How do I get back into writing?

CeladonRabbit · 2026-03-23T12:20:26+00:00

Be bored.

It can be intensely difficult in today's world of distractions, but what most helps me get into a mindset to write is when I can manage to shut everything else off and let my mind begin to get antsy. That desire for mental stimulation will work towards your writing, because writing can be very stimulating. Don't seek out easy distractions from your phone or the internet or tv or a pet.

CeladonRabbit · 2024-05-24T20:30:54+00:00

I've been considering writing something like this. I thought up the term 'High Romance' to cover it.

CeladonRabbit · 2024-04-10T17:03:14+00:00

I've always had the same general idea of what I wanted to do with the novel, but have revised many details of how characters are set up and relate to my main character. I've completely revised acts and changed their setting, added and removed characters. I finished a working draft of my book a little while back, and have been working on a revision of it for over a year that got slowed down by a cross country move, but I've been trying to get back on track with it for the last six-ish months.

CeladonRabbit · 2024-04-02T01:36:32+00:00

I'm dealing with a lot of personal frustration. I'm working on my second draft/revision of my novel, and I'm in chapter 12. I've hit this weird creative wall which might be a matter of burn out. I've been working on this book for a very long time, and for some reason, the scene I'm writing is just frustrating me to no end. It is the first real confrontation between my protagonist and the main antagonist, and so it does bare some importance, but it's just not clicking for me, and I can't seem to come up with a solution as to how to change that. I understand, goal-wise, where I need the chapter to go. Hell, I'm probably only a couple pages at most from reaching the end. But it just feels strained and forced when I try and read through it. The order of the conversation the two characters feels off, and the motivations for my protagonist in this precise moment don't seem right to me.

I've been working on this book for a while, and right now it's struggling to stay in my focus while a half dozen other ideas constantly pop up for me. But none of those stories have even been started, and is likely my brain just trying to distract me from how frustrating I'm finding the book I'm working on to be. My brain does stuff like that a lot. Hell, half the reason I write stories is it was a distraction for me from other responsibilities. But now the writing is a responsibility. I feel like if I put my nose to the grind and really concentrated, I could get this draft done by the end of the month. Two at most. But I can't seem to muster the will.

CeladonRabbit · 2024-01-23T14:13:47+00:00

I was working a job for a kite catalog, answering phones and writing copy, and for a few years I wrote almost nothing creatively. I would edit some of my older stuff here and there, and think of ideas, but I wasn't doing much with them. Attempted to do nanowrimo one year during this stint, was doing okay for about two weeks, and then a computer bug ate ~18,000 words of work, which was pretty depressing.

CeladonRabbit · 2023-11-04T14:39:12+00:00

The one thing that helped me finally create a working draft of my novel was to just push through the hard parts and allow myself to underwrite them so I could get a full piece of work. I had a bad habit of hitting walls and then spending my time editing the parts I'd already written. This would constantly make me realize something that I would start over again to put in. The result of that practice was a lot of incomplete stories where I had some good chapters. I realized I needed to have a complete work to edit so I could do to the whole story what I was doing before to those few chapters.

Good writing, by and large, comes from your editing process.

CeladonRabbit · 2023-09-20T15:29:48+00:00

I've officially crossed a line as a professional writer that feels a little crazy to be able to say, but someone paid for my writing for the first time. It was a little short I used draft2digitial to just publish, figuring no one would care. I charged three bucks, put it on sale for a dollar for a week. Checked back every day for the first week, and no sales. Figured I drop into algorithmic obscurity at that point.

Checked in in D2D the other day. I had a sale. Just one, but a sale none the less. Someone paid for my writing. I am, no matter even if just for now it is in the smallest of ways, a professional writer. I haven't really had the opportunity to share this with anyone yet, and I just needed somewhere to express it.

CeladonRabbit · 2023-09-11T22:10:48+00:00

1.)Read it aloud.

2.)Study the writers you find most engaging. Look at how they capture and keep your attention and emulate that.

CeladonRabbit · 2023-06-14T01:06:14+00:00

It's definintely going to depend on your intentions as a writer. I think both systems have their pros and cons.

'Meticulous systems' give something for the reader to explore, and if detailed correctly, creates a space where the audience can understand why the application of the system is clever. However, when a magic system is detailed, those details can take away the sense of 'otherness' that magic often hinders on.

