#trying to unstuck my brain. not my nanowrimos just

[cerealmonster15]

Guy sweating w/the two buttons choices meme but it’s like. Idk having to choose if I wanna make this a Shippy Fic or a Friendship Fic… bc sometimes the lines are blurred in my mind!!!! it could be a trio friendship fic or it could be a poly rarepair recognition moment!! And I mean I’ll use the ambiguous relationship tag sure but then on ao3 there’s also the choice of doing / or & and I feel like I’ll be obnoxious if I do both, bc since it’s a trio I’ll probably already be annoying in the tags of like doing each pair and then all three….. oughhhhhh

Like I guess I’ll just do / for ship bc that was the initial intent when I had the idea. But I also like friendship…!!!!!!!! Anthony Burch Voice sometimes things can be multiple things…..

[nanowrimo]

How to Unstick Your Camp NaNoWriMo Project

Every year, we’re lucky to have great sponsors for our nonprofit events. ProWritingAid, a 2023 NaNo sponsor, helps you turn your rough first draft into a clean, clear, publish-ready manuscript. Today, author Krystal N. Craiker shares some tips on how to push through to the end of your writing project when you’re feeling stuck:

Camp NaNo is the ultimate test of your creativity. You push your writing skills and habits to a new level. 

It’s inevitable that at some point this month—or any time when you’re writing a novel—you’re going to get stuck. 

You’ll run into a plot conundrum, or you’ll feel creatively drained. You’ll stare at the page and have no clue what to write next.

It happens to all of us, so don’t worry. Here are some of my favorite ways to get my stories unstuck and my creativity flowing once again.

1. Go Outside

Writing is an isolating process, and writers are notorious for losing hours of the day to the computer screen. But when you’re stuck in a rut, staring at the page stressed out doesn’t make things better.

Get up. Go get a drink of water. Then go outside. What you do next doesn’t matter. You can get some exercise in or drive to the coffee shop. Birdwatch, play with the kids, splash in some puddles—you get the idea.

A little movement and some sunshine will help you feel refreshed when you sit back down at the computer.

2. Brain Dump

This is my tried and true method for NaNoWriMo. When I reach a point in my novel that I don’t know what to write (or just don’t want to write), I insert a random brain dump. 

I’ll write what I’m feeling about this scene and type out what I think the issue is. Sometimes, it’s just a bulleted list and others it’s a stream-of-consciousness flow. Here’s an example:

“I don’t know what to write here. I was going to kill off that character but didn’t. Somehow I need to get to X plot point from here. How do I do that? This is so frustrating. Now that I didn’t kill them off, I need a good reason for them to stay in the story. What are their motivations?”

If that’s all you write during a writing session, that’s okay. You were still working on your novel, so it still counts.

3. Use AI

It’s the first NaNo event since Chat GPT opened to the public and countless AI tools are popping up. AI can be a great way to brainstorm and spark inspiration.

As writers, we often get hung up on finding the perfect way to say something. But you don’t need to let one sentence slow down your writing flow.

Rephrase by ProWritingAid is a brand-new feature meant for writers like you. You can highlight any sentence, click Rephrase, and generate a new sentence. Shorten or lengthen a sentence, change the tone to formal or informal, or add sensory detail. 

Here’s a boring sentence I wrote: “Quinn entered the dark and cold forest.”

And here’s a sentence Rephrase gave me: “Quinn shivered as he stepped into the cold, dark forest, the air thick with the scent of damp earth.”

I can build off that! Now I’m more excited to write this scene that was feeling bland. 

Sign up for ProWritingAid to get access to Rephrase and more than 20 in-depth writing reports.

4. Keep Going

Whatever you do, don’t give up! Getting stuck is part of the process. When you hit that creative wall, give one of these methods a try.

Your story still wants to be written, so keep writing.

Krystal N. Craiker is the Writing Pirate, an indie romance author and content writer who sails the seven internet seas, breaking tropes and bending genres. She has a background in anthropology and education, which bring fresh perspectives to her romance novels. When she’s not daydreaming about her next book or article, you can find her cooking gourmet gluten-free cuisine, laughing at memes, and playing board games. Krystal lives in Dallas, Texas with her husband, child, and two dogs.

Top photo by Kelly Sikkema on Unsplash  

[beanenigma]

So I'm currently trying to write my first book, but I sometimes have a hard time coming up with ideas any advice? By the way I love all the different advice you give it helps me so much.

