Getting STUCK and Strategies to Cope

[Boneman]

Originally Posted by Teresa Edgerton

Does anyone believe that someone can write 10,000 words a day and still take time to edit? Can you really, in those few minutes of planning that she advocates, figure out how to express what you want to say in the best words possible? It sounds highly unlikely to me. If she accomplishes it, then she must indeed be some kind of "freaky genius." And if that is the case, I don't think that any of us who aren't geniuses need feel bad about not matching her output.



How long have you been using this method? Have you written anything and had a chance to review it later in terms of its quality?

I'm not aiming at 10,000 words, never done 10,000 words, have no intention of doing 10,000 words - I'm just using the exercise to stimulate creativity, and it's working very well at removing the 'blocks' and I'm continuing to write at my own pace. (3000 words a day is a good day) Which is why I posted it here, not for the word output, but for the creative exercise...

[Teresa Edgerton]

I'm sorry, but there seems to be a disconnect in our communication here.

You can't really be saying that typing faster enables one to write clean drafts faster, can you?

If you aren't interested in publication, why would it matter how long it takes you to reach the end of a book? Isn't it the journey that matters in those circumstances, not just arriving at a set time?

And while publication might not be your goal, somehow I think Ms. Aaron's advice was aimed at professionals and aspiring professionals.

A writer can only produce what they are capable of.

Yet a writer can always strive to become better, and I really don't think that involves the rate one can spit words out onto the page.

When I was starting out, I could write more words in a day. I was younger then, and my standards were not so high. By the time my first book was published, I had raised my standards considerably through subsequent drafts. But after publishing ten books after that one, I am still trying to improve. I hope I will always be trying to improve. When I am no longer working harder and harder to become better and better, then I might as well give up. It will have become a meaningless exercise.

But if it is all about WPM, and how quickly my fingers can move, then I might as well take a refresher course in typing and leave it at that.

[Boneman]

Erm... I assume that was a posting that crossed, or I'm very confused.

[The Judge]

Undoubtedly crossed posts, Boneman, so you can remove that dazed look from your features...


And as I'm here, just a gentle reminder -- and I'm as guilty as anyone -- that the topic under discussion is what strategies we can employ to get ourselves unstuck when we are stuck.

[Yog-Sothoth]

I pretend I'm not stuck at all, and excuse my lack of writing on being busy with something else. I'm still an unpublished writer, so none of the deadlines that published authors have to deal with plague me, hence if for some reason I don't feel like touching my WIP for a week, I don't psycho-analyse it, but live life doing something else, while continuing world-building subconciously.

Usually I get an avalanche of creativity afterwards, and I secretly thank myself for not forcing myself to write in the period I was "stuck" - it was meant to be kind of thing - for the story would have gone a different direction, a less satisfying one.

[Stephen Palmer]

I can't remember which author said this, but the best advice I ever read about getting stuck and getting back on track was, "If you're stuck, don't rewrite - imagine it better."

That one's lasted me for years of writing...

[HareBrain]

Getting stuck is very different from (what I would call) writer's block. One is not knowing how to pull your foot out of the mud without losing your boot, the other is being sucked into the depths of a bog for weeks or months, and gawd knows what the answer to that is, if there is one.

I'd agree with Yog-Sothoth that the best cure for stuckness is taking a break, if you can afford it, or even if you can't. I've often found very sticky plot conundra solved when I've been in the bath or gazing blankly out of a coffee-shop window. Also, writing when you're tired of it is soul-sapping.

Another tip is to talk it through with a friend, even if they know nothing about the book (as long as they're vaguely interested, or perhaps asleep). Several times I've found a solution, which should have been obvious but which had eluded me for days, just by talking about the problem aloud.

I often find myelf getting stuck by the most trivial things. For the last three days I've been struggling to overcome inertia in order to write a linking passage describing how the characters get from one place to another -- a passage that turned out to be one short paragraph. The inertia was caused by not knowing in advance how I could make that paragraph interesting, and therefore by not wanting to write it. I suspect the answer to that is to skip it and go back later -- or to find a place to write with no distractions -- but I seem resistant to such sensible advice for some reason.

[AnyaKimlin]

Originally Posted by Stephen Palmer

I can't remember which author said this, but the best advice I ever read about getting stuck and getting back on track was, "If you're stuck, don't rewrite - imagine it better."

That one's lasted me for years of writing...

Actually that is usually the cause of me being stuck - rewriting the immediate chapter makes it better and often takes the story in a new direction.

Stuck is often a wrong turning.

[Coragem]

Originally Posted by Stephen Palmer

I can't remember which author said this, but the best advice I ever read about getting stuck and getting back on track was, "If you're stuck, don't rewrite - imagine it better."

That one's lasted me for years of writing...

One advantage of my "slow" writing approach is that I have plenty of time for imagining! If I keep going back to a scene over several days I keep coming back with new, exciting ideas. If I wrote the scene in a day and moved on it'd lack many things.

That said, if like me it is often a case of being stuck for words, knowing what I want to say but not knowing how to say it, I think writing is often the solution. Words = more words; seeing words appearing on the screen can be a stimulus for ideas and creativity. I.e., ideas may not appear from a vacuum.

Coragem.

P.S., No one has commented on my earlier post, on "what makes good writing". If you've seen it, fine. If not, take a look. I'm not (yet) a super famous author (so far as you know), yet I'm terribly clever** and I think people can learn from my observations there.

(**Only half kidding, lol)

[Hex]

Originally Posted by Coragem

P.S., No one has commented on my earlier post, on "what makes good writing". If you've seen it, fine. If not, take a look. I'm not (yet) a super famous author (so far as you know), yet I'm terribly clever** and I think people can learn from my observations there.

(**Only half kidding, lol)

I haven't commented on it (or read it) because I can't find it! I'd love to know what makes good writing, though.

[Coragem]

Originally Posted by Hex

I haven't commented on it (or read it) because I can't find it! I'd love to know what makes good writing, though.

Post number 28, on page 2 of this thread

Just a few lines: I'm not claiming that it expresses and encompasses the full sum of what makes good writing.

Coragem.