219: Your Writing Permission Slips

 

If you've ever felt like you're doing this whole writing thing "wrong" or you've felt guilty for not following advice another writer has given you, this week's episode will help! I give you 6 writing permission slips on everything from not outlining your book before you start to hating promoting yourself on social media. 

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Your Writing Permission Slips

 

Hi friends, welcome back to Your Big Creative Life podcast. Thank you for being here. Thank you for supporting the podcast. If you are new, welcome. We have episodes that come out every Tuesday. The podcast is available on Spotify and Apple Podcasts. And last Tuesday of the month is a Q&A podcast. So if you have a question that you would like me to answer about writing, editing, mindset, querying, my business as a book editor, anything personal, social media, you can feel free to drop that question. There's a little link in the show notes to a form that you can fill out and it's anonymous. And I will answer it on the episode at the end of the month. I've had a couple of people message me who were new listeners, so I thought I'd do a little shout out because we haven't done that in a while. There are a ton of episodes related to writing. There are a lot of episodes related to book editing in terms of like both my business as a book editor, but then also just how to work, how to edit your own book. We've got some episodes on mindset, some episodes on querying, some tough love episodes, and then also other episodes that are just about helping you live your best big creative life, whatever that means for you.

So yeah, hopefully there's some episodes that you can find to learn about something or just get some motivation. I know that for me, when I'm feeling kind of I don't know, when I'm feeling stuck, a bit unmotivated, it always helps to just plug back into the writing community in some way, whether that is talking to another writer, taking a writing class, listening to something writing related. In the past, it's been writing content on social media, not so much now, like recently in the last four or five years since I've been creating a lot of content myself on social media about writing, but Yeah, it helps. It helps with motivation. So anyways, I wanted to do this episode about permission slips for writers. I'll tell you what inspired this episode. I was having a conversation with a former coaching client who's now, she just hired me recently to edit her manuscript and was feeling just like overwhelmed by the editing process after her draft was done, like thinking about shifting gears to edit. And this is something that I've heard so many clients talk about is just being so overwhelmed. Like, okay, they did it. They got a draft done, even if it's messy, even if not every scene is fully complete. They've basically got a book written, but then they just feel like, oh dear God, what the hell do I do now? There's so much that needs to be fixed, particularly if the draft is rougher, because maybe they were just like figuring out the stories they were writing, maybe it changed. Who knows? My drafts always need a lot of work. That's just the way that I write. I write messy. I prefer to focus on getting the first draft out before I go back to edit. And that's what I recommend new writers do.

Of course, it's not wrong to do it the other way, but that's just what I recommend. So anyways, I was reassuring her that like, this is very normal. And I know it can feel, if you If you're just a writer, you only have your experience to go off of. So you don't, unless you know other writers, you're in a writing group, you have writing friends on social media, or I guess if you consume some writing content where writers talk about this, you might not know that this is normal to feel this way. And so many of the things that we feel, that we experience, that we think as writers, it can feel so isolating and it can feel like we're the only ones who experience or think or feel that way, but it's just not true. And take it from me, as someone who works with writers professionally, we're all freaking living, like this is so common. So anyways, that's what inspired this episode. And I wanted to just give you some permission slips. The other reason I think this is timely and important is it really ****** me off when I'm scrolling on social media and I see someone make a video where they're essentially shaming people for like not doing a certain thing related to writing. Something that is just a different approach. Like the only exception I can think of this to this is like where it would be okay to shame a writer is if they're like stealing someone else's work.

Or honestly, if they're using like ChatGPT or another generative AI tool at least to do some of the creative work for them, like to give them ideas or to write the book for them. Like those people aren't writers, they're frauds and they deserve to be called out. Sorry, I have a very, if you are new to the podcast, you might not know this, but I have a very strong anti-generative AI stance. I'm not talking about accessibility tools or Grammarly, I'm talking about people who just like don't want to do the work themselves as they outsource it to ChatGPT and then call themselves writers. But otherwise, I just see these videos where one of two things is usually happening. Either, number one, the person is a new writer, they only have their experience, and they think, oh, because this thing worked for me, this is the one correct way to do it. And maybe they have good intentions, but they're just ignorant. They don't know. They're just like thinking that because this is the process that worked for them, that means everyone has to do it this way. And you're wrong if you do it a different way, which is just, it's like, it's like they just don't know be better. But then there's also people who are yelling at you about how you're doing it wrong because they want to sell you something. Or they want you to like, it's like clickbaity or ragebait, they want you to follow them because they've got the solution, right? They've got the answer to this problem that isn't even a problem in the 1st place because you're just doing it differently. So But the more that I do this, the more that time passes of being a book editor and a book coach and working with a ton of different writers, like the more loose I hold my opinions.

