with minor characters that don't mean anything in the long run.
No. I don't need to spend a full page and a half on Grant doing his job and interacting with his boss. That shit doesn't actually matter. What I need is for Grant and Hope to have a heart to heart about Grant's decision to go no contact with their parents. What I need is for Grant and Charlie to laugh together about Charlie's hobbies. What I need is for the important things in Grant's life to be established in a way that people can connect to.
What the hell was I doing before?
Nothing bad. Just... Not the right thing.
It's painful to think about something I spent months writing being Bad. And I'm coming to learn that it's less about "the first draft is bad" and it's more like... "The first draft isn't right." The writing itself isn't bad. It just hasn't been refined into what the story needs. And I couldn't know what it needed until I'd already done it Wrong. Not bad. Just... Incorrect. Perfectly fine, but not right.
It feels like growing pains.
It sucks. But it's also... A little bit cathartic. Cleansing discomfort. Shedding the things that were holding me back to reach for the ones that will propel me forward.
It's very weird, to be so critical of my work in this way. I had a brief period of feeling really crummy about myself. But now I'm yo-yoing between excitement about the refinement of a story I want to tell, and exhausted frustration because goddamnit I have to write this whole thing again!? The elements I'm adding that make it more cohesive, better paced, more interesting? Those have me bouncing with anticipation.
At the other end of the spectrum it's a slog to look at my first draft and go "Ugh nope. That just needs to go." It's almost like building resentment for past me for being so long winded and clumsy. But it's also part of the learning process. And it'll get easier. My next first draft will be better for what I've learned this time around. And I'll learn new things when tearing it apart to get at the meat of what needs to be there.
It's a never ending process and the only way to learn is by doing.
Most Days I Love My Job but Also It's a fucking Job... Ugh.
One of the hardest parts of writing like it's a Job is the part where it is a job and I have to do it even when I don't feel like it.
YesterdayI had a serious case of the Can't Wannas. I didn't 't feel great, physically. Mentally I was checked out. And more than anything, I wanted to crawl back into bed.
Here's the thing about writing. Waiting for inspiration to strike or to be in the mood is all well and good if it's just a hobby. But waiting for inspiration, motivation, or the mood to strike is not an option when you have deadlines. You have to make your own motivation.
I have to make my own motivation.
Even if these deadlines are self imposed, I owe it to myself to take them seriously. Because this is something that deserves my dedication and sincerity. So even when I don't feel like writing at all. I write. I self-motivate.
And motivation is extremely hard for me when there's nothing but the work right now. I don't have a book deal or an audience that's itching to read what I'm working on. But I know that somewhere out there, there are people who do want to read the book I'm writing, even if they don't know about it yet. And also, I am writing this book because I want it to exist. Because it's something I want to read.
I'm lucky to have a small group of people around me who cheer me on and tell me I'm doing great. People who believe in me. I think, without them, I'd probably be grinding my face into the carpet and crawling back to hiding. It would be a lot easier to forego the reward of hard work that might go unseen or unappreciated, for the instant gratification of what's always been easy.
That's not to say that writing fanfiction is easier (In some aspects, yes it is. In others, not at all.) to work on than original fiction. But motivation is easy to find when you have people telling you they liked your update, that they can't wait to see what comes next. It's got motivation hard-baked into the experience. Though, it can still be deeply fickle because no two fandoms are alike in how much people interact, and if you're like me, you often find yourself writing something that only a niche portion of the fandom would be interested in to begin with.
Self Motivating is... A skill. One that I think is pretty achievable if you know yourself well enough to know what kinds of carrots and sticks you need and when. Yesterday, I was in a foul mood about it the whole time. Resented my computer chair. Didn't wanna do a damn thing. But. I told myself, just get it over with and then. The quality of the work doesn't matter right now, not nearly as much as getting it done does. So just put some words in the dang document.
Then! You can rot your brain on youtube. You'll be off the hook for the day. You have to make An Attempt.
I try to be reasonable with myself, because the slippery slope of Self Motivation and working from home is... Becoming a workaholic and treating yourself in ways that you'd unionize against any other boss for. I refuse to be my own over-bearing manager. More like a tough love boss who understands how hard the job is, but knows when I can do something, even if I don't want to.
I don't force myself to hit quota. But I do push myself to make the effort. I might try a few times in a day, again and again, write for a little while, languish over how I just can't wanna, take a break, come back, try it again. And some days that's just how it is. I don't get a lot done and I'm sour about it the whole time. But at least I always have something to show for it. Some words is better than none. Progress is progress.
But honestly, more often than not, that's not how my day goes. Once I put my butt in the chair and start writing, usually it's not that hard to hit that quota. It gets easier once I get over that initial hump and start doing it. Doing Something can become its own motivation to Keep Doing It. I find on the days I'm least motivated to write, when I put myself to work anyway, I actually come to it with more clarity than I do when I'm all fired up and full of inspiration.
I tend to make better technical choices when I'm checked out emotionally from the process of writing, where I'm just doing the work of writing the words that need to go in the spot so that the story does story things.
Tikatakatikataka keyboard noises go brrrr... Protip: If you're a stimmy boi like me, you might try getting a keyboard setup that you really like the sound of. That can also be motivation. Just to have a reason to hear the keys go click clack.
All this to say. I love my job. I chose it. It's all I've ever wanted to do. But it's still a fucking job and sometimes I don't wanna go to work and I have to drag my ass there anyway. (It's at the end of my bed. Such a travesty. The commute is abysmal. Also bed is right there.)
Anyway. If you're writing fanfiction, just have fun with it. Don't do this. Lol. But, if you are working on original stuff and you wanna get published, be it indie or trad publishing, treating it like a Job and giving yourself the dignity of saying as much is good for the soul. Good for the self motivation.
This is my job. I'm a writer. It's what I do. I dedicate my time, effort, and energy to it five days a week. Sometimes that job is writing when I don't want to. Other times it's updating my blog so I don't go insane. Other, other times it's scrawling notes about what I need to do in my notebook where my stream of consciousness lives. And then there's the research, the imposter syndrome, the dreaded networking I know I should probably start doing and yet I sit paralyzed, not networking, because talking to published authors is scary.
I'm taking the good with the bad.
I didn't want to write yesterday.
But I did. And I'm a little bit closer to my goal.
