That’s a lie.
Yes, being on a word count roll is something to be proud of, but it’s not been easy, and it doesn’t mean I haven’t veered off course or been stuck a few times, having to figure out where I might have gone in the wrong direction. I’ve been agonizing over my ending and shed a few tears about not knowing what to do with my characters next. I’ve had plenty of moments where I just sat at my laptop wanting to write, but nothing poured out.
I recently shelved my second manuscript without finishing it. I loved my characters, but somewhere down the line, I lost my plot line and the story fell apart. I mourned the death of my story and made the grave decision to put it away and start something new.
This new WIP has me excited again and wanting to write.
I guess the message and the lesson learned, is that writing the story isn’t always as simple as we want it to be. I mean, I always thought editing, revising, writing query letters and synopses were the hard part and that writing the first draft was the easy part, but I’m learning that this isn’t always the case. Not for me anyway.
I’d always pictured writers sitting at their desks, hashing away at the keys, producing page after page of story off the top of their heads and enjoying every minute of it. Now I know that’s not true for at least 75% of writers including me. I can actually say I’d rather revise and edit than sit down and write the story from scratch, but that doesn’t mean I don’t enjoy it even though it’s hard. Writing the story is just as hard or just as much work as the rest of the process.
With all that said, I now realize what an accomplishment it is to complete a Novel, and how proud I should be that after all that hard work, I'm eager to do it again and again whether I get published or not.
