A swift kick in the ass

[Liam]

I'm at a wall.

It's been weeks since I've made substantial progress on Rockets. Sure, I've been super busy with conferences, etc at work, including three weeks of travel, but that should have been time when I could buckle down in off hours in hotel rooms by myself and crank out thousands of words.

Building off the pantser vs planner conversation earlier, what do you do if you're largely the former, with aversions to jumping ahead, but you hit a stoppage and the piece you need to get excited or back into a groove just seems to get farther and farther away?

What do you do when these dry stretches happen and what was previously unshakable confidence in and excitement for your story gets chipped away by inactivity and doubt?

What do you do to give yourself the aforementioned swift kick in the butt?

[Yicheng]

Coffee. That...usually works when all else fails. Try that and sit at a small desk with no distractions. That could usually give you at least thirty minutes worth of good writing. :)

[Mykl]

Watch Stuart Smalley videos and follow his advice.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-DIET...

[A.C.]

Liam wrote: "I'm at a wall.

It's been weeks since I've made substantial progress on Rockets. Sure, I've been super busy with conferences, etc at work, including three weeks of travel, but that should have been..."

I usually... no, there's no "usually". I do all sorts of things.

I listen to my favorite album, or songs that really get me into the groove of one particular character, or a moment in my book, or a relationship.

I start writing a scene far into the future of my book.

I just start writing everything I know about a given characters and then force myself to come up with a bunch of new things.

I try to plot. I'm terrible at plotting, but I try to do it anyway.

Oooh, here's one thing I do: I think, if this were a traditional story, what would happen? And I write down all the most cliche plot turns and character beats and relationship developments I can think of. All the stuff that's just normal for how a story goes.

Then I figure out how to NOT DO THAT. It's a fun challenge to figure out how to avoid cliches. I'm particularly interested in including cliched ideas, but using them in new and/or interesting ways. Pretty much everything has been done before (there are no new stories, etc) so I'm just trying to push myself.

Do you have your ending in mind? Where are you stuck?

[Melissa]

I've been kind of in a similar rut. I'm at the end of book 4 of my series, sort of the come down from the big action-y climactic Luke-lost-his-hand-and-Han-is-frozen-it's-all-going-to-heck-type-ending before I move to the grand finally that will be the last two books. But I've been putting it off, and when I do sit down to write I feel like all that is coming out of me is Dr. Seuss type sentences... So I try to paint, which for me can help... Usually. I listen to music that has inspired scenes already written or still to come while I paint, my mind wanders. Painting is a lot like meditation I suppose. But lately, and my crowdfunding campaign has definitely not helped, all that goes through my brain are worries, fears, and doubts, which turn to anger... And now I sound like Yoda, but instead I'm Luke pouting in the mud because my ship is stuck... I just need to unstick it. Believe in myself, ignore the dark side, move passed this whole Inkshares... thing, or the fact that none of my friends are into what I'm trying to do, and even more importantly, believe in my story. Other than my family it's what I am most passionate about. So I think of that, watch a movie that inspires me, which sometimes helps me come up with new ideas and scenes, and then crank the music and imagine it being the soundtrack to my story and just... watch it start to take shape. Sometimes it's even something great!
Anyway... That's what I do...

[Liam]

Cara wrote: "...Do you have your ending in mind? Where are you stuck?"

I've definitely got an ending in mind. I already know my last scene, and the major beats in the story between here and there, but I'm just wading through some transitional muck. I'm nearing the end of another relatively important set piece, which for some reason has just been really tough to get through.

I've stepped back a few times and evaluated if it's necessary, since one's first instinct would be to say that if it's hard to write it would be hard to read, but there's a bunch of pieces that this segment moves into place.

I just find that since I'm definitely more of a linear writer, I'm just unable to leap ahead to a new piece, but also am just banging my head on the wall of this portion's wrap-up.

I've been telling myself all the things you should: just write now to edit later, don't second-guess too hard, etc. I'm just wondering how others deal with this sort of, well, not exactly "block", but more "drag".

