Author Topic: I've figured out why I can't write the crap floating in my head down!  (Read 1167 times)

Offline Amechra

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It's because of a few reasons:

1. I have a deep subconscious "vibe" of secrecy and information gathering. When I was younger, I used to spend at least one month essentially monitoring a person before I even tried making friends with them. I find it difficult to share information I have not filed into the "safe" area with other people.

2. My brain thinks in terms of archetypes instead of cause-and-effect; oftentimes, the scene conjured up in my mind is layered in emotional "color", which is the important part, and which I can't translate to others. I mean, how can I share the horror and heartbreak of a broken robot whimpering about the fact that it is a machine?

3. Part of me is reasonably sure that no-one would actually enjoy the stuff I wrote down. I mean, if anyone asks, I'll write something out, but other than that...

4. I have too many ideas trying to get out at once. Seriously, unless you restrict me to something, it's like trying to fill a cup with a broken faucet. I've actually been kinda resisting consuming media because it just adds more ideas to the mix.
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Offline Jackinthegreen

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Sounds like you need your own dumping grounds where no one else can read what you wrote, at least at the start.

Offline altpersona

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yay for anonymous blogging
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Offline Kuroimaken

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Every writer has a process. This is fact. Some write the skeleton of a story before the story proper, some keep it all in their heads.

I'll share what I can.

First of all, I used to share number three. The Tales have shown me this is not always so. As long as you write, someone will find it amusing. Maybe not today, maybe not tomorrow, but if enough people read it, then someone will find it interesting.

Second of all, number four is a feature, not a bug. You will often find that one idea that doesn't look like it has its place in a given story does in another - or that an idea that sounded awesome really isn't that good. It's part of how writing works. What you CAN do is set hard limits to your story. Start writing realistic (or semi-realistic ) stories, and work your way up towards progressively more fantastic. Given enough time, you will learn to police yourself in keeping a given theme in check, and to file away certain ideas for different stories.

Third: The answer to number 2, I believe, is music. The sounds behind a given scene set a mood like nothing else. Perhaps more to the point, the written word does NOT have the power to convey emotion or meaning by itself. Only the reader's brain can do that, and the task of a writer isn't to transmit a mental image to someone else's head, it's to give him the pieces and let him build the picture himself.

Fourth: The reason behind number one is fear. This may appear so blatantly obvious it doesn't bear mentioning, but trust me, it does. It's not 'simple' insecurity, the inability to believe a metaphorical part of you reaching out to someone has the capacity to produce good for both, it's fear of what happens when you do touch that someone and you don't get what you expected. But the thing about fear is that, in this instance, it serves no purpose. Fear is a limiter to the things we do, a limiter that's supposed to be there to keep us from accidentally killing ourselves. But writing cannot lead to suicide, much less the emotional kind.

If it helps any: I would be willing to read anything and everything you'd write, Amechra. I used to think in much the same terms you do, and if it helps, you'd probably make a better writer anyway.

PM me your stuff sometime.
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Offline CaptRory

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