You Don't Have to Take All Writing Advice

Pinterest has begun emailing me meme suggestions I could post on one of my boards or whatever they're called (I'm not a big Pinterest consumer, so I'm unclear on the lingo). And all the memes are the same things a writer is told ad nauseam, many of which I don't buy into.

Here are a few:

Don't worry about the writing. Just get that damn draft onto the page. Spill it all out. You can worry about the writing later.

This is like telling a mathematician, don't worry if your calculations are incorrect. You can always go back and fix them later. 

Writing is supposedly what we do. We're not reciting campfire stories. "No, wait. Let me go back. I lost my train of...oh, I'll just start over." If I have so little regard for my work that I'm fine with slopping words onto a page, why am I writing at all?

I'm not claiming there aren't times when I know a passage isn't perfect that I don't leave it alone and move on. I've done it, but that's the exception. I'm not a slow writer because I'm a slow thinker; it's because I work to get it right the first time.

Writing involves more than getting the story down. Good writing has an elegance and a flow. If I go back to a bunch of choppy bits and try to fix them, I won't come away with elegance, and I'll for sure abandon any flow. 

Write every day.

Do I have to? What if I don't feel like writing? If I skip a day, will I forget how? 

While I'm entirely on board with the notion that the more one writes, the better they get (it's a proven fact), forcing oneself to write every day, regardless of circumstances or lack of desire strikes me as sort of sadistic. Writing isn't supposed to be a punishment. Maybe tomorrow I'll write some fantastic passages, whereas today, when I don't feel like writing, I'm going to type out a bunch of crap that I'll end up backspacing and deleting.

Don't get me wrong; having discipline is important, but not discipline for the sake of discipline. When I was writing my current novel, I had three days a week when I was able to write--strike that; when I scheduled myself to write. I could have written every day, but I also had a life. Those off days didn't mean I stopped being a writer. I often though up plot points I would aim to write the next time. I say, "aim to write" because sometimes ideas sound better in your head than they do in execution. 

Start with an outline.

There are no official statistics available, but I'm guessing the number of authors who are plotters is a bit higher than that of pantsers discovery writers. ("Pantser" is such an ugly term for a writing process.) Personally, I would quit writing if I was forced to outline. Where's the spontaneity in that? Stumbling upon an exciting idea is when the fun happens. I can point to countless plotlines in my books that never (trust me) would have been written had I planned the story out in advance. The old saying, "you had to be there" applies. My main character is going along, lah-dee-dah, when BAM! Something totally crazy happens. 

I'm not saying don't start with an outline; just don't box yourself in just because someone told you to. You are you, and you know what works for you; not for Hortense Vanderplatt down the block. (I personally think Hortense is kind of a crackpot anyway.)

 

These are the three cliched writing tips that I see the most, which probably originated with people who don't write stories, just "advice" on how to write stories. Don't hesitate to comment with other ubiquitous tips, and we'll talk about them in a subsequent post. New writers especially want to approach writing the "correct way" and are full of self-doubt.

Learn to trust yourself.