Speaker 1: 0:32

Your first draft is supposed to be messy. It's supposed to have problems. That's literally what first drafts are for. They're for discovering your story and getting all of those ideas out of your head and onto the page. And I promise you that you will learn more from writing one terrible scene or one terrible first draft than from reading 50 articles about scene structure or how to plot your novel. To plot your novel.

Speaker 1: 1:00

Welcome to the Fiction Writing Made Easy podcast. My name is Savannah Gilbo and I'm here to help you write a story that works. I want to prove to you that writing a novel doesn't have to be overwhelming, so each week, I'll bring you a brand new episode with simple, actionable and step-by-step strategies that you can implement in your writing right away. So whether you're brand new to writing or more of a seasoned author looking to improve your craft, this podcast is for you. So pick up a pen and let's get started.

Speaker 1: 1:24

In today's episode, we're talking about why writing advice might be keeping you stuck and what to do instead. And to paint a picture of what this looks like, I want you to think about that browser bookmark folder that you've labeled writing advice, the one that has 147 articles about plot structure, 83 posts on character development, and that YouTube playlist titled how to write a novel that you started three months ago but never finished. Yeah, that one. Now, if you don't relate to having a browser bookmark folder full of writing advice, swap in a notebook or a bookshelf filled with craft books, whatever that looks like, no matter how it manifests for you, the thing I want you to know is that all of that writing advice you're collecting, it might be the exact reason you haven't finished your draft, and I know that sounds backwards. After all, you're being responsible, right. You're learning the craft, you're preparing, you're making sure you know what you're doing before you dive in. But here's the thing I've noticed after working with hundreds of aspiring authors the writers who consume the most advice often write the least.

Speaker 1: 2:25

Let me share a story that might sound familiar. One of my students spent five years yes, five years writing and rewriting the first few chapters of her novel. She'd read an article about opening hooks and then go back to revise it. She'd discover a new plotting method and then she would start over. She'd listen to a podcast about character voice and think, oh my gosh, I've been doing it all wrong and you guessed it. She'd start over and eventually she scrapped the whole thing. Sound familiar? If you can relate to this, I want you to know that you're so not alone.

Speaker 1: 2:55

Here's what's really happening when you're stuck in this research or information gathering mode, what's really happening is that you're not actually learning to write, you're learning to avoid writing, and that's because every new piece of advice becomes another reason to doubt what you've already written. Every expert's quote-unquote must-haves become another standard that you're failing to meet. Experts quote-unquote must-haves become another standard that you're failing to meet. Every contradictory opinion becomes another excuse to stop and reconsider everything you've already done. And I get it, I really do. You've heard me say before that I am a recovering perfectionist. I love to learn, I love to collect information.

Speaker 1: 3:30

But when you're just starting out or when you've been stuck writing your novel for a while, it can often feel safer to keep learning than to risk doing it wrong. And that's because your inner critic will whisper things to you like you need to know more before you start, or real writers understand all this stuff already. Or if you just find the right method, then maybe writing your first draft will be easy, or maybe, worst of all, you're just not ready yet. But here's the truth bomb that you need to hear. You are never going to feel ready enough and I'm going to say that one more time because it's so important you are never going to feel ready enough to write a novel. I've worked with hundreds of writers and not one of them has felt ready enough before starting, but the ones that go on to finish their books, they start anyway, okay. So think about it like this for a second when you're trying to write your novel, you're already juggling like 47 different elements right, plot, character development, dialogue, pacing, world building, theme, voice, scene structure and approximately 39 other things.

Speaker 1: 4:29

Now add to the fact that every expert out there has their own terminology, their own quote unquote foolproof method and their own strong opinions about the quote-unquote right way to do things, and it starts to become a lot right. The save the cat method says that your inciting incident should happen at the 10% mark, but the hero's journey calls it the call to adventure and suggests that it happens around 12 to 15%, depending on where you look. The three-act structure might have it at the end of act one, and then you might find yourself over on Storygrid's website that has totally different terminology altogether. And it's not just about structure right. One expert might swear by a detailed 40-page outline that maps out every single scene. Another insists that outlines kill creativity and that you should just go ahead and pants the whole thing. Some say that you must know your ending before you even start writing, and others say discovering the ending is half the fun. And we could still go on and on. So it's no wonder you're feeling stuck or overwhelmed or worried about getting right.

Speaker 1: 5:24

In one of my group coaching calls earlier this week, one of my students described it perfectly. She was talking about how she'd consumed almost every writing podcast and, yes, even this one that you're listening to. She'd bought multiple courses and knew more about the craft of writing a novel than many published authors seem to. But despite having all of that knowledge stored in her notebook, her web browser, her brain, whatever she still couldn't finish a first draft. And that's because too much information creates way too many choices for you, and too many choices creates this kind of paralysis or freezing and not being able to move forward. So instead of asking what else do I need to learn, I'd rather you ask something like what would happen if I only followed one approach all the way through to the end of my draft. So we're not looking for the perfect approach. We're not looking for a combination of 17 different methods, just one complete system from start to finish.