Hey, @the-silent-cry-never-heard! I’m so excited for you writing your first book. Seriously, I still remember the pure joy and excitement of finding those roads for the first time. I hope it goes well for you. And I’m glad my stuff have been helping you! I’ve only been here a little time and still finding the ropes around here. 

Well, first, I have to say that there is no easy way for getting ideas. There’s no tumblr post I could write that will just click in your brain and open doors for you. Also, getting ideas works different for everyone. If you write poetry or short stories, it’s a different process than writing a three novel series. But there are some methods I’ve seen laying around that have helped me in the past. 

Nothing is sacred 

Everything can and should change in your novel. If you’ve reached a patch where it’s hard to continue, try to go back and change things. Practice the “what if”. Let me give you an example: my current WIP, it’s the fifth outline I’m writing for it. I’ve rewritten the thing twice and found myself wondering why I couldn’t go on. I decided to change my entire premise, change my original idea, and make my supporting character into my main character. That solved half of my problems and created some super interesting dynamics. I’m still not sure I’m keeping it (testing is a part of it), but it surely got me unstuck.

No idea is a stupid idea 

I recently joked about my character being a male stripper because he couldn’t find any other jobs. And guess what? Him being a stripper is a major part of his character now. Try everything. It doesn’t mean you have to keep everything, but when playing with ideas, experimenting is key. 

Try flowcharting, outlining or listmaking

 When you’re really really stuck and don’t know how to go on, try free association. Just get a piece of paper and start scribbling everything that you can think of relating to that topic (your character, the situation they’re in, etc). Connect them with arrows and follow it freely until you feel like you’ve reached something new you didn’t have before. 

If you’re a technological kind of peep, I recommend bubbl.us (for flowcharting - although no software I’ve tried is fast or intuitive enough to substitute pen and paper) and SUPER SUPER SUPER recommend Workflowy (for outlining and overall organization - it’s a list making site). Workflowy has been my outlining and free association friend for years and I will love it and protect it and every writer should have an account. 

Don’t get stuck in one idea

When you’re new and you’re seeing everyone making jokes about having too many works in progress and never finishing them, you might think it’s good to avoid this and stay on one single path for the whole process. Personally, I find writing only one thing at a time to be demotivating. For me, it’s more important to keep ideas flowing than to finish things fast. In my current WIP for example, I hadn’t written in since NaNoWriMo in November. Then I read a book and wrote 12k words of fanfiction. Soon after, I opened my document and wrote 2k words in something I thought might have to be scraped. So really, no idea is a bad idea when it comes to letting creativity flow. 

I strongly advise you check out writing prompts. People who post prompts are marvelously creative people and deserve all praise (if you don’t know where to start, I personally always check @writing-prompt-s and @incognitoprompts). Not that you have to sit down and actually write on them (I think I only followed prompts once or twice in my life), but it’s great to think about them. Get them ideas flowing. I personally really like image prompts because they give me more freedom to explore where I can take these ideas. But it’s really up to you what sparks your creativity more. 

Build repertoire

Every creative person will tell you that! If you’re artist, you have to know art. If you’re a musician, you have to listen to music. And if you’re a writer, you have to read. Try to think of your favorite books and write down what makes them your favorites. What kinds of tropes appeal to you (tvtropes is a great tool for helping you understand them) and you think would appeal for people with similar tastes to you. When reading, try to understand the parts of the narrative (the character arcs, the narrative arcs, plot devices, etc.). By learning from the great, you become great yourself. 

Don’t put pressure on yourself

Writing is not as hard as it seems. Once you get it going, it’s quite relaxing. A lot of problems we have is virtually on our heads. It doesn’t have to go anywhere, it can be just for you. And your ideas matter. Has it been done before? Great. But it hasn’t been done by you. You have an unique set of experiences and thoughts that make you unlike any other writer (or person) in the world and no one could tell your story better than you. 

I hope that cover what you wanted/needed. I’m super happy to be able to help. Don’t hesitate to message me if you need anything else! Also, whoever is taking a look at this, feel free to shoot me an ask if there’s anything you think I could help you with and follow me for similar content!

