Day 316: Finally made a decision about my writing style
I had a good walk today. At first I was listening to the Dear Writer, You Need to Quit audiobook, but then the book made some good points so I shut it off so that I could think about it.
I realized that the reason I've been rambling and worrying about my slower writing style the past few days is because I have a Fear of Missing Out (FOMO) on the creativity supposedly generated by flow state. I don't doubt that a writer enters into a more uninhibited creative state in flow state, although I haven't positively seen the results in my own writing since I haven't done a real experiment with it--I haven't deliberately generated writing while in flow state and then compared it to writing not done in flow state.
So because I don't have any solid data, I've been wondering if my writing during flow state is superior to my writing when doing this current slow, but more polished writing style.
But I also know writers don't necessarily have to write in flow state to be great writers. Some writers' personalities ensure that they write better when they write slowly and deliberately. But does mine?
(It also occurred to me that I might only need to use this slower writing style for my Contemporary Romance novels, since they're a different genre and style of writing. I don't remember how I wrote and how long it took me to write my Protection for Hire novels, which is similar in style to the Hawaii novels.)
I thought more about when I write as fast as I can to try to get into flow state, and also about the process I go through to edit that writing. When writing fast, I have to rely on self-editing to clean up the writing because it's usually very messy. After all, the whole point of writing fast is to get stuff down and then fix it later, so I always have lots of stuff to fix.
The self-editing process is my problem. Not only do I dislike it (or maybe because I dislike it), I'm terrible at it. It takes me a really long time, especially if there's a lot that I have to fix in the writing (like when I use dictation).
When doing self-editing, there are two modes or mindsets I have to be in. The first mode involves patching holes up or rearranging writing around, and it's very difficult for my brain to be able to do this. I know other writers don't have this kind of problem--I know several who are amazing at self-editing and can easily do all the things that I find difficult.
The second mode or mindset is detailed polishing of the prose--making sure each word has the right meaning and impact, making sure the sentence structure has the right rhythm, making sure the paragraphs flow well. This isn't as difficult for me to do, but it does require more time and usually a second pass of the writing.
I have been realizing that when I do self-editing, I am actually doing two passes on each paragraph, one after the other--once to rearrange and patch things up, and a second to more finely polish the prose. I think this is why self-editing is so hard for me and why it also takes so much time. It requires a lot of energy for me to switch mindsets, and I am doing that for each paragraph.
This also made me start to worry that I didn't spend as much time as I should have to polish the prose for my 3 Regency books as much as I could have (which really isn't a great thing to realize after the books have already been released).
So if I depend upon flow state for my writing, I would have to improve my self-editing skills, but I already know that there's only so much I can improve on. I would have to work really hard to increase the amount of time and focus when I do self-editing, which is already a very difficult process for my brain. I don't know if I could do that. I know my limitations.
Conversely, when I use this slower writing style, while I may not be in flow state, I am either skipping or incorporating the self-editing process of patching and rearranging stuff, because I am correcting that as I write. I am also polishing as I write, and the polishing is much more thorough than when I do a self-editing pass. I think this is because I have so many things to fix while self-editing, so I just don't take as much time for polishing as I do now, with this slower writing style.
Since I am not confident in my ability to improve my self-editing, I realized that my choices are to continue with my not-as-polished prose but faster writing speed, or my slower speed and more polished writing. And I realized that I would rather put out higher quality writing than write faster. I would feel better knowing I released writing that was the best that I could write at the time.
Right now I am writing about 450 words per hour, which isn't far off from what I recall my writing speed was before I started doing sprints and consistently recording my words per hour rate. So I think I'm essentially back to my old writing style when I was writing for my publishers.
So now hopefully I'm done worrying and waffling about this writing style. I feel a bit better now that I've analyzed the pros and cons more logically. A lot of my worry was because of my impatience to write faster in general, but I do think that the more I write, I might get faster at writing even using this slower, more deliberate writing style.
I finished the second scene of my book yesterday, so today I'll start on scene 3.
***
On a side note, I was concerned about the number of hours I'd been working lately and wondering where my time during the day goes, so I also took another look at my daily schedule. I estimated times for non-writing tasks like chores and personal hygiene, and also for family time.
I realized that non-writing time actually takes up more time during the day than I had thought. Sleep, chores, exercise, and family time takes up about 15 hours a day, and it extends to 16 hours if I cook dinner (which I don't do every day, only every other day since I usually make a lot and we eat leftovers or else we eat take-out food). That leaves 8-9 hours for writing-related stuff.