Speaker 1: 6:19

Now, like I said, I know a lot of writers who experience this kind of overwhelm from all of the craft advice out there, and when some of my students made this shift from thinking let me try to couple all these methods together to I'm going to follow one process from start to finish. Here's what happened. Jenny went from 12 years of false starts to completing her first draft in six months. Despite being a busy mom with a full-time job and elderly parents to care for, Lindsay spent six months trying to draft on her own and only managed to write 25,000 words. And then she committed to one clear process from start to finish, and she wrote 100,000 words in the next six months. Another writer went from five years of writing and rewriting the same chapters to actually finishing a complete manuscript. And yes, these are people just like you who finally stopped collecting advice and started following one proven process from start to finish.

Speaker 1: 7:11

Now here's something that most writing gurus won't tell you or don't talk about for some reason Any complete system that you follow from start to finish is going to work better than 10 partial systems all hobbled together. And that's because, despite all of the different terminology out there and all the different timelines, most credible writing methods are trying to get you to the same place. They all want you to create compelling characters that readers care about, they all want you to build a plot that keeps pages turning, they all want you to develop meaningful conflict and stakes, and they all want you to deliver a satisfying ending. Now, each method is going to go about this in a different way. Right, the save the cat method has 15 story beats. The hero's journey has stages, there's the three-act structure. All of these are just different maps to the same ending destination.

Speaker 1: 7:58

It's kind of like having five different GPS apps all giving you directions to the same restaurant. The streets they suggest you go down might be a little different, the estimated arrival time might vary by a few minutes, right, but they're all going to get you there, and so the problem only comes when you try to follow all five different GPS directions at once, right? That's when you can find yourself driving in circles. Another way to think about it is it's kind of like trying to bake a cake by following five different recipes at once. So maybe you take the flour amount from recipe A, the baking time from recipe B, the mixing method from recipe C, and so on and so on, and you end up with a mess that may or may not resemble a cake at all, but if you pick one recipe to follow all the way through, then you're probably going to end up with a pretty decent cake. Might not be perfect on the first try, but it'll definitely be a cake, and the same is true for your novel. So, after helping hundreds of writers move from stuck to finished, here's what I know for sure.

Speaker 1: 8:53

The writers who finish their novels do three things differently. Number one they stop preparing and they start practicing. And here's the connection that most writers miss. You can't learn to write by reading about writing, any more than you can swim by watching Olympic footage. One of my students, sylvia, had been consuming writing advice for years, even rereading the same content multiple times, and despite working on what was her third novel, she found herself really struggling with low daily word counts and feeling defeated. Her breakthrough came when she remembered that her job was to discover her story on the first draft and not write a polished and perfect first draft.

Speaker 1: 9:30

And there's this trap that a lot of us fall into. Right, preparing to write can feel really productive. You're taking notes, you're writing down ideas, maybe you're even organizing all the 15 beats of the save the cat method in Scrivener or whatever kind of software you use. But that's still just preparing to write right, Practicing or actually putting words on the page, even if they're messy words. That's where the real learning happens. You're putting what you've learned into practice and that's what's creating those neural pathways that help something really cement itself in your brain. So just to remind you, your first draft is supposed to be messy, it's supposed to have problems. That's literally what first drafts are for. They're for discovering your story and getting all of those ideas out of your head and onto the page. And I promise you that you will learn more from writing one terrible scene or one terrible first draft than from reading 50 articles about scene structure or how to plot your novel. All right.

Speaker 1: 10:24

So that's number one, the first thing that writers who finish their novels do differently. They stop preparing to write and they start actually putting what they've been learning into practice. The second thing they do is they choose one path and they stick with it. So again, imagine you're driving from New York to Los Angeles. You could spend months researching every possible route, comparing highways, reading reviews of rest stops and debating the merits of the northern versus the southern path or whatever right. Or you could just pick a major highway and start driving. Will it be the absolute most efficient route? Maybe, maybe not, but you will actually get to LA while the person still researching routes is sitting in their driveway in New York. And so to clear up a common misconception or fear around choosing one path and sticking with it choosing one path doesn't mean you're married to it forever. It just means you're committing to following it all the way through, to the end of your first draft. So you're giving yourself permission to stop shopping for methods and to actually start writing your book.

