#something something rocket verse

[lightoftheunderground]

Making fun of Proton from a distance.

[rainbowpufflez]

Team RR but it’s their mugs 🤯

[vixletserenity]

Everybody come for the family drawing school assignment. And not knowing their names at the time, they were distinguished by traits; spooky, serious, and funny.

@devotionblind @dandieliongirl @reiketsui @chounaifu

[mxstball]

"...No, no. He has a point."

[badmusejail]

@puppypokemon​ starter call.

SNIFF.  

ew.

[castleclysm]

not sure how much use it'll see, but...

[thndrs-wrtr]

Hello!! That Chan pic with the baby is just sjdjsjdj and the entire video, lord. I was wondering if u could write something like thar pls, needing fluff dad Chan 🥹

OMG YES. ABSOLUTELY . Also, golden star for you for being my first request ⭐️

Let's see what I come up with.

Warnings: Dad Bangchan. Fluff, extreme domestic fluff.

Big hugs

Ever since Chan came back to work after his hiatus, he promised he would come back home earlier. In the end, he had to come back not only to his house, but to his home. It wasn't just you waiting for him, now there was a tiny little human being that would wait for him.

However, Chan's promise was forgotten that day. It was already 10pm and he was nowhere to be seen. The apple didn't fall far from the tree, for Daesung refused to sleep for the entire day. No nap time, and he was definitely far from falling asleep anytime soon. He's definitely his son, you thought when the tiny almost two year old refused closing his eyes.

Walking around the place, singing, showing him toys, begging, anything worked. Instead, his tears kept flowing and so did your stress. His diaper was clean, he ate his dinner, he didn't seem to be hurt, the thought of taking him to the hospital faded when he finally sat still on the floor and started playing with his toys, and if he was not sleeping, at least he have you some peaceful minutes to a quick trip to the bathroom.

Chan finally arrived home, quietly. He smiled when he saw the boy giving his entire attention to his tiny, tiny guitar, pulling the nylon strings one by one, thank you uncle Han for the present.

He hid behind the wall, just showing his face when he finally spoke, calling the baby's attention.

"Hello there"

His dimples appeared on his cheeks and his eyes became smaller thanks the smiling expression. The baby quickly turned around, and started moving his legs and arms in an attempt of getting up.

The older man left his hiding and went straight to him, kneeling as to pick him up. Daesung started giggling right away, gripping onto Chan's shirt without hesitation.

"Your eyes are so red, had you been crying, hm? No, don't cry! Let's whipe those eyes, yeah? Don't cry, I've got you, ok?."

He said with a downward smile, rubbing his nose against the chubby cheek after cleaning the dry tears on his cheeks, making you melt right away when you appeared in the room once again, leaning in the doorframe for a few seconds while Chan didn't notice you.

"Two good looking boys and I look like if I'm back from a camping night" you said in between giggles.

"Ah, baby" Chan laughed as well, walking towards your way and kissing your shortly as a hello. "I'm sorry, yeah? I knew I said I'd arrive early and-" you cut his words.

"Watch him while I take a quick shower. I need it. Then I'll forgive you."

"Sounds like a fair deal"

Chan agreed, and his attention went back to Daesung. He lifted him in his arms in swift motions, the baby giggling and kicking his legs whenever Chan would lift him up in the air, and then back down using his mouth to immitate the sound of a rocket. Their tiny game continued for a few minutes, until Chan took him back to the bedroom.

"Shall we put you on your pj's, yeah?" He said with a kind of high pitched voice, "yeah, you need to be in your pj's. Is late and you gotta sleep, ok?" He told him as if he'd get a solid answer in return.

"I wrote so many verses for you today, probably a bit cheesy but yeah. Ah, you're gonna hate me when you're fifteen aren't you"

Chan giggled while he was changing Daesung into his onesie. He leaned forward, gently tickling the boy's belly, and the multiple "nom noms" on his neck, hands and belly didn't take long in appear, making the baby giggle and kick his feet at his dad's attention.

You had no idea how time you spent taking your quick shower, but after a long day after barely eating, constantly trying to calm down Daesung's crying, you really needed some time alone, and you knew Chan had it all covered outside.

