writerly ways and a pimp

[cornerofmadness]

Honestly, today’s writerly ways brings nothing more than the idea of sitting down and finishing something. I am terrible at this sometimes. I can find a thousand different things to do, every one nothing more than a time waster. I can’t even tell you why. I want to write stories. I want to finish them. I want other people to read and enjoy them (well hopefully).

So why do I not finish things? One, I know is because I’m easily distracted by the newest shinest thing (most often the newest character to jump up and say ME ME ME). Two, I hate to say goodbye to my characters (but I’ve blogged about this one before) Three, I think I’m just lazy sometimes.

In the end I think we need to find out how it is we write and what motivates us to write. In that, we have the means to figure out how to get something done. For instance, I know I am a goal-oriented person. Witness Nano. I never have failed to make it to the finish line. So why can’t I do this the other 11 months of the year. Why do I have a half dozen unfinished nanos? (one of which is so close to finish I could probably do it in a night provided I just reread where I left off…)

Stephen King suggested make a word count goal for yourself per day. This doesn’t work for everyone naturally. Others like to do the ‘morning papers’ just to get something down. Me, I think I’d like the word count goal. I’m not sure yet what would be appropriate but I’m going to consider ir. I’m not sure what I’m going to do if I meet my goals. It better not be food or drink since I’ll be even fatter (and probably drunk) if I do. Maybe I’ll be better off with a punishment system. Write 300 words of original fiction daily or you have to dust something in this house. Hmmmm that could work.

Thoughts? How do you drive yourself to finish?

I DID finish my story, A Wolf in the Fold for Circlet Press’s Like Heaven or Hell anthology. It might be too dark in places but I finished it. I sent it in (with only days to spare). Now to finish my space pirate story (at least I have til May on that one. Bless Dreamspinner press and their open calls with lots of time to write. Btw go check them out. They have their entire year’s worth of open calls up).

I did promise I would pimp writers_toybox but leni_ba did it so much better than I would have so I shall just link you to hers right here. It is geared to Jossverse stuff but some of it will be far more universal.

In the fandom side of things, I finished eight or nine of my prompts and nearly have one more finished (it would be finished if I had seen it was supposed to be riza/roy not roy/riza and since I don’t know this person they might actually care about the order). I’ve made no progress on either big bang. Damn it.

Yearly word count –

12239 / 125000 words. 10% done!

Saiyuki Big Bang (let’s see if shame at no progress will motivate me)

9145 / 15000 words. 61% done!


FMA Big Bang (technically I’m over my 21K that I needed to get to so I bumped it up to 28K since that might be about where it ends up)

23845 / 28000 words. 85% done!

Comments

[enemytosleep]

I tend to do better with shame and boastful posting when it comes to finishing things (shame for not finishing, boastful posts for ego stroking hen I do). I also get great satisfaction from ticking things off of To Do lists, so you'd think I'd do them more often. XD

[cornerofmadness.livejournal.com]

haha, checklists are also a good way to go. My Springkink checklist is keeping me going. now if i could only do them in order and not by whichever couple gets the horniest

[bob_fish.livejournal.com]

Horror of the unfinished WIP and the need to get to the finish line motivates me. Signing up for things and accountability helps - I sometimes talk over my to do list with enemy and she is good at badgering me.

Posting or sending helps. My trouble with academic writing can be endlessly fiddling, so getting a 'good enough' draft and sending it to a friend for a read-through helps keep me moving. I need to have aims in mind.

[cornerofmadness.livejournal.com]

badgering helps me. that's half of why i put this stuff out there. POKE ME

Oh god I am a fiddler. The good thing about circlet's very short writing frame is I don't get to be a fiddler

[bob_fish.livejournal.com]

poke poke poke

For me it's easy not to fiddle too much with fandom stuff because it's so much less pressurised. As soon as it's anything where I feel it's going to be judged, I get fiddly. Which is when having hard deadlines helps!