That's why it's so funny that I have like, well, maybe not, maybe it's not so funny. But it just, I think it's noteworthy that the only strong stance I take publicly about writing is the stance being against generative AI for a million reasons. I have podcast episodes and social media content that talks about why specifically I'm against it. But other than that, I'm kind of like, meh, like you do you. Different things work for different people. Even things I recommend, like they're just recommendations. It's not going to work for everyone. So all that being said, Here are your writing permission slips. Don't let people on social media who don't know any better or who are trying to sell you something, make you feel bad about this, okay? Number one, it is okay to not outline your book. Meaning, you do not have to sit down and create an outline or a detailed map or figure out every like scene and chapter in your novel before you start writing. You don't have to do that. And it's fine to not do that. There are advantages and disadvantages of every approach to writing. So if you are someone who chooses not to outline, you just want to get into the story, start writing, play around a bit, you might have to do more work in the editing process to shape the story. It might be a bit rougher because you have to make sure that there's a consistent thread, right? A consistent narrative arc. The plot has an arc, the characters have an arc, everything. And if you just kind of wing it, you might not have all those pieces where they need to be, but that's okay. That's what editing is for.

So to say like you need to outline, you need to map out your chapters or whatever before you write is just not true. It is okay to be a pantser. I feel like very protective of pantsers. I'm not a... I guess I'm like a hybrid person where I do a little bit of outlining and brainstorming. And usually what this looks like is just me writing a few paragraphs or writing some bullet points about stuff and then starting to write. And then as I get into the story, I will do more brainstorming. It's like once I get a certain ways in, like, yeah, I just want to start writing and figure things out. But then also I'm like, well, I need to figure out this piece of it, especially because I write thrillers. So I need to have, I need to know what the twists are going to be. I need to know like where we end up, basically. Otherwise, it's just a lot more work. It's a lot more work in editing to create that. So even in thrillers, you don't have to outline. But I'm sort of a middle of the road, like hybrid person. But I feel very protective of pantsers because I have a number of pantser clients. And all of the pantser clients that I've talked to about this, like when we've had conversations, feel some sense of like, I know I should be this way. I know I should outline. And it's like, no, your process is your process. You don't have to. And if you're a new writer, you're starting your very first book and you're like, I don't know what I am. I don't know if I should outline or not. Just try. Like if creating an outline helps you feel in control and it helps you determine certain things out about what's going to happen in the book, then awesome. I do think it's at minimum, it's helpful to know a couple of things, sure.

But you might not know what your process is until you get into it, until you actually write a book. And my process is always changing the way that I'm writing. I always refine for different things. All right, next permission slip. It's okay to have a ****** first draft. This is, even though there's a lot of people saying in the writing community like, oh, embrace the ****** first draft, ****** first draft, ****** first draft. There's still, I think, some writers who feel some type of like embarrassment about how rough their draft is. And if that's you, I just want to remind you that no one's going to see it. doesn't matter. It doesn't matter if your draft is kind of incoherent and it's rambling and that things have to change and maybe you even just wrote some bullet points in one scene because you couldn't figure it out and wanted to come back to it later. Like it just does not matter. The first draft, part of the purpose of the first draft is you figuring out what this book is. You getting all of the foundation, like the skeleton, the framing of the house down before you can like decorate the interior and like do all that other internal stuff of building the house, right? You just have to get the skeleton, like the framing done. That's what the first draft is. So if you have a rough first draft, awesome. That means you're probably doing something right. Like it's fine. So don't feel any sort of weirdness about that. one more thing I'll say about this: I, when I talk about my drafts being rough, what I mean is...

