Much of my writing advice falls under the umbrella of “shut up and write the damn thing,” so this entry will probably develop a few sequels in the future. For now, though, I’m talking about first drafts.
They will suck. They’re meant to. Accept that and write them so you can move on.
This is a trap quite a few writers, myself included, have fallen into; hmming and hahing over your first draft, trying to make it perfect when all it needs to be at this stage is done. You can spend hours agonising over…
.. Wait. Should I have used “agonising” there? Bit cliched, isn’t it? Should I say “obsessing” instead? Eh, that seems a bit flat. What about “vacillating”? Wait, do enough people know what “vacillating” means? Do I know what it means? Maybe I should look it up…
Don’t. Put the nearest word you can think of, and trust that Future You will notice if it’s wrong.
Trusting Future You is a big part of getting your first draft done. But you can do that, right? I mean, they’re you. The only difference is, they’ve done slightly more writing than you have and they’re slightly better at it.
I do keep having problems with this, because whatever I’m writing tends to percolate in my brain for a while before making it outside. This means I’m often transcribing whole passages that arrive fully-formed after bubbling away in my subconscious, so when I reach a part that isn’t already formed and that I have to compose using my actual waking brain, it can feel like rushing headlong into mental quicksand. But I’ve found over time that squirming free of that quicksand can be as simple as remembering one thing:
If you have something, you can make it better. If you don’t, you can’t.
What you need to do at the first draft stage is send your Inner Critic home for the day. His time will come. For now, you need your Inner Cheerleader. Train up the voice in your head that celebrates the act of simply making progress.
“You wrote a thousand words today? Well done you! Hey, you know what? I bet you could do it again. Then you’re ahead on tomorrow, right? Hey, you did it! You’re a star! Think you can do just a couple hundred more?”
(Important note: you may be ahead on tomorrow, but when you actually get there that word counter resets to zero. Your Inner Cheerleader’s job is to keep you writing.)
Now, doesn’t that seem a little more productive than all that obsessing (worrying? Brooding?) over a single word back there?
The point is to forget the pressure of making it good in favour of getting it done. So train that cheerleader voice, trust your future self, and remember, you’ll make it better later.
Above all, just shut up and write the damn thing.
Harriet Phoenix 