[cornerofmadness.livejournal.com]

well yes i definitely fiddle more with my original fiction for the same reason

waah hides from the poke.

[bob_fish.livejournal.com]

But you said you wanted to be poked!

poke poke poke

[cornerofmadness.livejournal.com]

I LIED.

pokes back

[enemytosleep]

Weight off post?

*poke*

[cornerofmadness.livejournal.com]

I'm getting there. I promise. I had to make up an instrument of torture an exam for tomorrow.

everyone is poking me and and RL says ignore the poke. Better yet poke back. poke poke.

[enemytosleep]

*pokes*

[cornerofmadness.livejournal.com]

waaaah. pokes pokes pokes

(also big bang derailed for the moment because roy is demanding sex for SK)

[evil-little-dog.livejournal.com]

I hate the word count goals on a daily basis, though I understand the need behind it. And it kind of keeps me "on" during Nano, at least.

Not sure what would reward me for finishing goals, personally.

[cornerofmadness.livejournal.com]

yes I'm sure daily writing goals won't work for everyone though one thing the pros all agree on is we need to do something every day and have some kind of goal. What that goal is will be something we all have to figure out for ourselves. Apparently me and silvrethorn public shaming works

[evil-little-dog.livejournal.com]

I try to write at least a scene of something every day. Even if it's not 1,300 words or whatever.

[cornerofmadness.livejournal.com]

it just about amounts to the same thing with jus a slightly different goal

[evil-little-dog.livejournal.com]

Yes, this is true.

[scribesds.livejournal.com]

Thanks for the Writer's Toybix pimp, Dana - very kind of you.

Good luck with your writing projects, I hope you find your proper motivation.

[cornerofmadness.livejournal.com]

thank you very much. I probably will end up joining up once my life calms down just a tiny bit

[silvrethorn.livejournal.com]

I'd like to establish a 500-word daily goal for myself, but like you, I only seem to write anything when there is the possibility of public shame and failure involved, i.e. NaNo. 100 words a day seems to be a more realistic goal for me (I figure writing a novel one paragraph per day beats not writing one at all). Stephen King probably has a 10,000-word daily goal, so I'm not going to use him as a guide. Then again, Stephen King (a) doesn't have a day job and (b) probably doesn't cook for the family. (If we had maids and no outside distractions, would we write more, or would we just waste more time playing on the Internet? I don't know, but I'd sure like the chance to find out.)

[cornerofmadness.livejournal.com]

hahaha public shame is a good motivator for the likes of me. have no doubt

actually I think his goal was very small like 100 words (or was that 1000) but yes this IS his day job.

you and me both.I still plan on winning that lottery (as it's probably my only hope)

[evil-little-dog.livejournal.com]

Winning the lottery is a nice dream. Need to start playing again to win, though.

[cornerofmadness.livejournal.com]

yeah i keep forgetting that part

[evil-little-dog.livejournal.com]

Surely I can scrape together a dollar a week....

[cornerofmadness.livejournal.com]

yeah like i said it's that memory thing...

[evil-little-dog.livejournal.com]

Definitely.

[robertlyon.livejournal.com]

I used to focus on word count. I don't like that now because it doesn't factor in editing. I guess it depends on when you like to edit. For me, I have to edit as I go along, and so if I limit my focus to daily word count, I'll fail most times. In fact, I've shifted so far away from the word count tally, that I don't even pay attention to it now.

I am averaging 33 hours a week writing (which includes editing, and by editing I am making that a generic term for any form of future draft from small changes like single words to big changes like new sentences) in 2011. The way I figure it, if I continue with my goal of at least 20 hours a week, the word count total will come.

I now try to think of word count as almost secondary. On my last attempt at writing this book, I focused so greatly on the word count, that I think I actually lost sight of all the important aspects of writing. Of course everyone is different with their writing, and so what works for one person might not work for another. I am merely stating what I find to work for me.

[cornerofmadness.livejournal.com]

yes I can definitely see that too but to me editing is a totally different than the actual writing. I would however count it in place of doing a daily word count