However, when you got out the silence made you worried. Usually, Chan would be singing, or holding conversations with no replies back other than babbles, or music playing in the background. But now? Silence. Pure, and absolute silence.

The dim light of your bedroom made you walk towards it, the scene making you feel like sit down in that same spot and cry.

An unsual, asleep shirtless Chan under the sheets, accompanied by the image you wanted to see the entire day. Daesung finally, finally asleep. And not only asleep. He was soundly asleep using Chan's chest as bed, his tiny hands holding onto him while Chan's arms were perfectly wrapped around him a very, very big hug.

You walked towards them very cautiously, keeping your hand on Daesung's back for brief seconds as you leaned forward to kiss his head, repeating the gesture but this time on Chan's temple. Apparently, someone was refusing to sleep without his dad.

And you understood your son perfectly, you couldn't fall asleep easily when Chan wasn't there, how could you, if not wrapped in his arms?

[lightoftheunderground]

[skribbyposts]

ZOSAN AND MECHANICAL BULL SHENANIGANS?! sign me up, yes please.

post inspired by @bidisastersanji 's fantastic prompt, though slightly different since I kept it in the canon verse instead of making it a modern au.

buckle up children, get ready to go bull riding.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

"This is so stupid," Zoro grumbles.

"Can you enjoy anything, for once in your life?" Sanji plucks the cherry from his drink and tosses it into his mouth.

"I can, just not this."

Apparently, watching people get thrown off of a sad excuse for a mechanical bull in some shoddily made ring is supposed to be enjoyable. Zoro has lost count of the number of parties he's been dragged to by his captain, but watching people compete this way for a fucking cowboy hat has to be the least entertaining thing he's ever seen.

"Stop being such a buzzkill. Anyways, it's 'cause these people are fucking terrible," The cook says as he plays with the cherry stem between his teeth. "We had one of these at the Baratie; even Carne could stay on longer than these losers." Sanji downs the rest of his drink, muttering something under his breath.

Flash forward fifteen minutes (and a few drinks), and Zoro is ready to fall asleep. Next to him, Sanji has gotten progressively more vocal about how bad the partygoers are at riding around on the contraption in front of them. The crowd circling the ring has also gotten progressively bigger, squishing them shoulder-to-shoulder.

"Put your goddamn back into it!" The cook cups his hands and shouts to the man up next, who is currently trying to avoid getting rocketed into a wall as the bull violently bucks around. However, the blond's proximity to Zoro also means he shouts right in his ear.

"Do you ever shut up?" Zoro gripes.

"You shut up," Sanji replies, angrily nursing a margarita he stole off a waiter's tray.

"I wasn't even-- I hate you."

About thirty seconds go by before the cook exclaims in exasperation, throwing his hands in the air and almost spilling his drink all over Zoro. "Everyone's fucking incompetent!"

Zoro groans. "Stop complaining like you could do any better, curly-brow."

"I'm offended that you think I couldn't!" Sanji shouts over the cheering of the crowd as another person gets bucked off.

Zoro thinks the cook could last a lot longer than anyone up there, but he doesn't say that -- Sanji's ego is big enough.

"Here, marimo. Hold my drink," Sanji pushes the half-empty glass into Zoro's hands. "Let's make a bet. How long do you think I can stay on?"

"Curly, you're drunk."

"Answer the goddamn question."

Forever, if Sanji really tried. "Five seconds."

Sanji shoots him an offended look. "Jesus, where's your faith?" With that, he turns away and pushes himself to the front of the group of bustling people.

Sure enough, Zoro's watching the cook clamber into the ring, a lit cigarette in his mouth (where did he get that from?) and the worst posture Zoro's ever seen.

The cook hops onto the mechanical bull, grabbing onto the metal grip before pointing and yelling at someone in the corner to start it up.

The thing starts slowly at first, and Sanji's hair sways as the bull moves back and forth. the cook barks again at some unseen person, and then it really starts to ramp up.

The bull starts bucking hard, the force at which it travels increasing each time it swings. Zoro would be worried if he didn't recognize the look of smug anticipation on Sanji's face as he straightens up, even from back in the crowd. He's about to pull some crazy-ass stunt.

