Feel Like Giving Up On Your Novel? READ THIS!
Are you at that place with your writing where you feel like it may not be worth it to continue? To keep pushing through because your story isn’t coming out the way you want it to? Maybe you feel as if you’ve hit a creative wall with it and don’t know how to ignite that spark again, or maybe you’re so frustrated that it’d be easier to toss it all out the window and leave it all behind. If you’re feeling this way, this blog post today is for you.
Writing a novel is not an easy task, since the very moment you picked up the pen, or created the document for your story, it was bound to be a challenge. But, it’s not a challenge that you can’t succeed in. Often we can get wrapped up in the thought of, “well, what if I’m just not cut out for this?” or, “what if I can’t actually do this well?”. So many of the what ifs come into play and can discourage us and tear us down, making actually working on our projects even more difficult. It gets to the point where we don’t even want to open our document because we ask even more "what if" questions, “what if I don’t write anything?”, “what if I don’t write well?”
I want to encourage you to STOP YOURSELF in your tracks when you start asking these questions. They aren’t encouraging you, building you up, OR helping you make progress. So, throw those thoughts away, write them down on paper and physically throw them away if you have to. Tear them to shreds, they aren’t serving you or your story.
The first thing I recommend doing when you want to give up on your story, is remind yourself of why you started it in the first place. What about it was so intriguing to you? What was on your heart when you wrote “Chapter One” at the beginning of the first page (or even when you made your story playlist or Pinterest board)? I encourage you to make a list of your answers, really sit with that question and take yourself back to that place where it was nothing but love for that project, the early stages when nothing mattered but exploring the plot and the characters. Put this list somewhere you can see it, or somewhere you can easily go back to as a reminder.
Take a writing retreat to reset your goals/motives. When I say this, it doesn’t necessarily mean that you have to set aside a week to do nothing but think about your writing goals, because realistically so many of us are busy with school or our jobs or taking care of family that it’s extremely hard to block out enough time to go on a full “vacation” dedicated to our projects. But, you can still plan a retreat style week, weekend, or even day to ponder what your priorities are as a writer! I would love to make a separate blog post on how this retreat can be structured, but for this post I’ll leave you with some helpful questions to ask while you give yourself the space to think about your story: When I first got this idea, what excited me most about it? Why does this story mean so much to me? What does my character learn throughout the events of the story that is important to me? What is the message I want to convey through this story? Why does giving up on this story hurt?
Pause and outline your novel. Okay, you might think this one isn’t going to help you make any progress or maybe you already outlined your novel, but one thing that gets me ecstatic to write or continue writing my novels is writing a “raw outline” of the story from beginning to end and I write it as if I’m sitting at a coffee shop with a close friend, rambling about the story and my favorite parts and favorite characters. Don’t pressure yourself whatsoever with how it’s written, save that for the actual novel, and just pour out all your thoughts and let it be messy. I did this after writing the most chaotic first draft ever, and after I wrote a raw outline with bullet points for each scene, I can’t tell you how excited I was to continue writing it!
Surround yourself with fellow writers who are going to encourage you to persevere and keep writing! There is such a big community of people who have gone through this exact struggle and wrestle with it every day. If you’re struggling with finding a community of writers, contact me and I would love to connect you with some of the incredible communities I have found through my own journey as a writer. :)
Lastly, PERSEVERE! I know that writing novels comes with challenges and it’s so easy to let doubt quench your creativity, but sometimes showing up for your story – even just for a sentence a day – is your best friend when it comes to laying down the stepping stones of your novel, and one day you’ll look back and be so glad that you did. If you make it a priority to consistently show up to write, no matter the outcome on those writing days, you will be SO surprised by the progress you make! It may not feel good some days, but it will be worth it. Step by step, little by little, that is what it takes to write a novel. You will have good days, you will have bad days, and that’s the beauty of the journey you have embarked on with you and your precious story.
So, with all this being said, DON’T GIVE UP! If you want to talk on this topic further (because, honestly, I could talk about it forever), please don’t hesitate to contact me with any questions or comments. Your novel is so special and only you can write it, so don’t give up!
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Keep writing! Thank you so much for reading this blog post, it means the world to me.
~ Hannah