[jenroses]

things that apparently get me unstuck with writing:

1. Doing research about the thing I’m writing about, and making notes/spreadsheets/calendars about it. I know people are like, “Don’t waste time researching” but it’s never a waste for me. I spent a few hours entering figure skating routines into the spreadsheet, tweaking things until the scores made sense for what I wanted, and then the writing of the intense figure skating bits was suddenly easy once I had a list of who came in what order and what the scores were. No research or “go look it up while writing” is not very productive for me, but “dedicate specific time to organizing your thoughts and research in an easy-to-refer sheet” is incredibly helpful. I’ve spent weeks or months or in one case, years on research before blowing out 4000+ words in a couple hours or 200,000 words in a couple months. It just makes the descriptions easier (and more accurate). I can decide, mid-research, “Oh, I don’t need to parse those particular scores because I’m going to gloss over them as not plot relevant, but it’s harder to be trying to write and having to parse “what’s going on” and “How to describe what’s going on” at the same time. 

2. Rereading either the whole thing (if it’s been a while) or the last two chapters (if it’s long) and thinking, “What comes next?” (Related: Think about the timeline of the story, pick a random date, and think, “what are they doing now? do I care about this bit?”)

3. If I’m getting bored with a particular section, I assume my reader will, too. Time to skip ahead to another plot bunny. This means, for example, that I might be writing three different chapters at the same time, and then re-reading them and going “Okay, what happens in between and does the reader REALLY need to know?” If my computer was a desk this would mean short pieces written on post-it notes randomly glued to the lamp, phone and someone’s forehead, but because google docs is easily searchable, it ends up being more manageable, do you whippersnappers UNDERSTAND that once upon a time tabbed browsing did not exist? Sometimes this means switching fandoms/projects.

4. Feed the muse. If you’re “supposed” to be writing a long, angsty fic and you have an idea tickling at you for a short silly smut... write it. Then go back to your original project. Sometimes cranking out something short and cracky will give you the boost you need to get back to the longer stuff.

5. Pick a spot in your story and start writing. Sometimes this doesn’t work at all, and sometimes I discover I’ve added another 3k words without trying. If it’s not there, I don’t push it, but sometimes it just takes dropping the cursor in and saying the next thing, which sounds basic but is remarkably complex if you’re used to only writing when the mood strikes.

6. Hire someone to clean my house and get a lot of minor annoyances off my plate. (It’s not that I can’t write in a mess, but it’s harder.)

And last, but not least...

7. Tell everyone I’m not going to write this month. That apparently wakes up the stubborn part of me that doesn’t like nanowrimo and aims it at a different thing to be stubborn at... my own stubbornness. IDK either! My brain is strange that way. But I barely wrote in October and I’m closing in on 10k for November, which isn’t all that high for me but which only represents about 3 writing sessions, so there’s that. 

[thewordworrier]

Okay. 

I completely missed the year anniversary date, but whatever. It’s been over a year since - I - sent this message. I had been so, so creatively dry - work, depression, my general lack of disinterest in writing and reading. Then I fell into x Reader fanfic, and I found Robin (and a handful of others) and… Well. The ask says it all? Because, boy, did the bug come back! I mean, my masterlist is just the tip of the iceburg, really. Y’all haven’t seen all the words I’ve written as part of NaNoWriMo slash NaNoWriMo Camp events I’ve written since then. I’ve shared a lot of snippets from stuff, older stuff as well as the stuff I’ve written in this past year or so (hi ArrangedMarriage AU). Y’all haven’t seen the 30k fanfic I’m still working on that I started… Sometimes in June? Google Docs says I created the document on 23rd June 2021 but I think it might’ve been just before that. I’ve been chipping away at that. Despite the fact that I had the idea/dream a few years ago, much like with YHCTT - I’ve only recently been brave enough to put them down on paper. And there’s the handful of notebooks I’ve filled since I got bitten again too. (There’s also the small mention of Razzmatazz - I don’t remember the last album I’d purchased before that; just the ocassional track here and there, but not a full album. And also getting back into Taylor Swift’s music again.) I mean, it may seem a bit… Like I’m exaggerating, but when I can’t write, I’m pretty miserable, and I think my boyfriend can atttest to that, so to say that I’ve had a better year this past year is very accurate. Even if work has sucked actual ass, at least I’ve had writing to come home to. I mean, not only that, but she’s an utter fucking sweetheart. Totally encouraging, complete enabler, legit someone I share braincells with. She’s a great sounding board, tolerates me talking/whining about writing and has -more than once- thrown an idea at me that has unstuck my brain. (Oh and she deals with me being constantly thirsty for Gerard, somestimes Frank, on main. She deserves a medal for that XD y’all do.) And she’s cute too. But I just - I adore that Virgo y’all <3 I don’t know quite what I’m trying to say here. Or at least, I don’t know how to word things, because

thank you

doesn’t seem to be quite enough.

