Too Many Voices

For when you want to Do All The Things…

Are you sick of people telling you what you should be doing? (I know I am!)

There are so many things a writer ‘could’ be doing (social media, courses, mentorships, retreats, conferences, residencies…)

And only one thing a writer must do: write.

It’s easy to be distracted by the former, to the detriment of the latter.

So Much Noise

After the New Year lull, we’re hading into a season where it seems everyone is inviting you to attend a writers’ conference, a course, a retreat, a summit…and you’re going to have to tune most of it out—along with the FOMO—if you want to do any writing.

In my experience, the best way to stay focused and keep making progress is to limit your options: find one group where you belong, one teacher or annual conference that works for you, and then tune out the rest…for now.

Signal vs Noise

How do you identify the places that work for you?

There’s some trial and error, but here are some questions you can use while you’re evaluating different options:

  • Does showing up for these events make me more productive or just aspire to be more productive?
  • Do I come away from these events exhausted or exhilarated?
  • Does belonging to this group fill me with a restless energy to create, or do I feel like showing up at the event/class/conference ticks the creativity box and I can do nothing until the next scheduled event?
  • Am I inspired to write more, by the people around me?
  • Do I often learn something new that I can put into practice in my own writing right now, or is the teaching at the wrong level/stage for me?

If the answers to these questions are ‘yes’, stick with those groups, conferences or teachers until you start to answer ‘no’ more often than not.

The Most Valuable Question

That last question (“Do I learn something that I can put into practice in my writing right now”) is the really important one.

You might like the people or the teacher, but find that being with them doesn’t make you more productive. This can happen if:

  • They’re operating at a different level of ambition than yours
  • They’re working at a different skill level from yours (either far behind where you are or so far ahead that it’s not inspiring, it’s discouraging.)

It’s Not A Race

There’s so much to learn…but only so much you need to know right now.

Find the spaces that solve the challenges you are facing today.

Make progress on the challenges that face you today. Pause to celebrate and really FEEL that progress.

The rest can wait.

The Superstars Advantage
The fastest way to get better at writing stories is to write more stories — and reflect on them with other writers. That’s what the StoryADay Superstars group was built for.
You could do it alone, but why make it harder than it needs to be?
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Writing To Entertain

How cultivating wonder can keep your creative energy flowing, and why it’s so important to nurture it…

I recently caught an old interview (from 1974) with Harold Robbins. Apparently at the time he was the world’s best-paid novelist. You’d think that would cause the man to be self-important and precious, but when asked by the interviewer “Why do you think your books sell so well,” he answered, simply:

 “A novel is primarily an entertainment. And if the novelist forgets that, he’s lost.”

Write To Engage

Every month at StoryADay.org I set a theme for the articles and activities. Each one supports a part of the writing life, so that we can continue to build a satisfying writing practice, month after month, without becoming overwhelmed by trying to do everything–learn everything, master everything–at once.

This months’ theme is ‘Engage’, and I think that’s why I found Robbins’s elegant formula for writing success so appealing. 

He never forgot that his job was to engage with the reader.

Who Do You Write For?

When we first answer the call to write, we tend to say we’re writing for ourselves. Some of us continue in that vein forever, and that’s absolutely fine. 

Writing for pleasure, for mental health, to quiet the voices in our heads, or because it makes us easier to live with…these are all valid reasons for writing, and you’ll never hear me say you ‘ought’ to be doing it for any other reason or outcome.

But when people become serious about writing, and aspire to be published, there’s a trap waiting, and it’s this:

When we become serious about our writing, there is a temptation to plunge into all the courses and classes and critique groups, where other writers are trying to figure out what makes it all work.

There’s a danger, in trying to figure out if we’re using all five senses, and creating tension, and making our characters’s dialogue sound real, whether we’re showing not telling, and avoiding headhopping…that we forget job 1: to engage the reader and entertain them.

I’ve read lots of manuscripts that contained technically beautiful writing and bored me to tears. 

How To Engage Readers

“If you start with people that are valid, if you start with people that are exciting, people that mean things to the reader…you find that people identify with the character.” 

Harold Robbins, Parkinson (BBC TV 1974)

Making sure that our writing, first and foremost, is engaging for a reader is absolutely key. 

It explains why books like Fifty Shades of Grey do so well. 

Everyone who knows anying about what makes ‘good writing’, agrees that they are ‘terribly badly written’, and yet somehow millions of copies sold to people who were thoroughly engaged in the story of characters who are written in a way that’s never going to win any literary prizes. 

So what? It’s engaging!

Your personal tolerance for a mix of  ‘page-turner’ to ‘literary language’ in your own writing will be just that: highly personal.

But I certainly find it encouraging to think that in 1974, the highest-paid novelist in the world was willing to share the secret of his success and it was simply this: write about characters who feel real, in a way that readers can identify with.

No more. No less.

Makes it feel a bit more manageable, doesn’t it?

Join The Discussion

What about you? Do you obsess over perfect grammar and beautiful imagery, or do you skew towards creating entertaining romps? And are you–as I am–convinced that the best stories have a bit of each? Leave a comment.

Ready to turn those sparks of wonder into finished stories?

StoryaDay 3-Day Challenge

Take the 3-Day Challenge and write three short stories this weekend!

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Take the 3-Day Challenge — a short-story writing course you can finish this weekend. Go from “idea” to “The End” in three days, and give yourself the gift of an achievement you can celebrate.