#wordsmithofdoom

This is precisely the best reason to actually go ahead and write it anyway, because this is how you gain the experience you lack.

And yes, your first draft will probably not be up to your expectations. That is why after you finish it, you have to go on and keep writing other stuff. In a few years, with more experience, you'll be able to go back to that first draft and make a much better second draft. But you need to write it now or you'll forget it or simply no longer care.

The same will happen to any other idea you get. You will still feel inadequate until you have actually done the ground work to gain the experience, and you can only gain it by writing.

This image was created with Picrew’s “makowka character maker II“!!

Yours Truly: WordsmithOfDoom

I'm a writer, artist, and geek. I enjoy Science and Humanities in almost every form, as well as Science Fiction, Fantasy and Horror in literature, cinema, tv, art, and other media. I also have been a long-time fan of Dungeons and Dragons, videogames, art, and the occult/supernatural/spiritual. (I know, right? Science and Spirituality coexisting in the same brain? "Nonsense!" you say, yet here I am.)

English is actually my second language, so you will probably notice my writing here does not usually sound very natural. I am neurodivergent as well, which only adds to the weirdness.

Many of my characters are like myself: neurodivergent, queer, and woke (as in the proper sense of the word, not the slur some groups are actively trying to turn it into). If you don't like any of those, feel free to ignore my publications or even better, block me right away.

I welcome criticism if, and only if, it is well thought, respectful, and constructive. I will block anyone who comments saying things like "yuo sux!" and similar (bad spelling intentional). If you don't like the kind of stories I write, or the subject matter, or any of the elements that I've clearly tagged, then just ignore and scroll past.

Oh and one more thing: FUCK AI! I write and create art because I enjoy it, not because I want to show off without having worked for it. If you use generative AI to write for you, you have no right to call yourself a writer. Furthermore, you are actively harming artists everywhere in the world, as well as yourself by delegating your own human creativity to a thieving slop machine. Your brain is rotting right now thanks to AI, so don't look for any respect from me. I will block you if I see you publish AI slop. (Human-made slop is ok, though. My writing probably is, too.)

Be yourself. Be weird. Stay woke. And write on!

--WoD

PS: You can find me at AO3 by this same username, but I haven't published anything there, yet.

PSS: I have GOT to learn how to format these posts to make them look more appealing.

Everyone starts at level 0 of skill. Those writers you like? They started just like you and got better over time. Practice makes perfect, and the only way to get to where you want is starting now and never stopping. You can do it. Go!

This happens all the time: a new idea for a completely unrelated story pops up in my brain, usually while in the middle of writing my previous WIP. What to do?

In my experience, it is always better to finish what you start first.

Otherwise you will begin to accumulate unfinished works, which can be overwhelming later. You may end abandoning perfectly good stories because you lost momentum, got distracted and, ultimately, lost interest.

By finishing your current work first you can let your mind rest from it, and also so you can celebrate your achievement. Then you can start the new one.

HOWEVER, do write down any ideas you come up with for any new projects so you don't forget, but without working too much on them yet.

Photo by Garrett McQuown at Unsplash

Never Destroy Your Work!

If you’re a writer or creative of some kind, you’ve probably had the experience of creating something that turned out to be below your expectations. The words just don’t sound right. The drawing doesn’t look anything like the picture in your head. The idea falls flat. The design just can’t be made to work. Disappointment gives way to impostor syndrome and you suddenly feel an urge to delete and destroy.

Don’t do it!

This happens even to great artists. Franz Kafka was such a perfectionist writer, never satisfied with his work, that he considered it disgusting. He wanted to destroy everything he’d written and even asked his friend Max Brod to burn it all without even reading it once he died. Thank goodness Brod did not fulfill Kafka’s wish but instead went and edited then published much of the material he left. That's how the world knows about The Trial and so many other amazing stories. Sadly, Kafka still destroyed about 90% of what he wrote during his lifetime, but what survived proved he was a great writer, with a legacy worth preserving.

All artists must familiarize themselves with imperfection, practice and rework. A musician must rehearse a song a thousand times to get it right every time. An artist must sketch and correct and re-draw constantly to develop their skill. A writer must re-write and revise countless drafts, and so on.

You may think your work is worthless now, but if you keep it and come back to it after a few years, you may be surprised by how much of it can actually be turned into a good story or some other art form. Even if in its current shape it seems lacking, the content, the idea, the vision can still be preserved and reworked once you have acquired more experience.

You can also go back to your old works, even the failed ones, and compare them with your newest creations, to see how much you have grown as an artist.

If after all considerations you still prefer to get rid of it, at least know that no creative effort is ever wasted. What you wrote, what you drew or sculpted or composed or designed, even if you don’t like it now, has made you a better creator. The struggle is what makes you grow.

Ray Bradbury in his studio. (c) Getty Images.

“If you stuff yourself full of poems, essays, plays, stories, novels, films, comic strips, magazines, music, you automatically explode every morning like Old Faithful. I have never had a dry spell in my life, mainly because I feed myself well, to the point of bursting. I wake early and hear my morning voices leaping around in my head like jumping beans. I get out of bed to trap them before they escape.”

― Ray Bradbury

In other words, if you feel uninspired to write (or to make any other form of art), take a break and fill your mind with art. Do include non-fiction as well, especially if you already know your project requires some research.

If you are not currently working on anything in particular, just reading a book, or listening to music, or perusing art books or even online museum pages should get your creative juices flowing. It doesn't need to be directly related to anything you do. I cannot count the times I was painting a watercolor of a picture I found online, only to suddenly come up with an idea for a new short story.

And if you are stuck in your current work in progress, you can be more intentional in your consumption. Say, for example, you are writing a thriller mystery and don't know where to take your story next. Reading or watching the news, and specifically news about the topic you are writing about (crime, police cases, real detective cases, court procedures, articles on forensics, etc.) will probably give you interesting ideas, as well as valuable information to include later.

A word of warning, though: in today's digital world it is all too easy to get yourself lost on consuming media aimlessly. It is not uncommon to spend hours doomscrolling on your phone, losing track of time, and then feeling like you only wasted your day. If this sounds familiar, try to set a timer for, say, 30 minutes. Once the timer is off, stop browsing and start writing. Or painting, or composing, or whatever creative work you like doing.

Photo by Tong Su at Unsplash

On Choice

We don't choose who we feel attracted to, but we can choose to pursue or not a relationship with a specific individual.

We can choose to be ourselves or to pretend being something we're not. And we can choose to remain in the closet or come out in the open.

And thanks to advancements in medicine, some people can also choose to be who they really are, which was impossible before, and that is beautiful.

Some day in the future nobody will have to pretend, or to remain hidden, and that too will be fantastic.

Until then, we still have a choice that nobody can make for us.

Happy Pride!