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It's interesting how the subconscious communicates to you when it doesn't like what you're currently writing. For me, the 'tell' is when I'm finding it hard to sit down and write the scene, when I'm breaking a sweat to hammer out a single acceptable sentence, when checking to see if there's student e-mail that needs to be answered is more important than kicking up Scrivener, when watching a re-run of a television show holds more appeal than laying down new words, when I find myself wandering down to the kitchen to see what's in the fridge.
Gaining weight can be a symptom, too…
The subconscious is saying, as clearly as it can, "Hey, you up there! You're going in the wrong direction. You need to toss this scene and find a better path."
That's hard advice to take when you're 1,500 words into a chapter and it's taken you a week of struggle and five additional pounds to get that far. Sometimes I don't listen. Sometimes I just bull through anyway until the scene is finished and I'm on to the next one, hoping that it's not going to also be like finding out the tender steak you thought you were going to eat is actually a piece of tire tread.
When this happens, I've always found that it's best to pay heed to the subconscious and either delete the scene entirely, or -- if I'm still hesitant -- to at least cut the scene from the work and place it aside where I can retrieve it later if I change my mind. But I find that I rarely end up going back to that scene. Almost always, the scene I finally write to replace the recalcitrant one flows far better and feels much more satisfactory. I might go and steal a few lines from the abandoned thread, but usually it just stays gone.
I just had that experience again this morning. I've been fighting a scene (and losing) for the last four days. Today, the subconscious finally got fed up enough with me to give me a glimpse of the Path I Should Have Taken In The First Place (the epiphany came, as it often does for me, in the shower). I deleted the entire draft scene and just started over, with a different character in a different setting… and the words were coming much more easily. I could hear the subconscious sighing and muttering to itself. "Good grief, what a stupid mule that man is…"
So how is it for you? How does your subconscious let you know when it thinks you're heading off into the Swamp of Futility in your latest work-in-progress? How do you respond?
Gaining weight can be a symptom, too…
The subconscious is saying, as clearly as it can, "Hey, you up there! You're going in the wrong direction. You need to toss this scene and find a better path."
That's hard advice to take when you're 1,500 words into a chapter and it's taken you a week of struggle and five additional pounds to get that far. Sometimes I don't listen. Sometimes I just bull through anyway until the scene is finished and I'm on to the next one, hoping that it's not going to also be like finding out the tender steak you thought you were going to eat is actually a piece of tire tread.
When this happens, I've always found that it's best to pay heed to the subconscious and either delete the scene entirely, or -- if I'm still hesitant -- to at least cut the scene from the work and place it aside where I can retrieve it later if I change my mind. But I find that I rarely end up going back to that scene. Almost always, the scene I finally write to replace the recalcitrant one flows far better and feels much more satisfactory. I might go and steal a few lines from the abandoned thread, but usually it just stays gone.
I just had that experience again this morning. I've been fighting a scene (and losing) for the last four days. Today, the subconscious finally got fed up enough with me to give me a glimpse of the Path I Should Have Taken In The First Place (the epiphany came, as it often does for me, in the shower). I deleted the entire draft scene and just started over, with a different character in a different setting… and the words were coming much more easily. I could hear the subconscious sighing and muttering to itself. "Good grief, what a stupid mule that man is…"
So how is it for you? How does your subconscious let you know when it thinks you're heading off into the Swamp of Futility in your latest work-in-progress? How do you respond?
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Also, this explains my shrinking clothes.
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Sometimes it doesn’t hit me until I’ve written, oh, a lot. The story itself works up to a certain point...and then, not so much.
I actually wrote half a book, and then had to stop for a week, at the end of which I walked into the store and thought: Oh, of course. It’s the wrong viewpoint. Which is odd, because it’s the same viewpoint as the first book in the trilogy... but it wasn’t the right viewpoint for this book.
So, I had to throw that 50k out, and unfortunately, given my process, it’s gone. I feel a lot better about it, though...
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