Writing is... still hard! But we persist.
Jan. 18th, 2026 07:06 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
fitiaWrote around 1000 words of this fandom gift exchange fic in the past two days, so I think I can pat myself on the back for it! It's great to have something motivating me to write consistently.
It's also helped me unpack the many sentiments behind my perfectionism, whenever I write. I've noticed that when I start typing up first drafts, what automatically comes out of me is a pretty stiff, formal style, that I can probably trace to the fact that a lot of the prose I tend to be inspired by comes from early/mid-20th century writers that write in a kind of Victorian register? Or at least, the type of style that shows off an expansive vocabulary, and the creativity to use it to its fullest potential.
Which means that halfway through a first draft, I tend to notice pretty quickly that my prose feels dry, unimaginative, and it does eventually discourage me. Continuing to write always feels like trudging through a molasses of self-doubt, which makes it all too easy to give up. And I do realize that these are ridiculous things to be feeling when, again, you are literally only on your first draft, but knowing this has never helped the fact that I do, unfortunately, always feel like this! It sucks!
Hopefully this experience will teach me how to get over this little by little. I really love writing whenever I can actually manage it, and I want to become the sort of person who does it frequently, and not in-between five month intervals (sobs), so that I have a lot more to actually share.
On another note, I really need to find the discipline to consistently practice the more technical aspects of writing, especially when it comes to vocabulary and to being concise. It continues to frustrate me how I'll often get stuck staring at a page looking for the right word, or how all of my sentences feel unwieldy and tedious to get through, especially once they get long. I'm not all that good at finding clever, appropriate expressions that help demonstrate eloquence and that help make your writing more rhetorically effective, and it's something I really need to practice.
It's also helped me unpack the many sentiments behind my perfectionism, whenever I write. I've noticed that when I start typing up first drafts, what automatically comes out of me is a pretty stiff, formal style, that I can probably trace to the fact that a lot of the prose I tend to be inspired by comes from early/mid-20th century writers that write in a kind of Victorian register? Or at least, the type of style that shows off an expansive vocabulary, and the creativity to use it to its fullest potential.
Which means that halfway through a first draft, I tend to notice pretty quickly that my prose feels dry, unimaginative, and it does eventually discourage me. Continuing to write always feels like trudging through a molasses of self-doubt, which makes it all too easy to give up. And I do realize that these are ridiculous things to be feeling when, again, you are literally only on your first draft, but knowing this has never helped the fact that I do, unfortunately, always feel like this! It sucks!
Hopefully this experience will teach me how to get over this little by little. I really love writing whenever I can actually manage it, and I want to become the sort of person who does it frequently, and not in-between five month intervals (sobs), so that I have a lot more to actually share.
On another note, I really need to find the discipline to consistently practice the more technical aspects of writing, especially when it comes to vocabulary and to being concise. It continues to frustrate me how I'll often get stuck staring at a page looking for the right word, or how all of my sentences feel unwieldy and tedious to get through, especially once they get long. I'm not all that good at finding clever, appropriate expressions that help demonstrate eloquence and that help make your writing more rhetorically effective, and it's something I really need to practice.
no subject
Date: 2026-01-18 07:22 pm (UTC)I'm guilty of not wanting to learn technical stuff too, it's kinda boring but I know it must be done. Oh well.
no subject
Date: 2026-01-19 11:04 am (UTC)Honestly, I kind of like dealing with certain technical stuff, depending on how well I get it. It's like math, in the sense that it only sucks when it stops becoming intuitive. I have an easier time with practicing grammar and sentence structure as a result. Style practice is a lot harder because the rules are looser for it, which makes it that much harder for me to assess what works and what doesn't on my own, haha.
no subject
Date: 2026-01-19 03:14 pm (UTC)I think practicing is the way, these things might not be intuitive now but they should become more intuitive as you practice. I feel like my english got a lot better ever since I began writing, whereas I would struggle a lot with words like, two years ago.