I admit I take up too much time blogging during the week, but lately the blogging has been good for me to organize my thoughts and analyze my productivity, so I consider it useful. But even if I give myself 1-2 hours for blogging, I still need to divide the remaining time between writing and reading.
I don't want to neglect my reading like I did before, because I had that terrible 2 weeks of utter creative burnout in December last year where I got nothing done. So assuming I don't cook, and I am able to limit my blogging to 1 hour (which is difficult if I'm working through a problem like lately with my writing style), that still leaves only 8 hours for writing and reading. 6 hours of writing only leaves 2 hours of reading, which I've discovered isn't always enough time to refill the creative well. So my writing time is probably more like 4 or 5 hours. That means my writing time of 4-5 hours the past few days is actually average.
In order to increase my writing time, I'd have to decrease blogging (which naturally decreases if I'm not in the midst of some productivity experiment) and reading time. However, I don't want to decrease reading too much on a consistent basis. So I could probably spend 5-6 hours writing on an average day.
So, all this to say, I have to stop beating myself up over not getting 6 hours of writing done a day, because that would be the mark of an exceptionally good day.
***
I had been hoping to get 4 hours of writing done today at least, but 1) blogging took longer than I had anticipated (although it's all good for helping me understand my writing process), 2) I started getting a slight sinus headache, and 3) I want to get to bed early tonight anyway. I've been going to bed too late lately, and I feel like I get more done when I get up earlier.
I'm disappointed I couldn't improve the number of writing hours I worked today, but my writing speed improved today, so that made me happy. I'm hopeful I can get up earlier tomorrow and then get more work done.
Outlining: time spent: 0
Blocking: time spent: 0
Editing: Time spent: 0
Writing: Time spent: 2 hours, 37 minutes
Writing: Total number of words: 1512 words
Writing: Overall writing speed: 578 words/hour
Time spent doing other writing-related business: 2 hours
My takeaway for today: I made the decision to focus on more polished prose than writing fast. I will work on writing carefully and thoughtfully rather than vomiting my words out.
My second takeaway for today: I have to stop beating myself up over not getting 6 hours of writing done a day, because that would be the mark of an exceptionally good day.
I realized that the reason I've been rambling and worrying about my slower writing style the past few days is because I have a Fear of Missing Out (FOMO) on the creativity supposedly generated by flow state. I don't doubt that a writer enters into a more uninhibited creative state in flow state, although I haven't positively seen the results in my own writing since I haven't done a real experiment with it--I haven't deliberately generated writing while in flow state and then compared it to writing not done in flow state.
So because I don't have any solid data, I've been wondering if my writing during flow state is superior to my writing when doing this current slow, but more polished writing style.
But I also know writers don't necessarily have to write in flow state to be great writers. Some writers' personalities ensure that they write better when they write slowly and deliberately. But does mine?
(It also occurred to me that I might only need to use this slower writing style for my Contemporary Romance novels, since they're a different genre and style of writing. I don't remember how I wrote and how long it took me to write my Protection for Hire novels, which is similar in style to the Hawaii novels.)
I thought more about when I write as fast as I can to try to get into flow state, and also about the process I go through to edit that writing. When writing fast, I have to rely on self-editing to clean up the writing because it's usually very messy. After all, the whole point of writing fast is to get stuff down and then fix it later, so I always have lots of stuff to fix.
The self-editing process is my problem. Not only do I dislike it (or maybe because I dislike it), I'm terrible at it. It takes me a really long time, especially if there's a lot that I have to fix in the writing (like when I use dictation).
When doing self-editing, there are two modes or mindsets I have to be in. The first mode involves patching holes up or rearranging writing around, and it's very difficult for my brain to be able to do this. I know other writers don't have this kind of problem--I know several who are amazing at self-editing and can easily do all the things that I find difficult.
The second mode or mindset is detailed polishing of the prose--making sure each word has the right meaning and impact, making sure the sentence structure has the right rhythm, making sure the paragraphs flow well. This isn't as difficult for me to do, but it does require more time and usually a second pass of the writing.
I have been realizing that when I do self-editing, I am actually doing two passes on each paragraph, one after the other--once to rearrange and patch things up, and a second to more finely polish the prose. I think this is why self-editing is so hard for me and why it also takes so much time. It requires a lot of energy for me to switch mindsets, and I am doing that for each paragraph.