[Melissa]

Sometimes what I do, is I just start writing. I pick a character's POV, start describing the setting and start thinking of the situation from their point of view. Sometimes it is thoughts in their head, sometimes it's through dialogue, but it's a recap of sorts. It helps me focus on the main plot points and the way they might describe them. If they are trying to sort through a particular conflict, it helps to figure out how the character feels about, what they think they need to do to solve it, what they know they have to do, but maybe refuse to do it for certain reasons, and how they would handle where they are at now, and how they themselves would move forward. All of this might or might not get used for the actual story unless the scene ends up becoming quite dynamic, but often things happen or connections are made that wouldn't have happened if I hadn't gotten into the characters head like this. I often surprise myself. The best way to get unstuck is to just write through it, a few times if you have to until it starts to flesh out and make sense. I write linearly too, and I won't write upcoming scenes until I'm there. Sometimes just free-writing and describing the setting is enough to get focused. Try a few things... Change it several times if you must, but eventually something will fall into place ;)

[♠ TABI⁷ ♠]

I've been having a little bit of the same problem with a story of mine, where the transitional phasing between important scenes is just giving me so much grief. But the technique I've found is to step away for a little, sort it out in my mind, and then I've had to go back and shuffle scenes around so the transitioning is smoother and feels (and reads) less than a "Oh I HAVE to write this, but I really don't like it" part into something that actually feels like it adds to the story.

But if I'm stuck on a story, I just leave it alone and write something completely unrelated for a little bit. Get something to eat (I've had times where my lack of imagination was due to my brain being focused on being hungry). Drink some coffee. Read a book. Basically, give my brain a rest and then come back with a fresh, rested perspective and I've found things come a lot easier after a little break.

[Kelsey]

I have a couple of things that help.
For writers block I force myself to sit down and start listing off all the ideas I have for what I want to write (like how a scene should go or where a character should be headed). I find once you start doing that to idea that you start going into more and more detail is the one your really interested in. You just need to flush out all the other ideas swimming around to get to it.

For just getting yourself moving I have a method that almost always works for me but it's part of a process. When I'm writing my first step is the write the very basic form of events and dialogue by hand. It's messing and horrible but it's gets in down into reality and out of your head. Then I take the time writing the first serious draft on the computer. What works to get me in the right mind frame is reading over my hand written notes again.

Also you just have to hammer in the fact that sometimes (alot of the time) it won't come easy. It's a grind, a completely nightmarish grind.

Last thing. Don't worry to much on the first draft. You can fix it later.

[Bekki]

I have always been a non-linear writer. If the muse strikes me to try and tackle a scene I've planned, but comes much later in the book, I write it. I do this especially when what I have managed to link together chronologically has me blocked. That way I am always writing. The hard part comes in filling in the blanks, and keeping things cohesive. Or worse, the inevitable realization that something already written and fleshed out won't work anymore later in the story by the time I get to it.

Honestly, I probably have over half of Proxy written, plotted, or at least planned, just not in any kind of chronological order, and there are gaps in places between parts in the book. Part of the reason I have sought out a great writing group is just to have other writers to bounce ideas off, especially if they already write sci-fi, fantasy, or historical- all genres you could call my book- because I need people who creatively think like I do. Where I live is like a Writer's Wasteland.

[Billy]

One of the easiest and best things I've done lately is to talk about the book with someone who didn't know it even existed before. It's new all over again to them, and oftentimes their surprise and enthusiasm reminds me of what made me excited about it in the first place, and that kickstarts my motivation. (Added bonus: It reminds me that others understand what I'm enthusiastic about, and that I'm not putting this out in the world for nothing.)

This applies to the creative process, in that (at least for me) it made me feel less like I was in a silo doing this for myself. But I find it also helps during this extremely uncomfortable part of the process where I have to be my own salesperson. Sometimes, when action is slow, it feels dreary and you just get tired of making the same pitch and even tired of your own project in general. When I seek out someone who doesn't yet know about it and catch them by surprise, it completely turns my energy level around.