I can usually tell when I’m about to have a day when my writing is going to be awful. I’ll have this moment where I think the blank page looks so much better than the drivel I’m about to fill it with.
And I know that I’m envisioning the plot in my head a lot better than I’m going to write it out that day.
Since I give myself daily permission to screw up my writing, though, I keep on going.
There’ll be some days when I just can’t get my thoughts on paper in any kind of organized way—much less an entertaining way.
I’ll see that lousy day’s writing when I’m working on the second draft—it’s still there, it’s still awful. Time hasn’t made it any better.
The interesting thing, though, is that there usually is some redeemable part of the poorly-written scene. There might be a shred of decent character development, or a turn of phrase that’s not bad. It might have been the point in the story where I got a great idea for the next scene of the book.
Or it might have been so terrible that I took the whole scene out. :)
But usually, there’s something good there. It might just be some tiny thing that I can salvage and just rewrite everything that surrounds it.
I think what I’m trying to say here is that there are going to be plenty of days of writing drivel. There are also going to be days when our internal editor is on hyper-drive, reminding us how terrible our writing is.
Just keep going. Either ignore the internal editor or acknowledge it and just don’t let it affect you—tell yourself that you’ll fix the wretched writing later because priority #1 is to finish the book.
Even on a bad writing day, you’re still:
Keeping up your writing habit
Learning to quiet your self-editor
Moving your story forward
Making time for an activity that’s important to you
Exercising that writing muscle
Thinking about your story and characters
I know some of y’all work well with your inner-editor and edit your work as you go. Whatever works is definitely the method to go with. My advice is more for folks who get tripped up by their internal editor—and end up with a stalled-out project.
So my question to you is this—do you coexist well with your internal editor? If you don’t, how do you shut yours up? :)
Elizabeth – Ah that ever-present internal editor! For me, I quiet the editor by focusing as much as I can on the overall plot and characters, not the little details at first. Then, if I screw up on a detail, or make a minor character a little too something-or-other, or leave out a clue, I can always fix it. As you say, there are a lot of good things that come out of the daily discipline of writing. Even one word or sentence is better than nothing.
Only a tangental synchronicity today — My daily Hanuakkah gift today is a look at the first draft of the first scene introducing the heroine of When Danger Calls — which is NOTHING like what ended up in the book. I think putting the words out there gives us things to work with. Sometimes they’re good, but sometimes they’re just not right for the story.
Terry
Terry’s Place
Romance with a Twist–of Mystery
No cookies and milk for my internal editor unless he keeps his mouth zipped. Works every time.
I don’t live well with my IE. Sometimes even shutting off the edits in word don’t work. Those days I keep going and fighting. Not a lot accomplished but as long as I don’t give in it seems to pass. Maybe the IE gets tired. I know I do.
My bad writing day = my editing mind is interfering. Have to blame multitasking!
Fire and Cross
I’m so glad to read your post and the comments! That IE was a problem when I did NaNo! I couldn’t shut it off. I tried to ignore it, but my subconsious kept thinking about what I had written. It slows me down in seat of the pants writing! I’m so glad to hear how others delt with IE.
I usually stop if it’s bad writing, but from now on, I’m going to keep going. This is great insight. Thanks!
I’ve learned to ignore it. I placate it with telling it to go away and let me write badly and then, when I’m done, it can come back and ridicule me on how bad the writing is. This usually works.
My internal editor often slows me down, which is what made NaNo such a challenge. (That and I type slow.) It needs to make sense as I write it. If not, I tackle it the next day and make it better.
I hand-write first, so I can usually pound through my work without a second thought in terms of my internal editor.
I just keep going. Like you said, there’s usually something salvageable from those bad writing days, though I won’t know it until I re-read it the next day. That’s why it’s important to write every day no matter what because you don’t want to miss out on writing something great!
I have a hard time with my IE. Partly because it takes me a while to figure out how to verbalize what I’m imagining. And when I have no idea what should happen, words slow from a trickle to a drip.