When the bull leans forward, The cook uses the momentum to push himself off the handlebars from a seated position and into a handstand, twisting around to plant his feet on the saddle as he comes down.

Sanji moves fluidly with the machine, hips shifting in every direction it leans to keep himself firmly onboard. while the crowd roars, Zoro watches every movement Sanji makes with rapt attention. the blond rocks with the bull, hands now in his pockets and lips still wrapped around the cigarette he pulled from out of nowhere.

He pulls a few more tricks, long, muscular legs propelling him up to balance on the wooden horns of the bull - and gives a cheeky wave to the crowd. Goddamn. Zoro wishes that didn't work on him.

Sanji finishes up his routine with a flourish, doing an aerial and landing smoothly in a crouch on the hay floor of the ring. The crowd cheers even louder than before, and some tubby man comes out to give the cook a pink, bedazzled cowboy hat. The sea of people parts and leaves Zoro standing there awkwardly as Sanji saunters towards him.

"How's that for five seconds, Greenie?" the blond spins the hat around on his finger.

Zoro grunts and tries to suppress the flush on his face. "I could do better."

Sanji rolls his eyes, taking back his drink. "Sure you could. Anyways, I could last a lot longer than that in... other things, y'know?" Sanji makes eye contact with him as he downs the rest of his margarita. "What's that phrase again... ride a bull, fuck a cowboy?" He shrugs, placing the cowboy hat on Zoro's head then looking him up and down. "Eh, close enough."

If Zoro had liquid in his mouth, he would have done a spit take. "What!?"

The blond smirks and puts his cigarette out in the bottom of his glass. "You heard me, marimo. Now- WHERE'S THE FUCKING BATHROOM?"

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Sanji: i really wanna fuck a cowboy rn *puts cowboy hat on zoro* Zoro: *shocked, confused, bewildered* Sanji: That'll do, i guess

eughhh writers block hit me so hard for like 3 days and i rushed to get this out so this might be kinda terrible. wrote it in like 7 minute intervals over the course of a day so some things might not connect?? lmfao..... sleep deprivation is so fetch.

thibking of making an a03 account..... ill let yall know if i do!!!! hope u enoyed reading this pls comment i really appreciate it !! <3333

[vixletserenity]

Was sometimes the neighborhood little shit that somehow usually got away with her antics.

[vuelode-irbis]

[...] Y si hacemos caso a la leyenda, entonces tendremos que pensar que en la Tierra hay una perra menos y en el cielo una estrella más Y en el cielo una estrella más. Preparado está ya el cohete para zarpar El control en tierra dice a Laika adiós Adiós, adiós, adiós...

"Laika" by Mecano (1988)

[ID: digital drawing of Laika, the dog that was launched to space by the Soviet Union on November 3rd, 1957 to be the first living being orbiting Earth. She floates among bright yellow-green stars, her head turns around to look at the ones behind her, she has her tongue out. The background is outer space. End ID.]

This year I remembered to do something for her!!

Translation of the song verses are under the cut

[...] And if we listen to the legend,

then we will have to think

that Earth has one less dog

and the sky has one more star

And the sky has one more star.

The rocket is ready to launch

Ground control says Laika goodbye

Goodbye, goodbye, goodbye...

[quotidianish]

TF2 x ATLA AU :3

Lore, close ups, and doodles underneath !

Scout, Pauling, and Ludwig are the main three- scout, who’s an (admittedly shitty) airbender but not the avatar, who ran away after his father left. Once spotted by fire nation soldiers, he is presumed to be the avatar- and scout basks in the glory of his false identity. Pauling- a studious, too serious for her own good, non-bender, who’s Medic’s student. She’s of the southern water tribe, treating medic like her paternal figure after the disappearance of her aunt. Medic is (unbeknownst to pauling and scout) a blood bender who was exiled for his practices. He doesn’t seem to care for anyone or anything, also being very jovial and cheery.

All Pauling and Scout know is that Ludwig was exiled from the northern water tribe then fled to the south for an undisclosed reason. Pauling never bothered to pry and the Scout was too intimidated to. Here the avatar cycle has indeed been broken. It’s up to a group of nine ragtag men and one mousy girl to defeat Gray Mann.

