A popular advice all writers are given is to write every
single day. As a struggling writer, I find this advice isn't really expedient.
Though practicing your art everyday helps hone your skills,
actually writing every day is only a frustrating exercise.
A writer not only writes- they must read, research and find
inspiration to work.
When they force themselves to write every day the result is
often disastrous. The sentences are hackneyed, the characters don't seem
believable and the story is just ribbons of plot tied shabbily to each other.
The main part of writing is inspiration that can come from
anyone and anywhere. For me its always been music, but I don't always wake up
feeling inspired.
There are days when I'm so mentally exhausted from doing
research or working on chapters for my new fiction, that writing another
chapter is just so daunting. I guess the brain needs a break too every now and
then.
At this time, when my head feels like it's being baked,
forcing myself to write will NOT produce a great piece I can be proud of.
It will be a jumble of messy plots that won't be connected
to the story and I would have ruined my whole manuscript.
Instead of writing, I think it's important for the writer to
take a little break. Take a long walk sans technology- no phone to take unnecessary
pictures or selfies (a cringe-worthy word in my opinion) or check your email.
It should be just you and the nature.
Listen to music, watch a comedy, just anything to relax the
mind so that it can start producing good work again.
Also, use some time to research your story and learn new
things you can add to the story and make it a more informative and entertaining
read.
I do find however, that taking long breaks away from writing
results in losing interest in the story, so these "breaks" should
never last for more than 4-5 days in my opinion.
Writing is an endeavor and should be fun. In my experience,
my readers quickly picked on all the parts of the story that I didn't have fun
writing. It came off forced and didn't add anything to the story.
The parts and the chapters that I did have fun writing
elicited a good response from my readers.
Writing is hard and it takes a lot out of the writer. The
least a writer can do is enjoy themselves when they're working.
Because writing without passion and inspiration is just like
living a life without fun and music.
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