The story is pretty much there, but like my sentences are very basic. My characters are very basic and bland. There's not a ton of tension. There's not, the dialogue is stiff. Like the writing itself is just not that great because I'm not putting a lot of time and effort into my sentences and making them sound amazing. I'm really just focusing on getting the book, like the story done. to figure out what happens. So I do have to go through and really polish all of that later down the road in the final stages of editing for me. for me because it's just, it's just not like the writing is pretty boring. It's pretty basic when I write the first draft, but that's fine. Okay, permission slip #3. It is okay to change your mind about your characters or plot. This is a permission slip that I think, well, everyone needs, but I particularly, I'm thinking about the people who are very rigorous outliners, where you have mapped out, scene by scene, what happens in your book, chapter by chapter. You know your characters like the back of your hand. And then you get halfway into the book, or 1/3 of the way, or whatever mark, and you realize you have to make a change, but maybe you feel some weirdness about it because you can't deviate from the plan. This is for my type A organizer people. It is not only a good thing to shift your plot or characters if needed, it's actually an amazing thing because here's what it means. It means that you are honoring the direction that things want to go in.

Often we have an idea of what the plot is going to be, what the main conflict is going to be, what the characters are going to be, like how they're going to show up on the page. And then we get into the book and we realize we've got to adjust that because it turns out it's actually this other thing. Or maybe your basic idea was there, but there are just some adjustments that you have to make. And you realize that you have to make your character different than how you originally planned it. Forcing yourself to stick to an outline or a plan that no longer makes sense is going to be, you're doing a disservice to this idea, to this book, these characters, whatever it is. This can apply to anything in the writing process. So you honoring that and having the freedom and the bravery to adjust is a good thing. And maybe you get through the entire first draft and then in editing, you realize that things have to change. That happens all the time. So it is okay to change your mind about your plot and your characters and adjust. Again, no one's going to see that first draft, so it doesn't matter if you need to adjust slightly. And again, in most cases, it's going to be a good thing. It's okay, next up, it's okay to want to write in different genres. This is a permission slip that I feel like I need sometimes because my first book that I wrote was just general fiction, like women's fiction. This is a book, none of my books are published yet. I got an agent with that book, but then the book died on submission and it didn't sell. It went on submission right before COVID. Things were weird. And we just pulled it. And I switched over to writing thrillers.

And I remember some almost like a little bit of panic when I was doing that because I'm like, I want to write a lot of things. Like I have a half-baked idea for a fantasy novel even. I think I wrote like 5 to 10,000 words of a fantasy novel that's just languishing on my computer. I have, I would love to try like romance someday. You know, I want to write all these different things. I want to write non-fiction. I want to write a memoir at some point. That's okay. It's okay to feel that way. This is your permission slip, that you are a multifaceted, creative person. You do not have to limit yourself. Every person has to make this decision for themselves, and obviously it's going to vary a bit depending on your publishing path. But I've decided, at least for me right now, I'm a thriller writer. I'm A thriller author. That is my niche. That is my genre. I write a very specific type of thriller, psychological thriller. And I want to try to get a psychological thriller, this certain type that I write, published. And then go with that for a bit and kind of make my name, like make a name for myself in that space. And then down the road, I can transition and do something else. That's the path I've decided on and it feels good. And maybe I'll adjust that in the future. Who knows? I'm not committing to anything, obviously.

This is just like a tentative plan, but it feels good because I'm not saying no, I'm never going to write those other things. So hopefully that's helpful if you feel some kind of like, panic, I want to write all these different things. Some people do pen names and self-publish under a different pen name and do different genres. I have a fantasy author that I've worked with who's just finished writing her debut like romance novel. She went from romantasy, this incredible fantasy world, to now writing contemporary romance because she just wanted to, which is great. Next permission slip, I have two more. It's okay if social media slash promoting yourself as an author feels hard and you don't love it. because those are two very different jobs. The act of writing, being a writer, is very different from the act of promoting yourself, marketing your book, being on social media. Those are two vastly different skills. And I am someone who loves social media content, like content creation. And I view it as a creative act, but it is very different. Like I'm using different parts of my brain. I'm expressing different parts of myself. It's very a different approach when I'm writing by myself on a computer versus when I'm creating content. So I understand. And you're not alone if you really do not like creating content. If you're like, oh, I just want to write the book. I don't want to be promoting it. I don't want to be advertising and doing marketing. I get it. A lot of writers, I would guess the vast majority of authors feel that way as well. It's just kind of one of those things, though. It's just the reality of the world that we live in.