And the main three villains are soldier, demo, and sniper who're all fire nation folk. Sort of the team rocket; never truly competent enough to cause real damage, that or their hearts truly aren’t in it.

Soldier's a fire bender who specializes in jet propulsion and was kicked out of the army. He thinks if he steals back the avatar, they'll let him back in. A weapon since childhood, once a bully, always a bully, or so he’s heard.Character arc being the realization the fire nation army isn't worth fighting for. Surprisingly, he is very good with spirits, opposite to his best friend, Tavish, who despises them.

Demo’s just trying to impress his mum and be a good friend to the Soldier. People pleasing tendencies, that's his character arc. He's supposedly a non bender who's mighty good with swords; but underneath his inconspicuous-ish eye patch holds a combustion bending tattoo. Only Jane knows this. Well-versed in calligraphy.

Sniper is a 26 year old yuyan archer who was discharged for failing a mission while he was young. He joined the other two with the same goal as the Soldier. His yuyan archer tattoo still remains. He's a non bender with excellent aim, who grew up on the rural outskirts of the fire nation. His character arc is something about not adhering to expectations and learning who he's fighting for; a combination of the demoman and the soldier’s lessons.

Spy's a crusty airbender constantly sporting a mask to hide his tattoos, and knife. Nobody has a clue where he's from and he takes orders from whoever pays him best. His airbending tricks are so subtle, the public believes him to be a crafty nonbender. Usually said tricks are only invisibility and voice alteration. While not assassinating political figures he traverses the spirit world looking for his wife, a fellow air nomad, avoiding physical aging in brief sprints of time. He returns on a well paid mission to kill the “avatar,” which was presumably the scout. Little does he know, that weird whiteboy is just some lame airbender. Who’s also his son. His bad.

Engineers the metalbender; an art perfected by his ancestors and passed down in whispers to him. I haven't developed him much. He teaches the Scout what he knows while obscuring information on how he got that metal arm. Him and the Pyro have a shared love of blacksmithing. From an explosion, he thinks..

Pyro's a spirit probably. Nobody knows what he is. Where he’s from? Pyro. What’s his gender? Pyro. Guy who sets things on fire. Presumably human judging by his questionable use of what looks to be fire bending. And also the Spy's companion! They met in the spirit world. He and the Soldier form a close bond quite quickly thanks to their good graces with spirits (to Tavish’s immense dismay).

Heavy's an earth bender who continues to win in underground fights. Residing in ba sing se with his three sisters and elderly mother, scout pauling and medic meet him in an earth bender championship. Despite what his appearance suggests, his patience is unmatched, which is his greatest strength. He has near -perfect seismic sense. He and the Medic get on quite well, and after the fire lord has been struck down, form a duo in the ring, earning even more won championships.

[lightoftheunderground]

@reiketsui

He’s leaning over Archer’s shoulder while he works away at his desk, flames behind him flickering idly. He’s been extremely patient, waiting for him to finish whatever he was doing. Scribbling on a bunch of papers didn’t seem thaaaat important. Plus he wanted attention, good or bad, it didn’t matter to him as long as someone was paying attention to him. Previous attempts at gaining it failing, knocking a few pens and ornaments that sat on the desk off and onto the ground being ignored.

Before Rocket he could sit still and wait for Ingo to work away for hours at home or in the office at the station. If it really took long he would get up and go find something to entertain himself with, ultimately returning to his trainer to wait some more. It never bothered him. Not that those memories even lingered in the back of his mind anymore. Purged from the shadowing and abuse from Rocket. All that he could recall was that this was his life, the currently situation he found himself in but didn’t attempt to break away from either. If things went well for him he could let loose and use his abilities at full power. 

Though a large chunk of the time he was kept under ‘house arrest’ for his volatile and unpredictable behavior in the field. Not like he could help it. Rocket’s research for Shadow Pokémon was incomplete, not like he understood any of that. It had messed with his head and made him emotionally unstable at times, but the power it gave him---  He couldn’t care less what sort of condition the shadowing put him in. He got to battle and win. It was fun.---Familiar.

