Getting started with writing can be elusive. We believe we want to write. We have ideas for stories. We find a phrase turning over and over in our minds. But somehow, we don’t start. Or we do, and it seems to go nowhere.
This is where the professionals have us. They have habit. They write regularly. Often every day. That habit not only strings words together, but it makes it easy to sit down and capture ideas. For the pros, their expectations are lower than for the rest of us mortals. They don’t expect the perfect draft immediately. They know that the writing will twist and turn away from the anticipated destination. They are confident that some of today’s writing will be thrown away.
They are confident.
That’s the big thing. They know that by returning to their craft day after day they will amass, revise, refine, and ultimately, after much work, have a text they are willing to share with readers—be they friends or editors or the paying public.
The rest of us have dreams, ephemeral dreams that we worry will disappear in the light of day. And so they do. Because we don’t have habit and we lack confidence and so we let our worst nightmares take over and we don’t sit down and string words together. The feeling of failure grows within and we say, feeling like frauds: “I’d like to write.” “I can’t find time to write.” “Someday I’ll write the great American novel.”
To do that, we must start. One word in front of another, steps across the page. In the best of circumstances, when the phrase gets caught in my head I sit down not just to write those seven words, but to follow where they lead for 20 minutes or so. Most of the time, I don’t even have that much inspiration so I trick myself into beginning. I read a favorite passage from a writer I admire. I google a bit of research on an idea I heard on the radio. I write an email to someone about something I want to write. Each of these tricks moves me toward beginning without calling it that, without putting the fear of failure front and center.
I also say, “This won’t be part of the story, I’m just getting down some notes.” It’s a little lie, but an effective one. Without the fear, notes can turn into something if I stay with them awhile.
I’m also not averse to opening multiple documents for multiple beginnings. That act starts a revision process. It signals I’m not looking for perfection, I’m looking for an opening, one that will take me through the door, the door to the other side of consciousness where I let my intuition create and I stop trying to be in control. On that side is a bouncy house like they have for kids’ parties.
Even without the professional habit of writing every day (how we all long for that!), I can establish habits that let me go through the door, habits that let me start bouncing, start writing, without a consuming fear that incapacitates me.
Or I can wait for tomorrow. And tomorrow. And tomorrow. And while the petty pace of life beats on, I will not be the writer I dream of, only the nightmarish ghoul I fear.
When an idea strikes, write it and more. When you find that 15 or 20 minutes and you wonder what to do. Write—or do the acts that lead there—read and research. Lie to yourself that this isn’t writing as you sit at the keyboard and begin: you’re not writing your masterpiece, you’re just writing…one word…after…another.
Begin…