Speaker 1: 11:22

One of my Notes to Novel students she wrote 114,000 words in just 88 days, and she didn't have any kind of secret superpower Although if she's listening, I know she's probably thinking I sure wish I did right. All she did was pick one approach and she followed it all the way to the end, without looking back, without second guessing and without checking to see if another method might be better. All right, so that's the second thing that writers who actually finish their novels do differently they choose one path and they stick with it till the end. The third thing is that they measure progress, not perfection, and here's the biggest mindset shift. You probably need to make Writers who finish their books care more about forward momentum than they do about polished prose, at least in the beginning stages, on their first, second, maybe even third draft. So instead of asking, is this chapter good enough, they ask questions like did I move my story forward today? Did I make progress? Instead of thinking I need to fix this scene before I continue, they think things like I'll just make a note of what I want to change and keep going. It's all about making progress. So they understand that you can't edit a blank page, but you can absolutely edit a messy one, right? They know that perfectionism is something you work toward in revision, not something you achieve in a first draft. They measure success by pages written, not by pages perfected, and paradoxically, this leads to better writing, because they actually finish drafts that can then be polished into something wonderful, all right. So that is number three, the third thing that writers who finish their novels do differently than the ones who don't.

Speaker 1: 12:52

Now I know you might be thinking okay, savannah, this all makes sense, but which process should I follow? How do I know I'm picking the right one? Well, here's the thing. You're doing it again, right? You're looking for the perfect answer instead of just picking one and taking action. So I want to make this super simple for you Pick the one teacher or the one method that resonates with you the most and commit to following their complete system for your entire first draft. That's it no mixing and matching, no second guessing, no shopping for additional opinions. Just pick one approach and follow it all the way through to the end of your first draft.

Speaker 1: 13:26

All right, now let's get specific about what sticking to one method actually means. Let's say you're following some kind of structured approach, like, let's say that you love this podcast and that you're going to put every episode you hear into practice. Let's say, that's been going really well for you, and then you come across a blog post that claims every scene needs seven specific elements. But the method that you're following and what I teach on my podcast says there are five elements, right? So instead of panicking that you're missing these two crucial elements, you'll need to just recognize that different teachers simply break down the same concepts differently. So in this scenario, you would stick with the five element approach that you're already using and just keep going forward.

Speaker 1: 14:07

Another example is maybe you're halfway through your outline when you discover another craft book that really talks about the glory of pantsing and how everybody should be pantsing, or writing without an outline. Instead of walking away from your outline to try this better method, you can file that little nugget of information away as something to potentially explore with your next book. Now, this is assuming that the outlining you're doing is actually working for you and moving you forward. Right, it may still be hard at times, but the point is, if it's working for you, you don't need to mess with it. You can file something away as a strategy, a technique, whatever to try with your next book. And then when your inner critic pops up and they say something like well, what if another method would help me write faster, better or easier, just think to yourself all right, maybe that's true, but I'm going to find out what this method can do for me first.

Speaker 1: 14:56

So it's not about blindly following rules. It's about giving yourself and your writing the gift of focus, and I think that's a really important mindset shift. So I'm going to say it one more time Sticking to one method is not about blindly following rules. It's about giving yourself and your writing the gift of focus. So right now you have two options. Number one you can keep collecting advice, keep reading articles, keep watching videos, keep telling yourself you'll start when you know more, keep writing chapter one for another five years. Or option number two you can choose one complete system, method whatever, and follow it all the way to the end of your draft. And I know which one I would choose. I know which one I would recommend to you. And, hint, it's the one that actually results in a finished novel.

Speaker 1: 15:40

All right, so I hope you found this episode helpful today. If you are ready to trade your 147 bookmarked articles or your notebooks full of writing advice for one proven process that will take you from chapter one to the end of your draft, then I am here to help you. My Notes to Novel course is opening for enrollment very soon and this is my proven, step-by-step process that will help you take your ideas and turn them into a finished draft. We just opened up the waitlist and if you want to be first in line when doors open, go to savannahgilbocom forward slash waitlist. Put your name on the waitlist now. So one more time. That's savannagilbocom forward slash waitlist to put your name on the notes to novel waitlist and be the first to know when doors open.

Speaker 1: 16:22

All right, so that's it for this episode of the Fiction Writing Made Easy podcast. Head over to savannagilbocom forward slash podcast for the complete show notes, including the resources I mentioned today, as well as bonus materials to help you implement what you've learned. And if you're ready to get more personalized guidance for your specific writing stage whether you're just starting out, stuck somewhere in the middle of a draft, drowning in revisions, or getting ready to publish, take my free 30-second quiz at savannahgilbocom forward slash quiz. You'll get a customized podcast playlist that'll meet you right where you're at and help you get to your next big milestone. Last but not least, make sure to follow this podcast in your podcast player of choice, because I'll be back next week with another episode full of actionable tips, tools and strategies to help you become a better writer. Until then, happy writing.