First Drafting, Part 6: Perfectionism

When I first started writing, I would frequently re-start stories because the beginning wasn’t “quite right” in my beginners opinion.  I was always going back and deleting paragraphs, sentences, entire chapters.  I was getting nowhere, because in my mind, I had to get everything exactly right.  The first time.

Does anyone else feel the need to make your story perfect?  Does anyone else tend to go backwards as much as they go forwards?  Does your word count stay the same even after you spend time changing things?

Today I have three short and (hopefully) easy to remember rules.  If you abide by them, they may just help you get that draft finished in no time.

Don’t Stop Writing

Seriously.  Don’t stop.  Simple as that.

If you realize that you made a mistake – don’t go back and fix it.  If you change a character’s name or gender – don’t go back and fix it.  If you completely change, remove, or add a side plot – don’t go back and start over.

Just keep writing.  And keep writing with the new change, the new name, the new character, as if that’s how the story had been all along.

You will always find reasons to start over, and if you let yourself continue to go back and rewrite, you’ll get stuck in an endless loophole.

So what can you do with those things that need to be changed?

First Draft Notes

Start a new document/small notebook/your choice to use for your first draft notes (or FDN).  I find this really helpful to keep track changes I made or want to make, and it’s also a great starting point for editing.

If you remember you neglected to mention an important clue or write a particular conversation a chapter or so back, instead of going back to fix it, just make a note in your FDN and keep going forward.

Changed a name?  Make a note about it.  Changed the plot?  Make notes so you know where you started with the new plot.  Have ideas about how to edit things?  Make extensive notes, and just keep pushing through that first draft.

By the time you are done, you will have a finished draft, and lots of notes to help you through editing.

Pick Your Changes

Typos.  You can go and change them, or you can leave them.  If there are only a couple, chance them.  If you won’t remember the word you meant, change it.  If you’re in the middle of a word war, leave it.

Minor details.  If it’ll take you a few minutes to go back and correct, feel free to go for it.  Just make sure you don’t get sidetracked.

Things you strongly feel you need to change now.  If you really think they should be changed now, then go ahead and change it.  Or maybe this is why you’re not finishing, and you should restrain yourself.  You know who you are, and I don’t.  Use wisdom.

And remember this above all: this is a first draft.  You are still figuring out the story.  You are not going to send it to the publishers as soon as you type “the end.”  Edits exist for a reason, but you need something to edit before you can start them.

It may be rough at times.  Awkward at others.  Beautiful.  Enjoyable.  Hard.  Cringe-worthy.  Funny.  But just keep writing, and don’t stop!