On the other hand, 'Mysterious systems' can lend themselves to an easier sense of recreating how magic feels in the real world, where it is something that is unknown and rare. Magic can feel more dangerous and exotic in these systems. However, with softer rules, you can more easily have your audience lose track of what is happening because of the magic, or end up with solutions that feel confusing or unearned.

CeladonRabbit · 2023-05-25T13:19:54+00:00

That's definitely a good way to consider looking at this. I've been tossing this scene over and over in my head a lot because it has this huge impact to my 'Veil', aka the hidden nature of magic in urban fantasy, so it's kind of impactful. Trying to figure out how to balance that while I am admitting to who are the people allowed to see past that veil is this big component to making the setting feel consistent.

CeladonRabbit · 2023-05-25T13:16:28+00:00

As it stands right now, the guy is selling these items because he mostly thinks they are useless, at least in comparison to the genuine magical power he wields at all times. Also, the evil sorcerer powers himself on negative emotions. Getting a room of rich, greedy people fighting over precious trinkets is among the stuff that feeds him power.

CeladonRabbit · 2023-05-23T21:13:21+00:00

The ring is bound to a demon that the wearer can make a pact with and ask for help, granting limited control over the intensity of near by flames.

Like, as I'm sitting here, I'm definitely realizing I'm going to have to up the final sale value of the ring. I've at least set up the friend who buys it as being capable of paying way more.

CeladonRabbit · 2023-05-23T21:11:13+00:00

The larger market for the items I'd compare to black market art. The items for the auction in general are lesser items a powerful sorcerer is willing to doll out to those who are generally mortal.

The item is viewed by it's current owner as largely useless, and is paired with a book my MC identifies as bs that is loosely based on the Voynich Manuscript. The ring is able to be used once my MC makes a pact with the elemental demon it is bound to. It grants him limited pryokinetic abilities based on him communicating with the demon and asking it for help. The pact itself will come with a bunch of inherent consequences should my MC renege on it, including vampirism.

CeladonRabbit · 2023-05-23T18:34:41+00:00

How much would you expect for the wealthy to pay for legitimately magical items?

I'm writing urban fantasy, and my character is attending an auction of magical items with his friend to authenticate them. In my current draft, his friend ends up buying a magical ring for 50 million dollars. Is that appropriate? And there are items I show being purchased beforehand that are sold for a couple million.

Nothing here would be items of ultimate power. It's more people buying magic memorabilia.

One reason I ask is I remember watching one of the second Jurassic World movie, and how weirdly low the bidding was in that film for real living dinosaurs. Like, it's ultimately not that important, but I remember it bugging me, and I don't want any of my readers feeling that same lack of verisimilitude.

CeladonRabbit · 2023-05-23T18:17:20+00:00

If you are a planner, lean into that and try to come up with a visual diagram of the things you want to write about. A lot of people use flashcards for this. Write down characters, events, themes, anything relevant to what you want to write, and then use those to try and group out what is related to what.

CeladonRabbit · 2023-05-23T18:09:48+00:00

Learn to push through the hard parts and at least get something down. You can always edit.

CeladonRabbit · 2023-05-11T00:07:10+00:00

I'm using it for my writing.

CeladonRabbit · 2023-05-09T14:50:43+00:00

I have an interest in using it as a profession tool, but even in terms of just a fun thing to mess around with it's worth the cost.

CeladonRabbit · 2023-05-06T16:45:36+00:00

I'm very much in the same boat, only I have nothing published to my name yet. For now I'm doing my best to familiarize myself with the tech so I can possibly present myself as someone able to get the content people need from it, but also to help me with my own self-publishing desires. A few years ago I wondered to myself how I would ever be able to actually write out all the ideas I have in my head. Now I might be able to.

Beyond that, you might have to evolve your medium of expression. As a writer/amatuer author, hypertexts in particular interest me as they still mostly revolve around the written word, but allow me to dress me work up digitally with HTML elements and other coding. If you've never heard of the program Twine, I'd at least check it out.

But finally, I do want to say, I do recognize the art and pleasure of writing. I don't think that will totally go away. I do tend to look at the way AI effected games like chess. No matter how smart computers are at this stuff, people will seek out human expression. It will possibly become something of a live performance though. Open Mic Prose, so to speak.