This also made me start to worry that I didn't spend as much time as I should have to polish the prose for my 3 Regency books as much as I could have (which really isn't a great thing to realize after the books have already been released).
So if I depend upon flow state for my writing, I would have to improve my self-editing skills, but I already know that there's only so much I can improve on. I would have to work really hard to increase the amount of time and focus when I do self-editing, which is already a very difficult process for my brain. I don't know if I could do that. I know my limitations.
Conversely, when I use this slower writing style, while I may not be in flow state, I am either skipping or incorporating the self-editing process of patching and rearranging stuff, because I am correcting that as I write. I am also polishing as I write, and the polishing is much more thorough than when I do a self-editing pass. I think this is because I have so many things to fix while self-editing, so I just don't take as much time for polishing as I do now, with this slower writing style.
Since I am not confident in my ability to improve my self-editing, I realized that my choices are to continue with my not-as-polished prose but faster writing speed, or my slower speed and more polished writing. And I realized that I would rather put out higher quality writing than write faster. I would feel better knowing I released writing that was the best that I could write at the time.
Right now I am writing about 450 words per hour, which isn't far off from what I recall my writing speed was before I started doing sprints and consistently recording my words per hour rate. So I think I'm essentially back to my old writing style when I was writing for my publishers.
So now hopefully I'm done worrying and waffling about this writing style. I feel a bit better now that I've analyzed the pros and cons more logically. A lot of my worry was because of my impatience to write faster in general, but I do think that the more I write, I might get faster at writing even using this slower, more deliberate writing style.
I finished the second scene of my book yesterday, so today I'll start on scene 3.
***
On a side note, I was concerned about the number of hours I'd been working lately and wondering where my time during the day goes, so I also took another look at my daily schedule. I estimated times for non-writing tasks like chores and personal hygiene, and also for family time.
I realized that non-writing time actually takes up more time during the day than I had thought. Sleep, chores, exercise, and family time takes up about 15 hours a day, and it extends to 16 hours if I cook dinner (which I don't do every day, only every other day since I usually make a lot and we eat leftovers or else we eat take-out food). That leaves 8-9 hours for writing-related stuff.
I admit I take up too much time blogging during the week, but lately the blogging has been good for me to organize my thoughts and analyze my productivity, so I consider it useful. But even if I give myself 1-2 hours for blogging, I still need to divide the remaining time between writing and reading.
I don't want to neglect my reading like I did before, because I had that terrible 2 weeks of utter creative burnout in December last year where I got nothing done. So assuming I don't cook, and I am able to limit my blogging to 1 hour (which is difficult if I'm working through a problem like lately with my writing style), that still leaves only 8 hours for writing and reading. 6 hours of writing only leaves 2 hours of reading, which I've discovered isn't always enough time to refill the creative well. So my writing time is probably more like 4 or 5 hours. That means my writing time of 4-5 hours the past few days is actually average.
In order to increase my writing time, I'd have to decrease blogging (which naturally decreases if I'm not in the midst of some productivity experiment) and reading time. However, I don't want to decrease reading too much on a consistent basis. So I could probably spend 5-6 hours writing on an average day.
So, all this to say, I have to stop beating myself up over not getting 6 hours of writing done a day, because that would be the mark of an exceptionally good day.
***
I had been hoping to get 4 hours of writing done today at least, but 1) blogging took longer than I had anticipated (although it's all good for helping me understand my writing process), 2) I started getting a slight sinus headache, and 3) I want to get to bed early tonight anyway. I've been going to bed too late lately, and I feel like I get more done when I get up earlier.
I'm disappointed I couldn't improve the number of writing hours I worked today, but my writing speed improved today, so that made me happy. I'm hopeful I can get up earlier tomorrow and then get more work done.
Outlining: time spent: 0
Blocking: time spent: 0
Editing: Time spent: 0
Writing: Time spent: 2 hours, 37 minutes
Writing: Total number of words: 1512 words
Writing: Overall writing speed: 578 words/hour
Time spent doing other writing-related business: 2 hours
My takeaway for today: I made the decision to focus on more polished prose than writing fast. I will work on writing carefully and thoughtfully rather than vomiting my words out.
My second takeaway for today: I have to stop beating myself up over not getting 6 hours of writing done a day, because that would be the mark of an exceptionally good day.
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