Thoughts on Writing
I'm working on finishing my story I started for National Novel Writing Month last November. I fell off of writing it for a while, but I've picked it back up in recent months. I'm up to just over 61k words. I really want to finish the story. I'm curious about how it will end. That may sound odd since I'm the author, but I mean it. That often happens when I write. I refer to it as "stories writing themselves". A lot of the time I'll have a broad, overarching idea of what I want to happen in m story. Say, a character will start at point A, go to point B, and finally end up at point C. But how exactly does the character get from A to B and B to C? Those are the things I don't plan out. Here's an example from the the story I'm writing. I knew my main character was going to travel from her small village to the capital city to take music lessons. But how was she going to get there? Walk? Ride? Was she going to meet anyone along the way? Will she got straight to the capital or stop somewhere? Will she get lost? And what about when she arrives? How's she going to go about finding music lessons? So, while I know where I ultimately want my character to end up and what will ultimately happen I don't know all the details about exactly how it will happen.
These might seem like crucial points in the story, and it might seem odd that I don't plan them out. That's how I've always written though. I just write details as I go along. Often when I'm writing an idea will come up that just seems to fit the situation or the character. The story itself can also add more details. They'll come to me while I'm writing. Last evening I was working on my story. I knew the very next thing I wanted me character to do was go down to the kitchen to eat dinner. I wrote a little over 1000 words last night, and my character had just set out for the kitchen. Despite what I had planned details came to my mind when I started writing. I know other people who write and plan out all sorts of details about their stories in advance, but I just don't think that would work for me.
Another thing I've decided now that I'm working on my story again is that I'm not going to beat myself up if I don't work on it enough or even at all for a little bit. Sometimes I feel guilty because I don't write much one day or even at all. A questions finally hit me: why? Seriously, why? I'm not on a deadline for anyone. I don't have anyone waiting for me to finish so they can read my story. This doesn't mean I can just ignore my story for days and weeks on end. If I did that I'd never finish. However if I write little or nothing for a few days? No big deal. Things happen.
These might seem like crucial points in the story, and it might seem odd that I don't plan them out. That's how I've always written though. I just write details as I go along. Often when I'm writing an idea will come up that just seems to fit the situation or the character. The story itself can also add more details. They'll come to me while I'm writing. Last evening I was working on my story. I knew the very next thing I wanted me character to do was go down to the kitchen to eat dinner. I wrote a little over 1000 words last night, and my character had just set out for the kitchen. Despite what I had planned details came to my mind when I started writing. I know other people who write and plan out all sorts of details about their stories in advance, but I just don't think that would work for me.
Another thing I've decided now that I'm working on my story again is that I'm not going to beat myself up if I don't work on it enough or even at all for a little bit. Sometimes I feel guilty because I don't write much one day or even at all. A questions finally hit me: why? Seriously, why? I'm not on a deadline for anyone. I don't have anyone waiting for me to finish so they can read my story. This doesn't mean I can just ignore my story for days and weeks on end. If I did that I'd never finish. However if I write little or nothing for a few days? No big deal. Things happen.