I just wanted to say something. You're an awesome writer and everything I've read (which I think is literally everything at this point. Multiple times) has been worth the wait. You're my favourite and you've kinda inspired me to go back to my own bloody god-awful self indulgent Gee fanfics. Which is a huge thing for me 'cause depression ate my writing bug three or four years ago and hasn't really wanted to give it back until now.

Seriously thank you so much for this message! I didn't respond right away because I kept reading and rereading it because it made my day 😊

And I totally understand about how awful depression can be with regard to creativity and writing. I went untreated for quite a while before I got help last fall. I was worried I'd "lose my creativity" but as @mariawritesfanfic can attest, it really hasn't been the case (as I'm always bombarding her with "I have another idea!" messages) so I hope you can find enjoyment in writing again!

[krisroley]

Roley 6/11/2017: Zero To NaNoWriMo In Never

If you’re anything like me, you’ve got a zillion ideas in your head, but the trouble is getting it out of your head and on paper.  That transition is the most painful experience, because not only do you not know how to start, you’re also fighting that monster that thinks that nothing you have inside you is worth anything, nobody will like it, and then there’s it’s twin brother, the monster that fights you bringing what’s inside you to the physical world.  It tells you there’s a Pay Per view on, and shouldn’t you be hosing down the cat or something?  That’s why your brain hates every single time you sit down to write, and you sit there staring at a clean white screen. Worse yet, you may have even had a sentence or two on there that you’ve deleted a million times because you (or the monsters) hate it. 

Then you get discouraged because everything you try to write sucks and walk away.  What a waste. 

This happens to me ALL the time, and I totally get the irony of a guy trying to help you create things telling you that he gets stuck all the time.  It’s part of being any kind of a creator.  You either learn to live with it or your don’t.  It’s getting to that point that’s the hard slog.  If I can’t get something out of my head today, I’ve had to learn the patience to just let it come out when it wants to.  it sucks for consistency—like doing a podcast, for example—but when I rush things, they suck.  When I let it happen, it’s been some of my best work. 

Let’s talk about creativity under some kind of structure and deadline for a moment, and why I think that’s the worst thing you can do if you’re just beginning.  

Every year, there’s an event called Nanowrimo, where the idea is to write a 50,000 word novel.  It doesn’t matter if you suck, the point is to get you unstuck.  However, I can’t tell you the number of people that start and don’t finish because getting stuck is commonplace.  They look at that final number and shut down the second they get stuck.  “I’ll never get it done”, they say.  Even if they’ve broken it down to the daily equivalent—1,667 words a day—it’s still too big if you’re still staring at a blank sheet of paper a week in.  So they give up. 

As much as I admire the purpose of Nanowrimo, I have to wonder if it’s done more damage to people who secretly harbor an aspiration for writing, but are still fighting those monsters. 

So, I’m gonna tell you not to fight the monsters.  I’m also gonna tell you not to participate in Nanowrimo.  

Yet. 

What I AM going to say is that if you really want to write—if you really want to create something—one day that need to make something is going to outweigh the desire to avoid the monsters.  That’s the day whatever it is you want to make will get made.  But in the meantime, fly under the monster’s radar.  Can you write a sentence a day?  Can you take one step towards your creation a day?  One little baby step?  Here’s the deal, though: you have to say to yourself, “I’m going to take this one step today.  I don’t care right now if it’s good or bad. I’m not going to listen to the monsters, I’m just gonna do this one little thing today and walk away.”  

Then write your sentence, save your document, and go do something else.  Tomorrow, do the same thing.  There’s no clock, there’s no judgement, there’s just one little baby step.  Commit to the baby step, and that’s all.  No more.  There’s no reason you can’t go back and edit or revise later.  We’re not worried about that now.  We’re just taking a baby step. 

This is based off an idea I heard once about a guy who hates running.  He just said to himself, I’m just gonna put on my shoes. Then it became, I’m just gonna put on my shoes and go outside.  Then, it was I’m just gonna go for a walk to the end of the driveway.  

You see where this leads?  Running. 

You won’t go from zero to NaNoWrimo tomorrow.  You can go from Zero to a paragraph in a week, if you’re taking baby steps.  Try it.  

Then, here’s a bonus...look at other areas where baby steps might be the key to getting other things done.  You’ve heard the story of the compounding pennies, right?  I won’t rehash it here, but the point here is that little things add up to big things, if you let them. 

So let them.