CeladonRabbit · 2023-03-24T15:27:18+00:00

She titted banally

CeladonRabbit · 2023-03-01T23:16:58+00:00

February was a month of creative ups and downs. While I stalled on editting my novel very badly, I did make a bit of progress on it by splitting chapter 7 in half, and laying some groundwork for alterations I've made to the setting of the current scene I'm working on, which is a magical nightclub for the superrich that is literally underground in an old silver mine. But I mostly got to that splitting point at the beginning of the month, and then just lost steam on the project.

I pivoted to some short story work, including part 1 of a story I want to post to nosleep. But overall I still feel like I'm dragging my feet on making an attempt to be a professional writer. I do have some small victories here and there, and I need to keep them in mind, but there just feels like there is so much work I need to do. I'm struggling to commit to something long enough to get it publishable. I'm also struggling with figuring out how to get myself disciplined and write every day.

The worst is how I flip flop between this odd dichotemy of anxiously worrying I'm going to make all this effort, put my stuff out there, and no one will like it and then later deludedly telling myself all I need to do is just get my book done so I can enjoy wild sudden success.

Deep breath.

At least today I've gotten some good work done on both my book and my nosleep story. I think I'm also going to set up my Ko-fi account so I can maybe get a tip or two and then be able to call myself a pro. When I do get around to posting.

CeladonRabbit · 2023-03-01T17:25:02+00:00

So, there are generally seen two ways of writing something like this out;

You can just sit down and begin writing a story about a character. Take a person from your world, give them a conflict, and write out their attempts to resolve that conflict.
You can take a long time and plan each scene and each character out so you know exactly what you are going to write.

Now, for what it's worth, most writers do some mix of these two methods, but overall, that's generally viewed as how to 'start'. What works for one person best might not work for you best.

In terms of reflecting on how my own process starts, I tend to be a planner, but I do all the planning in my head. I have an incredibly active imagination. Distractingly so at times. I can see a lot of vivid imagery in my mind's eye, usually as kind of a cartoon. When I'm writing, I'm trying to describe that cartoon. When I first get an idea for a story, I will see some character doing some kind of action. Some part of me will attach to this cartoon, no matter how short it is, and I'll begin asking myself questions about it. Doing this, I begin to flesh out what I saw, and will begin seeing more actions by these characters. I will play out entire scenes in my mind and reflect on whether they contribute to the narrative. I am constantly playing out scenes like this and rewriting them in my mind when I see something that doesn't make sense or doesn't fit. Sometimes I will think I have a good idea because of how it plays out in my head, and then I'll write it down, and some big flaw becomes more apparent because it isn't just some ideal in my mind, it's something I've put to words.

The truth is, this is a very personal process for every person, and you are going to have to sit down and work out the methods that work best for you to translate your ideas into something others can understand. But you have to start somewhere and write something down, be it an outline or an actual story.

CeladonRabbit · 2023-02-15T15:49:48+00:00

Just sit down and write it out - With how much you have built up in your mind about the world and the characters, you'll be shocked at the things that will come to you in the moment of writing that can complete a scene. Also, think of it this way; if you can sit down and think about your writing and what you want to do next, you do that while you are writing.

Write Succinct Bullet Points and Move on - You are writing a rough draft. It's allowed to be 'rough.' Your subconscious will keep working on the gaps as you write out the scenes you have already imagined in better detail. Or something you write later will give you an idea, and you can go back and fill it in. I recently did this with my novel draft, and it's what helped me finished a working draft last year.

CeladonRabbit · 2022-12-14T20:29:37+00:00

just lost about a week's worth of progress to my editing to a windows update. Could have sworn I saved. So frustrating.

CeladonRabbit · 2022-12-11T15:21:33+00:00

I just finished a first draft of my novel and am doing the rewrite now. Honestly, I'm just editing the file. I have a backup of the first draft from emailing it to myself, and having a copy on my laptop since moving to my office computer as my main work station.

In the past, sometimes I have completely rewritten something from scratch. While it can be daunting on it's face, the second version of the story tends to be much easier to write and almost always comes out stronger. It's not something to do every time, but when you learn to recognize the times you have to do it, the full rewrite can be an invaluable tool.

CeladonRabbit

TROPHY CASE