One of my biggest challenges with writing fiction is getting all those ideas on the page so I can work with them. It’s not that I don’t know what to say — I’m rarely at a loss for words anytime, but especially not when I’m lost in Story World. The ideas are great in my head and I know a lot about where I want to go. The problem is that I want these wonderful scenes to be great once they hit the page — but those of us who are writers know that’s rarely the case. I know that too, which is why I love editing … and tweaking … and playing with my thesaurus or Flip Dictionary until everything in that scene is just so.
So what’s the problem with that, some of you might ask. The problem is that I can get so hung up on making a scene work perfectly that it’s hard to keep moving. I need to learn the art of dumping ideas on the page and getting the basic story down before I fiddle it to perfection. Writing the bones and then adding muscles and flesh, as some writers call it. How do I do that? I’m not really sure, but I’m getting better at highlighting words I know I want to change and leaving blanks to fill in later instead of wracking my brain for the right phrase. Maybe that’s a step in the right direction, but I’ll take all the help I can get.
Any advice from you other writers who are much better at getting that initial draft knocked out than I am? What’s your trick for keeping things moving instead of getting bogged down in trying to make it right the first time? I’ll take all the help I can get! 🙂
