WRITING EVEN WHEN YOU DON’T FEEL LIKE IT
How to Conquer Resistance and Finish Your Story
If your goal is to wait until inspiration and creativity strike, you may be waiting for the rest of your life. I used to try and wait for inspiration and I wound up not writing a single thing for three years.
Back when I was in college I started my first screenplay. I was in school studying civil and environmental engineering and so I spent my days employing the left side of my brain. It was very difficult to switch back after all of my physics and calculus induced brain freezes. I was writing a story that had come to me one day while watching Law & Order. It was heavy subject matter and kind of required that I get into the zone.
My lack of “inspiration” caused me to give up on the script once I finished the first draft, and it definitely needed some more loving. It wasn’t until 2017 that I started writing again. And I haven’t stopped since. Looking back on what caused me to avoid writer’s block all this time, I’ve come up with three ways to stop waiting on magical inspiration to fall from the sky.
#1 Develop a plan for what to do when your story’s done
Going back to the script I mentioned before, once I finished that first draft, I had planned on giving it to Tyler Perry. In my newbie mind, I thought he’d hand me half a million for my screenplay and then pay me to direct it. First draft then immediate success. As delusional as I was, I didn’t even know where to start with getting my script to Tyler. And thank God, because that script was hardly ready for studio executive eyes. My lack of an executable plan paralyzed me.
It can feel daunting to spend so much time working on something that may never see the light of day. When you’re writing you must have some kind of end goal in mind. So in order to keep yourself going and hammer out that first draft, and the subsequent drafts, you can use these GOALS to keep yourself focused.
Take your writing to workshops where it can be read outloud and you can hear immediate feedback
Find festivals & competitions that offer exciting prizes and then plan to submit your stories to them
Film a trailer version of your story in order to see if it has an exciting premise and set-up
For novels, you could self-publish or release your writing as an ebook
#2 Write about something that excites you
Personally the idea of writing some melodramatic story gives me immediate writer’s block. I don’t seek out those kinds of movies to watch and I definitely don’t want to write one. My writing flow didn’t come until I chose to write things that excite me.
Not only can one genre be more exciting than others, certain portions of your story can be too. If you’re really amped up to write the inciting incident that propels your story into motion, then skip the rest and write that! Eventually you’ll have to go back and bridge the gap between the two, but for now, the most important thing is that you write SOMETHING.
If there’s a character you really like, then make the story about them. That way you get to explore their voice, their choices, their most intimate desires. And they‘ll be able to propel your story in the most interesting way because you like them and you want to see what happens in their life.
Lastly, if you’re a visual person and you see the aesthetics of your story first, then write out the descriptions of that gorgeous scene. Then go back and create the story line that leads us to this destination. Figure out who the people are that would be in this place and how they got to be in this particular situation.
#3 Change your story if it seems like it might be stupid
Your characters are doing things for seemingly no reason, there’s not enough purpose in their goal, your plot points are anticlimactic, or stuff just doesn’t make sense. There are a million things that can be wrong with your script and they all aid in causing writer’s block.
It’s pointless to get stuck on half a story for the sake of avoiding change when you can start over and finish it fully in half the time. If you find that there are gaping holes in your story, don’t ignore them. They won’t go away. They’ll whisper in your ear and make you think you don’t know what you’re doing, when in fact, your story is just a little stupid. But everyone’s story starts off a little stupid… so hope is not lost! It can totally be fixed! But how?
You can start by listening to your own intuitions. Write a list of reasons why you don’t want to write. Then write out all of the elements in your story that seem stupid. Now brainstorm like crazy until you figure out how to fix these issues!
After you’ve heard what yourself has to say, you should branch out and hear what your peers have to say. You do this by pitching your story out loud to people.
1st - choose people that are interested in the genre you’re pitching
2nd - choose people that are not afraid to hurt your feelings
3rd - Use whatever social skills you have to gauge their reactions and note where they lose interest
4th - When they tell you what’s wrong, don’t argue (You asked them for help for a reason)
And finally, don’t automatically do what they tell you to do to fix it. They know there’s something wrong - and they’re right - but they don’t know your vision or the characters inside of your head - so they don’t know how to fix it. Also, people are boring and come up with the most generic ways to fix story holes
These are the methods that I’ve been using to keep myself going. I am definitely not a writing guru, and I’m still working towards seeing my career goals fulfilled, but I have figured out how to keep writing.
~I’m still waiting on someone to hand me that 500K for my screenplay :-) ~
Finally, if adding these steps to your to-do list gives you loads of anxiety, then there’s help! I specialize in bringing stories to life. Whether you have a snibbit of an idea, a full back story, or you’ve finished something and are nervous to get it out there, I can help you make magic. Anyone can give you a book or an e-learning course, but not everyone can offer face-to-face one-on-one story consultation. Hush Girl Productions can and will do all of these things for you;
I’ll organize a plan for your brainstorming, your writing, and your plan for what to do with your story when it’s done.
I offer story mapping compiled from expert books like Save The Cat and Syd Field’s Screenplay as well as high quality planning from UCLA professors
You’ll realize the benefit of talking about your story out loud with someone who cares
And if you have an idea, but don’t want to write at all, I can write the entire thing for you!