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Post by K'Sennia Visitor on Mar 23, 2019 6:01:09 GMT
I have a lot of issues with becoming untethered to the feeling of wanting to do things to the point where something I cared about moments ago suddenly seems alien and strange, and I cannot for the life of me remember or justify to myself why I wanted to do it. It's really a problem and it makes finishing things almost impossible sometimes.
What do y'all use to keep you motivated to keep writing every day? Do you simply decide you want to and that feeling of wanting to write never leaves you? Does your motivation waver but you have simply become so disciplined that you write anyway? Do you have a "big picture" motivating factor that you can remind yourself of to help keep you going when your willpower fizzles out?
What works and doesn't work for you?
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Post by kateelizabeth on Mar 23, 2019 22:32:04 GMT
I've been feeling a lot better overall, so that helps. Over the past few months, I've been sitting in the chair, writing at least 500-1,000 words daily. I can't write every single day, and I'm okay with that. I just know that with these small chunks, I'm making progress. In the past three weeks, I've published a sweet romance novella and a steamy romance short, that refused to turn into a novella, no matter how much I worked with it. Sometimes I write with music, sometimes not. I just sit in that chair and write.
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Post by jwgolan on Mar 28, 2019 22:25:02 GMT
What do y'all use to keep you motivated to keep writing every day? Do you simply decide you want to and that feeling of wanting to write never leaves you? Does your motivation waver but you have simply become so disciplined that you write anyway? Do you have a "big picture" motivating factor that you can remind yourself of to help keep you going when your willpower fizzles out? What works and doesn't work for you? My first book - non-fiction, published through a traditional publishing house - took more than a decade to compose. I would work on it for a couple of months, then walk away from it, then come back and work on it some more. Editing, polishing, adding to it. After all, I had a full time job, family responsibilities - in short, a life to attend to. Once I found a publisher, however, it was all about deadlines: they needed the word count dropped to be within their publishing limit (whittled from 170,000 words down to 115,000 - that was some brutal editing); then it was back-and-forth with the copy editor (all of the citations had to meet their formatting standard for end notes); photos and diagrams had to be in a certain format and resolution. I'm still thrilled with how the book turned out and glad that I went through all of that - but it was a lot of work. Since then, I have turned to writing fiction as an indie author (because writing should be fun, not just arduous), and have set myself deadlines for when I expect to meet certain objectives: first draft complete by such-and-such a date; edited draft to my beta-readers by another date; book published by a certain milestone. Setting those self-imposed deadlines keeps me focused on writing every day - even if just a little - and marching towards a larger objective. I might be a week or two behind at times, but I can see the progress and have a goal clearly in mind. Besides, I really want to see how my beta-readers (my teenage daughters) react to what happens to the characters they know in this next book.
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Post by writeway on Mar 30, 2019 3:58:12 GMT
Writing itself. I love it. It's a part of me. I couldn't see my life without writing. For motivation, I've always been a great self-disciplinarian. If you have trouble staying motivated you have to hold yourself accountable or else you will never get things done. Of course, some times it's a struggle and I have to dig deep to get into a project but I realize that's me procrastinating and procrastination can be detrimental if you let it get out of hand. Some people use awards for themselves to motivate them, meaning they will hold back things they want until they finish their writing goals for the day. I just stay on myself and I am good at making myself feel guilty when I know I should be writing and that really makes me get in gear on those tough days.
Sometimes you just need a break too and there is nothing wrong with that. We should let our minds and imagination rest at time. But things take a turn for the worst when you start making excuses as to why you can't write or you find yourself never motivated by anything. We have to use ourselves for motivation and know that us needing to finish our work is enough to get our BIC (butts-in-chair).
It begins and ends with me. I can make excuses all day about why I don't feel like writing or can't write but if I don't get my booty in the chair and actually do it, those excuses fester and before you know it, you're never writing anything.
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Post by writeway on Mar 30, 2019 4:08:51 GMT
Another point is, maybe you are not into what you are writing. Sometimes I start projects but fall out of love so I sit them aside and work on something else until I get that "loving feeling" for the previous work again. That can be a big cause for lack of motivation. Sometimes you simply aren't into the story and other times you aren't into the GENRE. Sometimes your imagination needs fresh ideas to become motivated. Or maybe your muse is telling you to challenge yourself. Lack of motivation comes from many things but with all of them the key is being committed and disciplined and write something no matter what it is.
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Post by davidvandyke on Apr 6, 2019 19:21:59 GMT
It's not high-minded, but just like any other job, making a living. Or perhaps one might say, paying the bills motivates me to not slack off. It doesn't provide inspiration, but it can provide impetus.
There's a trap to commercial success--most authors want it, but it does tend to limit you if you want to keep it, as it's far easier to replicate or reproduce that success if you stay within the box of your earlier success. So, I've made most of my sales in military sci-fi, so I'm "an MSF writer"... despite also writing other things. I know if I publish another MSF book, it will sell. A double-edged sword.
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Post by K'Sennia Visitor on Apr 7, 2019 18:21:38 GMT
It's not high-minded, but just like any other job, making a living. Or perhaps one might say, paying the bills motivates me to not slack off. It doesn't provide inspiration, but it can provide impetus. There's a trap to commercial success--most authors want it, but it does tend to limit you if you want to keep it, as it's far easier to replicate or reproduce that success if you stay within the box of your earlier success. So, I've made most of my sales in military sci-fi, so I'm "an MSF writer"... despite also writing other things. I know if I publish another MSF book, it will sell. A double-edged sword. Nothing wrong with making a living!
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Post by dormouse on Apr 8, 2019 21:22:46 GMT
What works best for me is just habit. And if something interrupts that habit it takes a while to get going again.
Deadlines aren't that effective. There are soft deadlines, hard deadlines and very hard deadlines. They used to work better, but now it's mostly that the work won't be done until the deadline.
Money doesn't work at all for writing. It's what I focus on when I'm wearing a business hat, so it's good for publishing, but not relevant to writing.
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Post by prolificwriter on Apr 9, 2019 6:31:16 GMT
$$$!!! Money is a great motivator, plus the fact that I don’t want to find another job I’ll hate even more! Plus, writing can be fun sometimes. I’ve made a promise to myself that I’ll treat this as a full-time job for the next 12 months, I even wrote a contract to that effect and signed it! Right now I’m also taking inspiration from those authors that are actually doing what I’d like to be doing. This bit from a recent Facebook post by Nora Roberts is keeping me motivated at the moment as well: Stop making excuses and write.
Stop whining and write.
Stop fucking around and write.
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