Patience had run thin, the chandelier arms behind him flicking around once more in annoyance, much like a cat that was either being pet too much or not enough. Using psychic to lift up a few sheets up paper that were currently being worked on he floated them in midair before the human-like Pokémon raised a hand, the papers bursting into flames seconds later. He looked at the Executive intensely, yellow eyes unblinking. Archer couldn’t ignore that, right?

[calscompositions]

i don’t have the motivation to make a full animatic for a 3 and a half minute song, much less two of them, so here are a few things that would happen in my hypothetical animatics for Get in the Water and 600 Strike.

also Vengeance Saga spoilers, putting a readmore under this so as to not spoil that one mutual

Most of Get in the Water would go about as you’d expect, and fairly close to what was in the stream animatic, but there are a few minor details I would change:

Poseidon’s entrance would have him surface, absolutely enormous, making waves that flip over Ody’s raft. After Odysseus gets back on the other side of the raft, Poseidon gets RIGHT up in his face for the “There you are. Coward.” line

When Poseidon threatens Odysseus between each “Get in the water,” he demonstrates exactly how he’d do each thing using constructs made of water.

The beat drop where Poseidon yells “GET IN THE WATER” is accompanied by him raising his trident into the air and slamming it back down, causing large columns of water to shoot up on either side of him. Their crashing down is timed to the crash of the waves in the music.

Odysseus literally gets down on his knees and begs during the second verse.

After Poseidon has Odysseus deep enough in the water, the calm part of the song has him stop thrusting Odysseus down (since there’s realistically only so far he can stab him). Once Ody stops moving, the Polites jumpscare happens.

When the rest of the crew appears, they (along with Polites and Eurylochus) reach out their hands, welcoming Odysseus into death with them. He takes their hands, closes his eyes, and…

600 Strike is where I’d make the most changes to what “canonically” happens.

Picking up from the ending of Get in the Water, the song opens similarly to the stream animatic, with a dramatic eye open from Odysseus, grabbing onto the wind bag with his other hand and rocketing up, still holding onto his crew and dragging them up with him. No jetpack though, he just holds onto the bag.

Odysseus’ eyes still glow here, but it’s more of a blue-green color to represent the ghosts backing him up, because him just straight up transcending mortality was kinda stupid.

When Odysseus surfaces, Hermes is there, and gives him a little nod to signal that he was, in fact, intending for him to open the bag if something like this happened. Then he flies off. This is to fix the issue of “why would Hermes give Odysseus the bag instead of just hiding it” because that bothered me just a little bit.

Odysseus has to be in constant motion during this part due to the nature of the bag. He would incorporate this into his strategy.

There would be some fighting during the instrumental part. Seems obvious enough but I don’t think it was there in the stream animatic. Poseidon defends himself well at first, but eventually gets overrun by the sheer number of crewmen, along with some clever maneuvers from Odysseus causing him to drop his guard.

The actual “600 Strike” move involves each of Odysseus’ crewmen landing a blow on Poseidon in rapid succession (yes, even Polites, he fought in the war and presumably at least tried to fight Polyphemus) followed by a blow from Ody himself (backed by the whole crew). This is enough to wound Poseidon and knock him down.

During the line “You released my storm when you opened that bag,” the camera would focus on a shot of the storm with the bag in the foreground. The focus shifts from the storm to the bag halfway through the line.

Poseidon being huge in this hypothetical animatic raises the question: “How does Odysseus lift the trident to stab him?” The answer is that his crew helps lift it— just like they did in Remember Them when they were stabbing Polyphemus’ eye. This scene would be a very intentional parallel to that scene.

Each stab causes Poseidon to decrease in size, along with his trident. By the time it gets to the last stab, Poseidon is human-sized, and Odysseus is holding the trident by himself, like in the canon animatic (though of course his crew is standing behind him this whole time as well). Bonus points if Polites and Eurylochus are on either side of him during this sequence.

After Odysseus walks off, the crew stays there to make sure Poseidon doesn’t try anything funny until Odysseus reaches Ithaca. Once he’s sufficiently offscreen, they fade away.

and yeah that’s how i would fix about 80% of my problems with the Vengeance Saga (plus a few extra things that aren’t really fixes but they’d still be cool.)

