Thursday 5 January 2012

Getting Started

I am new to writing and I hope I'm not be too presumptious to tackle the nasties that accompany writing.  Anyway, having one book up on Amazon, I'm no longer a newbie and will take the plunge.  We writers have to pay our dues. 

What I mean by that is we have to go through the nasties and take our tumbles into the various traps all writers tumble into at one time or another, the chief of which, in my own experience, is self-doubt.  The talk runs something like this:  will the plot hold water?  are the characters real?  what will the readers think if I do this or that?  Have I done enough research? 

You get the picture.  So, I circumvent my way around the first hurtle by ignorning the self-doubt and pushing on.  Then comes the second one - this has been done before, it's not original enough, it will put readers to sleep which is fine if they happen to be insomoniacs.  This is the point where I test the waters with writer friends and my trusted readers.  What do you think, I ask, will it hold water?  And, trust is the ultimate word here, they always come back with the truth whether it hurts or not.  If its okay, I push on, if not I begin to re-twig. 

I believe I am not alone in this.  I've read enough blogs to know other writers go through the same thing - a few variations, no doubt, but you get the picture.  So, if you are a new writer (I'm on my second book) I feel for you.  There's a lot of work to be done.  But knowing it is half the battle so, go on, go for it, for one thing I know, many people attempt to write and the majority (believe it or not) start but don't finish. 

Perserve new writers and you will get there.  I tell myself this every time I sit in front of the blank page.  Good luck with your project. 

2 comments:

  1. Yes, the correct response to self-doubt is to sweetly say to it "please leave me be for awhile - I know you are just my fear speaking but I'm going to push on regardless" or sometimes to shout out loud "I'm scared and I'm going to do it anyway"
    I'm revising my third book, my second still needs to be finished and my first is going nowhere but it is done. How we learn to write is by writing. that's all.

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  2. You know of what you speak for what you say is so true. we learn to write by writing. Self-doubt will come and we need to learn to handle it. Congrats on all the books you have written - revising the third! Good luck with all of them - it takes time to get them out to the readers but they will find them.

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