Striking While the Muse is Hot
One bit of advice I've gotten, applied, internalized and have no problem repeating is 'don't wait for the muse.' Just write. The key to finishing a book is consistency, not fits and starts of inspired prose or whatever. Even when it's not working, you have to try; maybe it'll unclog something or get the juices flowing, or at the very least you'll have something to refine that will engage your critical brain. You can't wait until you 'feel like it' or have a perfect moment of inspiration.
Because when you do, when you have a real, genuine moment of perfectly envisioning something that just comes to you out of nowhere, it's a race to get it out before it falls apart or evaporates. No matter what you're doing or when, you have to get it out as fast as possible. Can you really write whole book that way?
The one I just had was so fleeting that I couldn't string the ideas together coherently fast enough when I was trying to record them. Like, the process of converting it into language that I would be able to understand later was too slow. I was having the thoughts faster than I could put into language, and trying to make sentences was using up too much of my brain to keep the ideas coming. In the end I had to cobble together a pale shadow of the idea I'd had; it was like trying to transcribe a dream.
It was a character moment, the first really deep, incisive one I've had for the particular pairing I'm working with right now, and I want to say it was glorious, but it was so fleeting. I was there with them in a way I haven't been yet, and it was both validating and frustrating. It told me that I might actually be on the right track with these two, that there's something there between them, but it was a visual, emotional moment. Putting it into words was almost a distraction, as necessary as it also was. On top of that, I wasn't even writing at the time! I was doing something completely separate when the lightning struck.
I've had several moments of perfect clarity like this over the eight books I've written, but they are few and far between, and you can't count on them. Sometimes it's a flash like this one was, and others can be like turbo version of a flow state, where the ideas are coming faster than you can make them into words while you're writing. My brain can't do both simultaneously unless it comes out in the form of prose. Most often I see and feel it, and the transcription can strip some of the magic away.
But I never look a gift muse in the mouth! I'm grateful for all of these moments, and the validation is usually the part that sticks with me in the end. They're like little sparks that get kicked off when I'm on the right track, and encourage me to keep going.
And like other things that run on tracks, they don't react to stopping and starting very well. They might even be slow to start, but once they do it's much simpler to keep them going.
Just remember, you're the conductor. The muse is those dynamite log things Doc Brown used in Back to the Future III. Only working together can make the train fly.
Because when you do, when you have a real, genuine moment of perfectly envisioning something that just comes to you out of nowhere, it's a race to get it out before it falls apart or evaporates. No matter what you're doing or when, you have to get it out as fast as possible. Can you really write whole book that way?
The one I just had was so fleeting that I couldn't string the ideas together coherently fast enough when I was trying to record them. Like, the process of converting it into language that I would be able to understand later was too slow. I was having the thoughts faster than I could put into language, and trying to make sentences was using up too much of my brain to keep the ideas coming. In the end I had to cobble together a pale shadow of the idea I'd had; it was like trying to transcribe a dream.
It was a character moment, the first really deep, incisive one I've had for the particular pairing I'm working with right now, and I want to say it was glorious, but it was so fleeting. I was there with them in a way I haven't been yet, and it was both validating and frustrating. It told me that I might actually be on the right track with these two, that there's something there between them, but it was a visual, emotional moment. Putting it into words was almost a distraction, as necessary as it also was. On top of that, I wasn't even writing at the time! I was doing something completely separate when the lightning struck.
I've had several moments of perfect clarity like this over the eight books I've written, but they are few and far between, and you can't count on them. Sometimes it's a flash like this one was, and others can be like turbo version of a flow state, where the ideas are coming faster than you can make them into words while you're writing. My brain can't do both simultaneously unless it comes out in the form of prose. Most often I see and feel it, and the transcription can strip some of the magic away.
But I never look a gift muse in the mouth! I'm grateful for all of these moments, and the validation is usually the part that sticks with me in the end. They're like little sparks that get kicked off when I'm on the right track, and encourage me to keep going.
And like other things that run on tracks, they don't react to stopping and starting very well. They might even be slow to start, but once they do it's much simpler to keep them going.
Just remember, you're the conductor. The muse is those dynamite log things Doc Brown used in Back to the Future III. Only working together can make the train fly.
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