Since this comes up from time to time, I’m sharing advice I offer other writers.
On Facebook, I’m in multiple writing groups.
No matter what subject or genre, there are a group of questions that come up frequently about pausing, rewriting, editing, story order, writing as a pantser vs planner, and other niggling details relevant to a completed work.
And that’s the key. Completed work. I’ve encountered multiple writers along the way who have been unable to complete their work for all kinds of reasons ranging from decision paralysis to life happenings.
Whatever question along the above line comes up, my advice is always the same – and I think bears sharing here.
The best advice I can offer other writers
Without further ado – the best advice I can offer other writers:
Just keep writing.
Please allow me to explain.
When you get caught up in niggling details, endless edits along the way, various issues of writing out of sequence, and the like – the key is to just keep writing.
Often, those issues are tied to distractions and self-sabotage.
For example – you’re working on your story and keep coming up with little edits you want to make. Nothing that changes the plot, characters, or setting in a must-fix way – just a detail here, some dialogue there, and the like.
If you stop and go back, odds are you will correct that – then find more to correct. Then even more edits occur. And before long, you’re no longer writing – you’re stuck where you left off and treading water rather than swimming to the next shore.
When you have not completed your work, the key to completing it is to just keep writing. Even when you know it will need to be edited – just keep writing.
Like Dory says often in Finding Nemo – “Just keep swimming.”
Just keep writing
It’s easy to stop what you are doing, whether you’re a new writer, an unpublished writer, a hobbyist, or a well-experienced writer. The minutia of a sentence here, a paragraph there, or a chapter along the way can overwhelm the big picture. Which means you stop writing to reach the end.
We all want the work we do to be awesome, and the best that we can make it. While living day-to-day tends to require focus on the tiny details of life, writing is about creating product and progress therein.
Often, the desire to pause and edit early in the process is a form of self-sabotage. It’s a reaction of your ego based in fear of what might come to pass – usually connected to suffering – should you finish.
It’s frequently disguised as a reasonable idea.
For example, a writer on one of the Facebook groups I’m on asked about the overall length of their work. Was it in danger of becoming too long for the given genre? Should they stop, evaluate, and adjust now before continuing?
That looks reasonable. But I assure you – it’s not. It’s a form of self-sabotage. Go down that rabbit hole, start a deep analysis of your word count related to a nebulous notion connected to a given genre – and watch as you cease the journey to the story’s end.
Just keep writing. Get to the end – and then you can go back, edit, kill your darlings, and the like.
But don’t do this before you reach the end.
Exceptions to the advice I offer other writers
Like most things – there are exceptions to this advice.
If, along the way, something occurs to drastically change the story – going back to edit might become necessary before you reach the end. And by drastically, I mean a major shift in the plot, removal or huge change of character, a shift in narrative style, changing from 1st to 3rd person perspective, and the like.
However – before you go back, you need to ask yourself this question. Does changing this now matter to my work going forward – or can it wait until I’ve finished?
Perfect example – while writing Seeker – book 1 of my Source Chronicles series – I hit a major snag about halfway in. My villain ceased to be the villain. That was a rather major sticking point. However – after a small crisis – and a chat with a good friend to screw my head back on normally – I just kept writing. The only chapter I needed to remove was the 2nd chapter- in its original format – because the character had changed.
Note – in the final edit, my first two chapters were eliminated for other reasons.
Hence, from experience, I have this advice to offer other writers. When writing, no matter what you encounter along the way – just keep writing.
Other writers have been there
Every writer I’ve ever talked to has felt the same. When in doubt, just keep writing.
Yes, you might have garbage in front of you on the page or screen. But what matters at this point is the work. As I’m editing the first Savagespace novel – before I send it off to an editor – I’ve found bits that needed to be repaired. I even went to a completely unusual tense – removed from the rest of the story – in one chapter I needed to adjust.
But I finished what I was writing first.
No matter where you are at in your work – just keep writing. That’s the best thing to do to reach the end. Because when all’s said and done – the end is what we desire to see when we’re writing something.
After we reach the end, that’s the time to deal with the niggling details, problematic parts, word counts, and whatever else needs to be edited and changed.
To get there – we need to get to the end. To get to the end what do we need to do?
Just keep writing.
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