thinking too much about my writing

[authordaeygur]

Hello, I'm a new writer on Scribble Hub, and I really want to write some of my stories on here.
I have a few story ideas that are bouncing around in my mind, but I think I'm sucking the joy out of it. All my life I wanted to be an author and get published by some big publishing company. I know that probably will never happen, and for ten years I kept writing for publishing, not for me. I now want to stop writing for publishing and write for me but it's a battle lol. I hope I'm not the only one who feels this way. I just wanted to vent for a bit.

I used to write a bunch of fanfiction on Fanfiction.Net, but since I got real serious about my work I can't even write fanfiction. It's like my writing powers have been zapped from me! LOL

 

[Cossimeri]

Mood.

I seriously handicapped myself with the same concepts and it ended up with me giving up writing altogether. It is kind of frustrating to imagine where I'd be if I'd kept writing after high school and just self-published. I'd at least have more than a single story under my belt.

These days I overcome my 'writer's paralysis' by having set word goals for every day. On days where I have my day job I require myself to write 500 words, and on days I have off I require a minimum of 1,000 words. If I miss a day for any reason I add half that day's goal to the next day and then move forward. I know it kind of makes writing sound like a job, but that's the kind of structure my mind needed to force itself into compliance. My creativity is an employee ^.~ I don't let her work only when it is convenient.

 

[NotaNuffian]

I am running on my old failed ideas for my current work. Now watch me whip, watch me nainai!

 

[OneRanter]

I used to write a bunch of fanfiction on Fanfiction.Net, but since I got real serious about my work I can't even write fanfiction. It's like my writing powers have been zapped from me! LOL

It may be that when you started getting serious about publishing you began researching and stuying about techniques, plot, characters, developement, etc, and now your own standards are much higher than what you demanded from yourself when writing fanfictions.
Although it is only a posibilty, testing it is easy. You just need to go back and check what you wrote before to see if you cringe at it xD

Leaving that aside, from my personal experience, and what I have seen of others in the forum, it is fairly common to have doubts. You can check that too looking into earlier threads and see people asking about all kind of issues about anything. Good luck!

 

[DubstheDuke]

I mean as I always say, writing is all about fun. If you don't enjoy your story, how will anyone?

I write for fun. I like throwing in crazy characters, horrid backstories, and strange quirks.

There is also a lot of fun in having a deep rooted plot, some emotional development, and so on and so forth, but if it doesn't come naturally then it could be a real pain in the brain. All I can say is if you find yourself writing and aren't on the edge of your seat, cracking a smile like a madman, you're doing something wrong.

-madman who you shouldn't listen to.

 

[JayDirex]

I used to write trash! (Bad grammar everything). now my writing is fire! ?

The point is keep writing and absolutely write for you. Write from the heart, even if it's not the most popular thing up here, I promise you're going to get a dedicated following even if it's just like 40 readers.

Don't disappoint them.

 

[Queenfisher]

I feel for you. I have the same concerns, only mine are that writing "seriously" (or what I consider serious) is fun for me but not very fun (or popular) in the eyes of the potential readers.

Thus, I constantly try to "fix" my writing by making it more accessible and entertaining for what I think (and sometimes witness) the majority of readers enjoy, but... yeah, that sucks all fun of what I want to write.

Standing down and writing what (only) I genuinely enjoy is super scary because I always feel like I'm killing my own chances at being read by many people, but oh well.

I have to remind myself this:

There will always be people who genuinely enjoy writing what you (or Ianyone) consider popular trash, or pretentious lit, or chick lit, or macho lit, or whatever. You don't have to copy them just to fit in because they're popular. They will always be naturally better at it than your halfhearted attempt to mimic them -- because they are enjoying it.

So write whatever you genuinely enjoy ^^. It will show in your writing and the few people who would want to read it will love it because it's authentic.


In regard to the "serious" writing, I have my own "PTSD" with that:

Spoiler: My gripes with tradpub

I had the same issues with MFA and SFWA-approved writing earlier, too, while writing to be published in "serious" magazines. After I learned the patterns of what is accepted there, it actually felt like such a conveyor-belt of catering to the approved tastes. And nothing else. A checklist of requirements, and no artistic freedom whatsoever. Use this specific style, this specific set of idioms and metaphors, this set of topics, etc. Anything else -- and you're out. Like I'm a machine, for hell's sake. I finally succeeded in publishing in a couple of places, but with stories that I wrote literally by a beat-sheet (I.e. a standardized template for short stories) with zero creativity applied and kind of gibberish that even I didn't know what it was about, lol.

(But supposedly that's what the editors wanted, so... whatever).

Honestly, after that whole disaster, I felt like web-fiction would help me with liberating me from my writerly depression, but it's kind of more of the same, lol.

So please do not worry too much about it.

 

[Jemini]

If you've been working at it for 10 years, I'm pretty sure anything you have to write will be far better than the average seen on this site. So, think of it this way. There are a lot of people here who don't let the fact that they suck stop them from writing. You can probably write better than they can, so what do you have to be afraid of exactly?

(Yeah, I know I have kinda a blunt and harsh way of encouraging people, but I hope some of that might be usable.)

Anyway, bottom line, just write and put your stuff out there. Silencing that voice in your head that tells you that you are not good enough is the major fight that any author has to face. Just write. Even if it's not publishing worthy, and even if it's not good enough to earn you a good enough following that you can get financial support from your readers, just writing is the way that you get there. Put your stuff out there.

Some of the biggest authors in the Web Novel community earn 6 figures off their Patreon, and most of their first few dozen chapters really suck. The way that they got such a huge following is that they stuck with it.

(I mean, Ok, "He Who Fights With Monsters" had a pretty solid start, but "Azarinth Healer" and "The Legend of Randidly Ghosthound" both start very rough but the authors for those series kept writing and now they're earning bank.)

 

[Motsu]

 

[RepresentingCaution]

Humans aren't all that different. If you write what you love, someone out there will love it, too. Not everyone, obviously, but you'll rock someone's world.

 

[BenJepheneT]

This is actually a good chance for introspection. What are you writing for? To simply have your works be published in physical form? To gain fame? To replicate/recreate an emotion you've felt in stories you've worked on? To improve your writing itself? To reach a personal goal?

This is how life goes. Reality never works to your favour; they're only lucky coincidences. Is writing that important to you? Is it a passion you have worth the sacrifice for the material side of your life? Are you willing to forgo the reality to chase your aspiration?

If you can answer all those questions confidently, you'll be able to find your conclusion eventually.

You can never have everything, but you can hold on to as much as you can.

 

[TLCsDestiny]

In probably less then a hundred years you'll be gone...You want to do nothing now? Or leave something behind?
On a much less future note lol, I suggest you go for publishing, it seemed you did more that way!
Don't stress so much but at the same time don't only rely on your writing to live, that's all...