Articulating a Philosophy

Yesterday’s writing session went okay, I guess. I think I’m going to have to back up and probably make some changes to what I did yesterday, because it doesn’t feel quite right, it’s not flowing as well as it should I have. I am thinking that I may shoot for a full ninety minutes today instead of the required sixty and possibly polish off the third chapter. 

In any case, I find rambling about the specifics of my projects to be dull, and that single paragraph up above is really all I have to say about it. I’ve also noticed that, now that the warm-ups have become a blog, it’s made me choose my words a little more carefully and it’s a little harder to ramble on and on. 

I need to set that aside, just be honest – it’s mostly just me musing to myself over writing, the problems I’m facing and other things. I touched on the two large ones yesterday, lack of focus and procrastination. There was a third one that I believe I found a solution to, that I’m going to ramble on about now. 

For a very long time, I had, shall we say, issues with writing – even with the time limit, the words wouldn’t come, the plot stayed at a standstill, and my word count suffered. Then it hit me all of a sudden: I was over-thinking it. I was spending my time trying to plan it out before writing a word of the actual manuscript, I was treating it like a machine. Writing is not a machine, it’s an art form. 

The story has to flow naturally – some of my biggest projects (and the ones I’m most proud of) emerged because of spontaneous writing. There were no specific plans I had in mind, no attempts to force the plot to do what I wanted, it just happened and it came simply and naturally. Every story, I think, has a rhythm to it, a certain beat that the author needs to find if the writing is to proceed. Basically, writing is an art-form, not a science. It’s organic, a living thing, not a machine. 

That…probably didn’t make a whole lot of sense, but it made sense in my head. I’m still trying to find the best way to articulate my philosophy and how it’s shaping the story that I’m writing. Just let the story, let the words come. If you have no idea what they might be, just start throwing them on the page and seeing what sticks, until you find the right words, the right rhythm, the beat.

My first (recent) attempt at it didn’t end particularly well, as the characters were largely incredibly silly and the story quickly devolved to a pile of mush (not literally), which leads me to believe that there’s a piece of the puzzle missing here – the author needs to take an active role in shaping the story, while still trying to let it flow naturally, still trying to let it emerge organically. Like shaping a bush, or a landscape, trying to find the best fit. 

I’ve recently started (or, I guess, returned since I’ve done this before) re-reading the previous chapters and editing them, reminding myself of what’s happening in the story and making little changes here and there to the main manuscript. This worked fairly well in the past and it seems to be working here, I just hope it leads to an actual finished draft of a story. 

Then, once the draft is done, it’s time for more editing! There’s always lots of touch-ups, changes, revisions, re-writes that need to be made. In any case, that’s enough rambling for one day. Thanks for reading.