The Journey Here: Realizing I Had No Idea What I Was Doing
I wrote a brief summary of my writerly journey back when I started the blog (The Road So Far), but it was pretty bare bones, and I didn't mention all the details, such as when I realized I sucked at writing. So I thought I'd go into a little more depth now.
Like I've said in the past, writing was always a hobby of mine. Sometimes I ignored it and spent more time on the piano, and my other hobbies frequently wax and wan in relation to gaming. When my World of Warcraft guild fell apart, I moved on to League of Legends, which is way too addicting for me to even have installed on my computer anymore. (Now I've gone and allowed myself to install the Binding of Isaac... and unsurprisingly, my writing output has, uh, decreased). But through thick and thin, I always had stories going.
They weren't full-bodied novels--I pretty much never had plots, or much setting, or much of anything. I had characters and fun scenes or adventures I'd write (or start to write). Most of the time they only made it a few pages. Sometimes a few chapters. I never plotted a novel, and as much as I'd get excited and claim I was going to write a novel "this time," I never really believed it; I always got distracted by some other idea, or didn't care enough to keep pushing through a project. I did think I was pretty good at writing, though.
This is a common theme with me. I always think I'm awesome at writing. I get better, and look back and go "holy crap that was awful," and think the new stuff is amazing... rinse and repeat. I know I do it, and I'm okay with it. But I think it's hilarious to look at the really old stuff and realize how awful it was. Don't worry, I plan to share some with you eventually.
My poor friends tried to make me see how awful it was. They gave me advice that I either disagreed with, or thought I applied but actually didn't do very well. I had every classic beginner's thought along the lines of, "Nah, this infodump is really important, I'm not going to delete it," and "It's not confusing! You'll see it's explained in the next chapter!" and every other defensive gut response we all get initially.
As I mentioned in previous posts, what finally made it click for me was watching Brandon Sanderson's creative writing lectures on Youtube. It was a happy accident, really--I was bored one day, and had been watching some interviews with actors. It occurred to me I also love a lot of authors, so I typed my favorite one into the search bar, and that's what came up. From there, I was hooked. I essentially took the whole course, even though I didn't realize that's what was happening at the time.
I remember constantly thinking to myself that I was pleased I already knew most of the basics, things like show vs tell, basics of dialogue, prose, story structure, etc. Half the time, he'd articulate something I'd sensed and kind of figured out on my own without having words to go with it. However, as much as I felt I knew what he was talking about, I wasn't very good at applying it. The more I watched, the more self-aware I became. The really magical part is that every single time I re-watch a lecture, I learn something new and realize more depth and nuance than I did before. This is still true today, and I occasionally look up quotes from certain episodes, and end up re-watching the whole thing and being fascinated at the new details I hadn't noticed before.
As I finally became cognizant of writing technique, something clicked in my brain, and one day I looked at the story I'd been writing and thought... "Oh man, this whole chapter is one big backstory infodump, and it's really boring, just like Mishona said it was." There were a few other things with the characters and worldbuilding that struck me, but that's the BIG one, the defining moment in my memory. The point where I realized my writing sucked, my old stories were unsalvageable, and it was time to throw everything out and learn to write.
Tune in next time for how I went about doing that. :)
Like I've said in the past, writing was always a hobby of mine. Sometimes I ignored it and spent more time on the piano, and my other hobbies frequently wax and wan in relation to gaming. When my World of Warcraft guild fell apart, I moved on to League of Legends, which is way too addicting for me to even have installed on my computer anymore. (Now I've gone and allowed myself to install the Binding of Isaac... and unsurprisingly, my writing output has, uh, decreased). But through thick and thin, I always had stories going.
They weren't full-bodied novels--I pretty much never had plots, or much setting, or much of anything. I had characters and fun scenes or adventures I'd write (or start to write). Most of the time they only made it a few pages. Sometimes a few chapters. I never plotted a novel, and as much as I'd get excited and claim I was going to write a novel "this time," I never really believed it; I always got distracted by some other idea, or didn't care enough to keep pushing through a project. I did think I was pretty good at writing, though.
This is a common theme with me. I always think I'm awesome at writing. I get better, and look back and go "holy crap that was awful," and think the new stuff is amazing... rinse and repeat. I know I do it, and I'm okay with it. But I think it's hilarious to look at the really old stuff and realize how awful it was. Don't worry, I plan to share some with you eventually.
My poor friends tried to make me see how awful it was. They gave me advice that I either disagreed with, or thought I applied but actually didn't do very well. I had every classic beginner's thought along the lines of, "Nah, this infodump is really important, I'm not going to delete it," and "It's not confusing! You'll see it's explained in the next chapter!" and every other defensive gut response we all get initially.
As I mentioned in previous posts, what finally made it click for me was watching Brandon Sanderson's creative writing lectures on Youtube. It was a happy accident, really--I was bored one day, and had been watching some interviews with actors. It occurred to me I also love a lot of authors, so I typed my favorite one into the search bar, and that's what came up. From there, I was hooked. I essentially took the whole course, even though I didn't realize that's what was happening at the time.
I remember constantly thinking to myself that I was pleased I already knew most of the basics, things like show vs tell, basics of dialogue, prose, story structure, etc. Half the time, he'd articulate something I'd sensed and kind of figured out on my own without having words to go with it. However, as much as I felt I knew what he was talking about, I wasn't very good at applying it. The more I watched, the more self-aware I became. The really magical part is that every single time I re-watch a lecture, I learn something new and realize more depth and nuance than I did before. This is still true today, and I occasionally look up quotes from certain episodes, and end up re-watching the whole thing and being fascinated at the new details I hadn't noticed before.
As I finally became cognizant of writing technique, something clicked in my brain, and one day I looked at the story I'd been writing and thought... "Oh man, this whole chapter is one big backstory infodump, and it's really boring, just like Mishona said it was." There were a few other things with the characters and worldbuilding that struck me, but that's the BIG one, the defining moment in my memory. The point where I realized my writing sucked, my old stories were unsalvageable, and it was time to throw everything out and learn to write.
Tune in next time for how I went about doing that. :)
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