2008 & 2009
Writers Digest Best Writers' Site
2010 Critters Best Writers' Info Site
Start your own freelance writing career - with
advice from a pro:
There's Always
a Book Inside of You
Rob Parnell
Do you ever have those days when you don't
know what to write about? And worse, do those days turn
into weeks and months, even years?
You're not alone. I know this for a fact because people
email me and send me letters about it all the time.
According to most surveys, 80% of people feel they have a
writer inside, someone who could - and thinks they should
- write a book at some point in their lives. That's a
huge statistic.
So huge that it's the kind of percentage that would have
marketers foaming at the mouth! But experience shows that
only around 5% actually get around to any kind of serious
writing in their lifetimes - and only around 1% of that
5% end up getting paid to do it.
That's why, in marketing terms, writing remains a niche -
one of those nebulous terms that means 'so specialized'
as to be largely irrelevant to modern demographics.
Clearly that doesn't quash the urge to write for most of
us. But this issue of "I want to write but I can't
think what to write about" remains for many a point
of frustration for much of their lives.
My feeling is that is usually caused by having too high
expectations of ourselves.
We tend to think that our words and sentences should be
good and wonderful the moment we put them down on paper.
The beginner can feel immense distress after writing a
paragraph and realizing it's either awful, or nothing
like the thought they wanted to transfer.
We should take comfort in the fact that this phenomenon
is as true for seasoned writers as it is for the
beginner!
Removing the barrier between our thoughts and their
expression is something a writer may take a lifetime to
learn - and never quite thoroughly master.
I think it was Evelyn Waugh who said that he found
writing in his old age much harder than in his youth
because the more he tried to get down precisely what he
meant, the more laborious the process seemed to become. A
few throw away lines that may have sufficed as a younger
man became pages of exposition that delved further and
deeper into delicate nuances that seemed almost
impossible for him to capture.
Churchill expressed the same concerns as he aged - and
his works became longer and denser.
One of my intentions with The Easy Way to Write is to
short circuit this dilemma.
Because I believe that our subconscious minds have a much
better grasp on writing, story, theme, structure and
style than our conscious, rational minds.
This is one of the reasons why thinking too much doesn't
seem to help us write. Thinking is thinking.
But writing is writing. And the only way to solve a
writing problem - a block or a lack of ideas - is to
write.
I've noticed this over and again. That if you switch off
your inner critic somehow - ignore it, or deliberately
suppress it - and just write the first thing that comes
into your head, then the subconscious somehow kicks in
and takes over.
And this is not just the case for short pieces. I've also
noticed that if you write every day, the subconscious can
actually guide you through an entire novel. I used to
marvel at how my brain could even begin to hold a 150,000
word opus in mind all at the same time - until I realized
it can't, and doesn't.
It's the subconscious that does this job. It holds the
novel in a hidden databank. And if you're true to
yourself - and have an objective moral compass - then
your storylines tend to surface naturally.
Writing professors will often tell you about their
favorite novelists who've managed to weave profound
themes into their work - and still created superb prose
to house them.
But this is to misunderstand the process a writer uses.
I've yet to see a writer interviewed who will say they
had all their themes - even subject matter - worked out before
they started writing. This is not how it works. Themes,
indeed stories, characters and plots are subconscious
manifestations of the writer's mindset and attitudes
that come through the work, rather than being
deliberately planned and executed to any formula.
At best, writing is a mysterious process that defies
explanation.
But this is good. It means that all of us can do it - if
we let go of any preconceptions or expectations of our
abilities.
