Take a story, Leave a story

A (object closest to you on the left) of (last thing you spent money on) and (your current emotion)

There’s really no right or wrong way to do it. My advice would be to start with an idea of the project you want to write (genre, style, etc.) and then think about the type of person you would imagine writing it. Who could pull off that kind of story? What’s their name? What’s their background? You can keep it basic or answer more detailed questions to flesh out the character more; that’s all up to you. Mainly though, the goal is to create a character who you believe would be able to write what you want to write.

I hope that helps!

First of all, don’t beat yourself up about it. That problem is extremely normal. I would say the vast majority of writers can relate. 

There are two apps I know that might help:

Write or Die (You can set it to give you rewards for writing or punishments for not writing. I used this during NaNoWriMo–the year I won it–and found that my desire to stop loud, obnoxious noises from coming out of my computer was stronger than my perfectionism. 10/10 would recommend.)

Draft (I haven’t used this yet myself, but you can set it to Hemingway Mode, which doesn’t allow you to go back and edit anything. You can only keep writing. Cut out temptation altogether!)

Good luck!

It might help to spend more time outlining your writing before you sit down to write. I know many writers like to “pants” it (i.e. write by the seat of their pants, not planning it), but it’s so easy to go off on tangents, get sidetracked, and generally lose the thread of what you wanted to say. An outline gives you a road map that keeps you on track and helps you move from one plot point to the next in a logical way. You might try adding more detail to your main outline, so that you can see the whole story’s plot together. Also, each time you sit down to write, try starting by outlining what you want to happen in that scene or chapter (and check that it matches up with your main outline).

If you think the problem is the writing style, try simplifying your prose. Shorter sentences. More common words. Write more conversationally. You can always add more detail or description later when you edit!

Good luck!