[vixletserenity]

Her name was forcefully changed to Nova; her mother's name, as a way to hide her whereabouts. Along with being a reminder that she may never see her again.

Giving a child an identity crisis in the beginning

[topazadine]

Signs That You Will Probably Finish Your Writing Project

Anyone can finish a book if they work hard at it, even if it takes them longer than someone else. That's right: anyone. Anyone, anywhere, can write a book. Maybe it won't be the best book in the world, but it would be done!

But most don't. Many start a project and never do anything else with it. They then come up with a million excuses as to why they couldn't do it.

After speaking with dozens of writers over my lifetime, I've become able to predict with good accuracy whether someone will actually achieve a completed first draft. I am not always right, of course, because I am simply a human. But I am right most of the time.

There's no rocket science here, and I'm not a mindreader. It's just that there are certain habits conducive to finishing projects, and others that stymie your success.

I know that this will upset some people, and I'm sorry in advance. I'm not saying any of this to be mean, nor am I trying to discourage you. All these bad habits can be fixed, though it requires a mindset shift. You can achieve all of these powerful mindesets with some of the tips I provide.

Why should you listen to me? I have a pretty good track record of finishing things. I have 132 stories available on AO3, have published two parts of The Eirenic Verses, and am already revising the third manuscript before the second is even out. I've finished three of the other manuscripts in the 10-part series already in addition to the aforementioned third part.

It is the mindset I mention here that helps me stay so productive. This is not exhaustive. There are probably plenty of things that go into a great writing mindset that I have completely forgotten about. And maybe you'll beat the odds and have one of these issues but still get it done! And that's great, and I'm happy for you.

But nevertheless, let's get into it.

You have healthy self-esteem (or are working on building it)

I'm dead serious here. Having a healthy self-esteem is crucial to being a great writer. Here's a few reasons why:

You believe your work is good enough as it is, but that it can always be better. You think you have something important to say and that other people will enjoy it. You are not shooting yourself in the foot by bemoaning how terrible your writing is, making no one want to read it. You self-soothe when things get frustrating (writer's block, plot not working out, etc) and encourage yourself out of that hole rather than needing others to comfort you. You believe you have the skills to solve problems in your text and remain proactive in fixing things. You don't get absolutely obliterated by critique because you recognize that it's not a personal attack, so you improve by taking good advice. You don't think that rejection of your writing is rejection of you as a person. Your happiness doesn't hinge upon success as a writer, which may not happen no matter how good you are. You're willing to take risks, to talk to people about your work, and to market yourself because you understand that you won't get success without a bit of exposure.

What are some signs of low self-esteem for writers?

Not wanting to show anyone their writing yet also talking about it constantly hoping that others will want to read it

Talking about how bad their writing is

Getting jealous of other peoples' success

Being hypercritical of other writers

Talking more about their failures than their successes

Dismissing any praise as disingenuous

Needing constant reassurance at every part of the writing cycle

Being a perfectionist, especially during the active writing phase

Constantly revising to the point where they don't get anything done

Obsessing over perceived imperfections in their work

Avoiding getting feedback after they have completed a draft

Just as with everything else in life, your mindset plays a huge role in your success as a writer. Having healthy self-esteem (not an overinflated ego) will serve you much better than being overly critical of yourself or others.

Knowing you have the skills and talents necessary to tackle your project (because you do) will help motivate you when things get tough and keep you from giving up at the first sign of trouble.

Look, I had a shit childhood and a rocky start to adulthood. But I've managed to scrabble up some good self-esteem juice, and I am sure you can too. It takes time, and it looks different for everyone, so I'm not going to tell you how to do it because I don't know you personally.

However, fixing your mindset and believing in yourself does wonders for your writing - more than any expensive course, more than a personal editor, more than any of that. Trust your own process, and you'll reap wonderful results.

You think of yourself as a writer first, not an aspiring author.

Though my profile says I'm the author of The Eirenic Verses, that's not how I introduce myself. When people ask me what I do, I say I'm a writer. Because it's true: I write business stuff for work, and I write fiction for self-fulfillment.