But I’ve gotten better at it. This year for NaNo, I told myself that I wasn’t writing a first draft, I was writing draft zero, a brainstorm draft. I’ve got notes to myself all over the place, adverbs and adjectives liberally sprinkled in most sentences, and blatant telling phrases to remind myself what I was thinking at the time. There is almost no coherent transitioning, and I contradict myself sometimes, with a note that I changed my mind about something. The story still isn’t done, but in one month I got farther along than I have with any of my other stories, so I guess it’s working out pretty well.
So far, I co-exist well but you never know, as I learn more it may be a problem.
Last night I had a terrible time with the inspiration for one of my blogfest. I ended the night searching You-Tube for Christmas songs. That was fun.
Nancy
N. R. Williams, fantasy author
My bad days there IS NO plot in my head… I sit and stare at my timeline and think “I have no idea how to do this” but i totally agree about powering through it. I write significantly SLOWER. Each sentence or paragraph takes effort to get out, and they are frequently less connected to each other than I like, but they provide the connection between the scenes I KNOW about in the short run, and can be improved in the long run…
I will sometimes edit if a really great alternative occurs to me sort of fully formed, but I don’t make a point of it at all.
Mary–Sounds like you might wear your internal editor out! :)
Enid–I think multitasking is one of the biggest enemies that writers face!
Margot–Exactly! Even if it’s just a LITTLE bit of writing, it’s so much better than nothing at all.
Alex–I think you need some voice recognition software. :) That is, unless your Southern accent is as thick as mine…the software never understands me.
Diane–That’s a great idea!
Terry–Good point–gives us a base to work from.
Alan–Bribing our internal editor? Genius! I’ll remember that.:)
Laura–That’s the BEST–when a bad writing day transforms into a good one!
Jaleh–I think that’s totally understandable. The times when I’ve just plowed ahead with it, it’s the writing equivalent of “umm” and “uhh” in the text. :)
Oh, I do the note-to-myself thing, too–in track changes, the comments function. The embarrassing thing is the couple of times when I forgot they’re still in there when I send it off to my agent. Oops!I think I get so used to seeing the notes to myself in the margins that I don’t even notice they’re there after a while. Frequently they’re random, stream of consciousness babblings about the story. I’m sure Ellen has got to wonder what on earth is going through my head sometimes. :)
Nancy–Blogging can be the BIGGEST challenge, as far as writer’s block goes. Every once in a while I’ll just draw a complete blank for blog posts…YouTube is a good idea!
Hart–Ha! Yes, my transitions will be either nonexistent or horrid on the bad writing days. I think I’m subconsciously not even TRYING to link my crappy writing to the rest of the book because I know that I’ll be pulling out whole chunks of the text later, anyway.
My inner editor can be quite intimidating and demanding, so I let her work on the last paragraph from the previous day for a few minutes before moving along to new stuff.
My IE & I have a bit of rocky relationship. Sometimes she’s quiet when I need her to be – at others, she continues to scream at me regardless of what I need her to do!
That headline was aimed at me, was it? Damn, I need to kill that internal editor >:)
Cold As Heaven
Even when good writing is held hostage, at least there are signs of life when writing poorly.
Judy–I usually just acknowledge that it’s awful and keep moving! We can worry about it later. :)
Kristen–It can always be fixed later. :)
Elspeth–Yeah, mine rips up the second draft pretty badly. :) But then, that’s when I NEED the internal editor!
Jane–Oh, that’ll keep her busy for a while…give her something to gnaw on!
Cold As Heaven–As a mystery writer, let me recommend murdering the internal editor. :)
John–Exactly. And it’s really rare to have 2 bad writing days, back to back. At least we know that the next time we sit down, it won’t be as bad.
Jemi–Sounds like none of us are really getting along with our internal editors! :)
I can’t stand my internal editor. He is always yelling at me telling me my word choice I’m thinking is not going to work, there is not enough detail and I’ve got no reason to even try to write anything on that piece of blank paper.
Yea, he sucks.
My internal editor is quiet until that rough draft if finished. I’m lucky that way!