What motivates you to write?

[TASTYLEADPAINT]

Self loathing

 

[CharlesEBrown]

To be fair, when I can write, I write because these stories WANT to get out (and I hope maybe I'll make money on one or two of them eventually, but mostly they just need to get OUT).

 

[Notadate]

FUCKING MY MC OVER

 

[CharlesEBrown]

Well, you finished novels so your chances are high...

Well, one novella, three RPG modules and a very amateurish novel that, unless an ex-girlfriend still has the print copy, no longer exists in any accessible media (3.5 inch floppy disk for the last major version of DOS before Windows 3.1 took over everything, in a program called First Writer). Everything else is still in progress.

Oh, Strange Awakening had the first major story arc finished too, but that's not a finished novel, just a 40 or so chapter arc...

 

[FRWriter]

Money.

Honestly, this is a W take.

Love it when people are honest ;)

 

[LeilaniOtter]

Money. ?

But apart from that, I'm also motivated by my readers. I love the idea of sitting down and writing something, and thinking to myself, "OMG, they're going to love this." I love entertaining; I kick myself for not getting into screenwriting earlier in life, and it's a thrill to write something if I think i'm going to make someone's day. I don't write for me very often. ?

 

[Bobple]

A combination of a desire to create and dread of leaving things incomplete.

 

[ChristopherMartinsen]

I just like to write and tell my story.
And, I want to some day be able to show my kids a story that I've written.

When stuck, I either just take a little break and do something completely different, or work a little on my second series, or dabble with short stories. You'd be amazed how much a little break can do.

 

[Alfir]

Get rid of youtube, tiktok, twitter, reddit, or any social media that eats away at your attention. Even games if you could. I've deleted my COD and Modern Warfare, and now, I rarely play games.

 

[Cookiez_N_Potionz]

I use to really love drawing but I kept falling behind in school, so I switched to writing. Very different craft but I didn't wanna lose my creativity.

My favorite genre is paranormal

 

[DireBadger]

I love reading. Always have. But most modern stuff in my preferred genre is utter crap. I thought I could do better, so I do.

 

[Alucard21]

Depression.

 

[Max02]

I write as a means to escape depression and anxiety, because it helps to pass the time and when I get obsessed about a story I can think about nothing else but to finish it as soon as possible, until my mind is ready to be free of it and to engage with other topics.

Writing is tiresome at times but it's surely a more interesting way to pass the time than TT or Instagram.

 

[Shorgoth]

It was a bit of an exorcism for me at first. Now? Now I write because it's my life's work.

What you are feeling is not a lack of motivation; it's a lack of things to write. You had lived enough to have something to write, but you reached the end for now. Now you need to expand your horizons, live a little, have new experiences, good and bad... then it will come to you. You can't keep drilling a dry well and get more oil. You have to explore and find oil. It can be by getting inspirations from others, from different subjects (that part is critical), from lived experiences, from trauma... the list is long. Simply put: Touch grass, take walks, find love or whatever else you need to do. Don't think pushing like that is helpful; it will just be more frustrating, more traumatic. When I can't write the next chapter, I let it simmer for a while, do other unrelated things, explore myself (NO, not like that, boink!) Then it comes to me naturally at some point (I really am digging my own grave, ain't I?).

 

[Worthy39]

It was a bit of an exorcism for me at first. Now? Now I write because it's my life's work.

What you are feeling is not a lack of motivation; it's a lack of things to write. You had lived enough to have something to write, but you reached the end for now. Now you need to expand your horizons, live a little, have new experiences, good and bad... then it will come to you. You can't keep drilling a dry well and get more oil. You have to explore and find oil. It can be by getting inspirations from others, from different subjects (that part is critical), from lived experiences, from trauma... the list is long. Simply put: Touch grass, take walks, find love or whatever else you need to do. Don't think pushing like that is helpful; it will just be more frustrating, more traumatic. When I can't write the next chapter, I let it simmer for a while, do other unrelated things, explore myself (NO, not like that, boink!) Then it comes to me naturally at some point (I really am digging my own grave, ain't I?).

Full honesty, what inspired the first 50 chapters to be written so quickly was discovering Zombieland saga. When I saw the concept, and how terrible it was, I figured whatever I could imagine off the top of my head couldn't possibly be worse than zombie idols.

 

[Shorgoth]

Full honesty, what inspired the first 50 chapters to be written so quickly was discovering Zombieland saga. When I saw the concept, and how terrible it was, I figured whatever I could imagine off the top of my head couldn't possibly be worse than zombie idols.

OK, so you took someone else's story (admittedly a bad one) and never did the work to plan and structure it yourself or imagine past a point because you do not have a strong feel for the story. It's no wonder. Please understand that I'm saying it with the best intent in mind, even if it might be harsh to hear... You basically stole someone else's bad homework and copied from it... No wonder you're stuck; it's a castle built on sand. You'll have to rework it in your head from scratch then. There is a limit on how much one can do without doing the full mental work. It's not a desperate situation, but you have a lot of catching up to do.

 

[Worthy39]

OK, so you took someone else's story (admittedly a bad one) and never did the work to plan and structure it yourself or imagine past a point because you do not have a strong feel for the story. It's no wonder. Please understand that I'm saying it with the best intent in mind, even if it might be harsh to hear... You basically stole someone else's bad homework and copied from it... No wonder you're stuck; it's a castle built on sand. You'll have to rework it in your head from scratch then. There is a limit on how much one can do without doing the full mental work.

Oh, no no no, I'm not saying I stole their work. The fact something so bizarre got popular inspired me to make more details about a story I already had floating around in my head. While there are bits here and there inspired by other stories (at this point, every story takes inspiration from at least one other story), the idea and concepts are definitely not based on Zombieland saga. Seeing that something so random was popular simply inspired me to focus and write off the top of my head.

 

[Shorgoth]

Oh, no no no, I'm not saying I stole their work. The fact something so bizarre got popular inspired me to make more details about a story I already had floating around in my head. While there are bits here and there inspired by other stories (at this point, every story takes inspiration from at least one other story), the idea and concepts are definitely not based on Zombieland saga. Seeing that something so random was popular simply inspired me to focus and write off the top of my head.

Ah, sorry for the misunderstanding! Though even if you did, I didn't mean it would have been necessarily bad. Dali said it best: good artists copy, great artists steal XD

But yeah, no matter what, if you didn't do the work to get a good feel for your world and characters, you will get stuck. Do you understand on a deep emotional level your main cast? What drives them, not their goals, their morals and values, their traumas and how they interact with their behaviours... start from base principles and it will naturally build itself.

Sorry I wasn't clearer on this.

 

[Fox-Trot-9]

As a reader and a writer, it's this: wanting to know what happens next.

 

[lambenttyto]

I started my story with a lot of excitement to keep it going, and ended up burning through dozens of chapters in a month. Now, I've got a lot of ideas for the story I'm really excited about, but every time I sit down to actually write it out, I get distracted by literally everything. What tricks do you guys use to stay motivated and actually focus on your writing?

I find the more I prepare for a story, the more distractable I am, because if I know the story in my head, the process of writing is now actually a form of transcription, and that's just boring work. If I'm telling myself a story as I write it, not knowing too much about where I'm heading, I find myself getting very excited to FIND OUT what happens.