When I was still working on the first book in the series, I did not call myself an aspiring author. I said I was writing a book. I've never called myself an aspiring author once in my entire life, and I'm glad for that.

Why is this important?

"Author" is a status, but "writer" is an activity. Anyone can publish one singular book and be an author, but only people who write regularly can call themselves writers.

"Aspiring author" is a dead-end title. It means you want something but haven't achieved it. Then you become an "author" and ... what? That doesn't mean you're going to keep writing. It just means you did one thing, once.

For sustainable mindsets, we need to remind ourselves that if we want to be something, we have to do something.

No one calls themselves an "aspiring scientist." They call themselves a scientist in training because they are learning how to be a scientist. That's an active title. It implies you are doing something.

So, if you want to keep doing, call yourself a writer. It reminds you, every single time that you tell someone, that you need to write. You'll feel guilty if you call yourself a writer and then haven't written anything in five months, and it will compel you to keep going.

You don't worry about what happens after finishing.

Fussing about what will happen after you finish is the best way to burn yourself out. The writing phase is about writing, not about revising or publishing or marketing or whether anyone will ever want to read it.

Focus on one thing at a time. Think only about the writing when you are writing. Everything else comes at a later date.

You do not announce WIPs when you start them.

There's this author I follow over on Twitter whose name I will not share. It seems like every other week, she's announcing a new WIP with a pretty moodboard and a name and characters and so on.

She has little emojis and "code names" for each of her WIPs, and she'll "drop hints" about all of them every once in a while, all mysterious and Taylor Swift-esque.

Has she published anything? Nope. Nothing. Nada. A whole lot of talk and not a lot of action.

Why are you announcing something you haven't even done? Why are you telling us about a project that you personally haven't devoted much attention to? Why should we care about something that you haven't cared enough to work on yet?

I have a list of my WIPs for The Eirenic Verses because they are all in the same world and all have to exist for the next part to make sense. I don't have a choice to drop them if I want to finish the series. I didn't create that WIP list until I had already decided on each of the parts and had already published the first book, so now if I want to keep people reading, I have to commit to them.

But if you have dozens of different unrelated WIPs, who is to say that you'll finish all of them? You probably won't.

Announcing a WIP before you have done the work is cheating; you're getting a little dopamine hit of everyone telling you how excited they are rather than a dopamine hit of achievement for doing the thing.

You do not talk excessively about your projects.

The more you talk about your work, the less you get done because you are tricking your brain into thinking that you are actually getting things done.

Again, you get the dopamine hit of people saying "ohhh that's so cool I love it!!" and then you are happy that people liked your idea, and then you don't do the idea because you don't need to. You already got the result you wanted, which was people telling you they liked it.

Great authors don't tell anyone about their projects except in the most general, vague sense before they are well underway, because they don't want to jinx themselves. If you're already staying mum about your work, then you're doing great.

And yes, your constant updates of "here is exactly how much I wrote today" every single day does count as talking about your project.

You are okay with going it alone.

The Active Writing process is the loneliest part of writing. No one is looking over your shoulder and encouraging you. It is only after you get to Percolation and Revision that you start to share your work with others, get feedback, and find ways to improve what you already have.

If you need someone to constantly build up your confidence and tell you that you're wonderful and that you should keep going, then you are not likely to finish because you are constantly talking about your work instead of doing it.

Writers need to be comfortable with solitude, but they also need to be willing to network, get feedback, and listen to other perspectives. It is a balance and it all depends on where you are in the specific stages of this given project.

When I'm working on a project, I tend to just avoid other writers entirely and stick to my other activity groups so that I'm still getting social stimulation but don't feel encouraged to share details of my work.

Those other friend groups do not really care about the ins and outs of writing, and that's perfectly fine; they don't need to. If they're willing to show up and cheer me on when I actually finish the project, great! That's all I need.

Constantly needing to check in with other people and having them rubber-stamp your writing is a sign of a lack of confidence, and it's something you need to work on it if you want to finish anything.

Be okay with going it alone. Be okay with waiting for feedback. Trust in yourself and your writing.

You have a process.

Your process doesn't have to look like mine to be successful. I've shared my process so that those without a process yet can get some inspiration for how to organize themselves, but there's no rule that you have to do it like me.

