What is your writing process. I mean like, for example when I write I write down like a single paragraph, make one mistake, start again, make the paragraph good then lose all creativity. How do you write?
Excellent question.
I have no goddamn idea.
I mean, let me think about it. I would say that what usually happens is that I get a scene in my head and however long it plays out–from a ficlet to an actual novel–I just write what I see in my head. Sometimes the whole thing is there and sometimes it’s just fragments, but whatever is present gets written down and then read maybe 2-3 times and saved for later. I typically sleep on it and then wake up the next day, read it again, and then can tell if it’s good or if it’s just total nonsense to be left alone.
Creativity is tricky. I just get in certain moods to write and that’s when I bang out most of my stuff. For example, (TMI warning) I was seriously PMS-ing so bad yesterday that I had a day-long headache and nausea so intense that I had to call out at work, and yet my brain said, “Hey, I know how Chapter 8 begins and ends, so go write it down.” In spite of the horrible pain, I did indeed sit here and write 4,783 words for my upcoming novella. And that’s after not writing a new chapter on this novella for 11 straight days. The writing process is random for everyone and it’s not just you, trust me.
Since I’m just a small prawn indie author, I’m allowed to not write every day, though I do always proofread/edit daily. I typically write one book a year, but sometimes I write two books for whatever reason. It’s an ongoing thing, much like a music composer. Stories are constantly flowing through my head, and I write them when the lyrics are loudest. I can force myself to write, but usually it ends up being crap, and so I wait until I have most of a scene in my head before I proceed. It’s the same with the fanfiction you’ll see me post here and there: I wait until I have something I feel is interesting enough to pursue and then I write it. I’m not a daily writer. I’m a weekly writer. It comes in huge chunks or not at all. That’s why I can’t write original short stories. I can do in-canon vignettes or drabbles, but not true brief fiction.
Please don’t be hard on yourself. If this job were easy, everyone would do it. Find your most productive hours and moods and use those. For instance, I’m a daytime writer. As soon as the sun goes down, my brain pretty much shuts off and can’t think of anything, with the exception of fanfiction that I occasionally pen at night. Figure out when your ideas flow smoothly and that’s when you work your magic and get your creativity going. Every writer is different.
For you specifically, it sounds like maybe you shouldn’t edit the same time you write new material because it’s quite easy to talk yourself out of it and erase what you’ve written. That’s why I mostly edit the day after I’ve written something, so that it has time to sink in and I can examine its quality.
Don’t despair! You can do it! Just find your methods and stick to them.