And it can seem like such a negative thing sometimes, but I guess a way, 2 reframes I would offer you. Well, the permission slip, number one is it's okay to feel that way. You are very normal to feel that way. A ton of writers do, so don't like beat yourself up and judge yourself for that because it, yeah. But 2 reframes I would offer you is #1, all social media, all marketing is not created equal. If there's something that you hate, but maybe there's something else that you hate a little bit less, try that. Meaning, maybe you hate the idea of showing your face on video content, but you can do a Substack or be on threads. You know, there are options for you. The other reframe is, yes, this is just an unfortunate reality for some people. They view it as unfortunate of like, you just have to be on social media, whether you are traditionally published or published by a small press or publish it yourself. You have to do some of that promotion, like no matter what your publishing path. But it's also an incredible thing. Because think of how this would work in the past. If you self-published 30 years ago, you would not have an opportunity to reach readers in different cities, states, countries, unless you like went there, had a deal with a local bookshop to put your books there or did a reading or did an author signing in another location. It would be challenging. Like I don't even know how that would work exactly. I'm sure there are other options.

Like, you know, you could get reviewed in like Publishers Weekly and then like librarians or school. teachers could buy your books and put them in the light. Like, I don't know. There are different ways that you could be promoted, of course, but I'm just saying that social media is not an option. You were more limited in terms of what you could do, the readers that you could reach. And now the sky's the limit. You can reach readers at every corner of the globe just by posting on social media. So that is an incredible thing. If you can reframe it to think about like, wow, I'm able to connect with potential readers. I'm able to reach readers in a way that just wasn't possible. even a few decades ago. That's an incredible thing. But again, going back to the permission slip part, like I hear you. If it sucks, or if you feel like you're screaming into the void and no one's engaging with your social media content and it feels like a slog, so many authors feel that way. You just, you've got to keep going. It's just part of the job nowadays. And finally, the last permission slip is it's okay to feel envy or jealousy of other writers who are fill in the blank. Getting a big book deal, signing with agents, reaching a certain number of page reads, achieving incredible success as an indie author, got published by small press, got a TV deal, a movie deal, whatever it is, right? It's normal to feel that way. I certainly do, especially, having a book that just died on submission and didn't sell. So then like that was a really hard time in my life.

And I felt like so frustrated and angry and I would see people getting book deals and I would just be like, why not me? Like this is so, and of course I'd be happy for them. It wasn't like I was like full of rage towards them, but I did get that twinge of jealousy for sure. Like that's a normal human emotion. But Where the permission slip ends is about behavior because you're not responsible for your first thought or feeling. Like it's okay to feel that instant burst of like envy or jealousy. It just, yeah. But you are responsible for your behavior. So this is where I hate seeing the comments on social media where people are tearing an author down who announces some kind of success or like hits a milestone or whatever it is. Because someone achieving something, it's not, I don't know if you've heard this analogy, like it's not pie. There's not like a limited number of slices. And like, oh, someone else getting a book deal or signing with an agent or getting a certain number of sales on their debut book that they self-published, it doesn't mean that they're taking something away from you. And now it's going to be harder for you. If anything, you can shift how you view it. You can reframe it to view it as, this is an example. of what can happen, which is inspiring. And that's honestly how I've chosen, like when I was really struggling in the past, that's how I chose to look at those people who were on the path that I wanted to be on.

Like, okay, yes, I get that little bit of jealousy, but like, let me shift that. This is so cool. This could happen to me. This is amazing that this person got this thing. Like I need to be celebrating this and it's proof that it can happen. So again, it's all about the behavior and just pay, this is something to pay attention to as well. So it doesn't turn into like resentment or, I don't know, competition or something like that, because it's just, it's a normal feeling, but it's about what you do with it. The action and the behavior piece of it, that's just something to be mindful of. So All right, those are your writing permission slips. Hopefully this makes you feel better about whatever it is. There's so much stuff that just gets like demonized on social media. And unless it's, I really can't think of anything else outside of like plagiarizing or using ChatGPT to like do the creative work for you. That's like a no. We all have our different processes. Like, I don't know. You don't need to feel guilty about your approach for writing a book as long as it's you actually writing a book. So. All right, thank you for listening to this, and I will see you all next week. Thank you so much for listening. For more tips, advice, and motivation, check out at Your Big Creative Life on Instagram, or you can follow me at Katie Wolfe Writes on Instagram, TikTok, and YouTube. If you enjoyed this episode, the best way to show your support is to leave a review on Apple Podcasts or Spotify to help other people discover the show. See you next week.

 

 

Katie Wolf