I will say that my process has achieved great results, but I'm not omniscient; maybe there's an even better way of working that I don't know about yet.

Every writer goes about things a different way, and that's totally fine. What matters is that they are getting things done in a manner that they like and that is working well for them. Even if their approach would make me want to tear my own skin off, I cannot and will not judge. They've got their thing, and that's perfect.

You need to have something that guides you so that you can replicate your successes. Scattershot approaches get scattershot results.

Contrary to how it may seem, I am not actually a very organized person. I work on both Google Docs AND Word for different parts of the process because I like doing it that way, but it would probably drive someone else insane if they like to use things like Ellipsus or Scrivener.

But it works for me, and if it ain't broke, I'm not going to fix it. If what you has is doing well, then keep at it. If it's not working for you, then you have many options to better organize and systematize your work.

You worldbuild as you go along.

This is specifically for fantasy and scifi, two of the genres where I see people crash and burn the most.

That's because they set everything up to perfection before actually doing anything and then just ... don't do the thing. Or do the thing in fits and starts because they spent so much time and energy worldbuilding that they don't have any creative juice for actually writing anything.

If you have like one chapter done but you have a full bible-sized guide to your lore, you've gone about things in the wrong order. Now your project becomes about fitting all of that in somewhere instead of writing an entertaining story, and you're far more likely to fall into the Infodumping Trap. You're making things too complicated.

In my guide to worldbuilding, you'll notice that the things I encourage people to emphasize are little things that don't have anything to do with the plot. One cannot build a plot around a cultural dish.

And I emphasized those things on purpose, because those are things that aren't going to overtake your story and become a substitute for actually creating something people want to read.

When I started writing The Eirenic Verses, I had a pretty simple premise: there's one country that has poetry magic and one that doesn't, and there's a giant mountain range between them and the girls are fightinggg.

That's about it for what I had at the jump. All the other things - lore, mythology, religion, international politics, festivals, cultural consciousness, economy, clothing, etc - all came later, as I was writing.

I didn't set out knowing what festivals the Bremish had or how the royal family works in Sina or what the towns looked like or exactly how High Poetry works or any of that. I discovered all of that during the writing process and noted it down so I wouldn't contradict myself.

By focusing only on the "what if" at the start, then infusing the rest as you go along, you will avoid the sin of infodumping because you don't know what to infodump. Things will just come to you as they make sense, and you will include them as relevant. You don't have anything to infodump on the reader.

You remember that you can always revise.

And lastly, great writers worry about getting the draft done. They don't fret over every word because they know that they can get it looking flawless LATER. They just want that rough draft, and then they seek specific feedback on how to improve that draft.

My third book, Funeral of Hopes, is extraordinarily short right now. after finishing the first draft, I then sent it to a great beta, who offered me suggestions for how to lengthen it, and I'm now fitting those new puzzle pieces together.

I knew as soon as I was done that I needed more, but I wanted to let it sit for a bit and get some suggestions for how to do that. If I had spent ages trying to lengthen it the first go-round, I probably would have gotten frustrated and given up. It's okay to just have the bare bones of the story and then seek out feedback; there's something there to scaffold off.

If you'd like to read more of my work, consider buying my book!

9 Years Yearning is a gay coming-of-age romance set in a fantasy world. It follows Uileac Korviridi, a young soldier training at the War Academy. His primary motivations are honoring the memory of his late parents, protecting his little sister Cerie, and becoming a top-notch soldier.

However, there's a problem: Orrinir Relickim, a rough and tough fellow pupil who just can't seem to leave Uileac alone.

The book features poetry, descriptions of a beautiful country inspired by Mongolia, and a whole lot of tsundere vibes.

You can also check it out on Goodreads for a list of expanded distribution.

Be sure to preorder Pride Before a Fall, arriving January 1, 2025!

If you do purchase my book, don't forget to leave a review!

Reviews are vital for visibility on Amazon and help to support indie authors like me. Whenever you love a book, be sure to let the author know! It's much appreciated.

I've also created a masterlist of writing resources that you can peruse at your leisure, all for free.

Enjoy!