I do that, too. Here's my remedy:
I put a story on the net that I know is good. If people like it, they will want you to continue on it. And, ultimately, force you to keep writing on that particular story.
Option 2: combine the current story with the new idea.
Option 3: Make sure you write (amount) every day, to make sure that you ARE writing on it and not procrastinating on it.
Repeatidly smack your head against the wall until you've forgotten the new idea.
Or, if you don't like the idea of brain damage, just ignore the new idea and carry on with the old. Or see if you can incorporate your new idea into your old ones (I've done that a couple of times, with good results).
Haha I have the same problem. If there is a deadline or something on the old piece, I usually write down the new idea and file it away for the time being and stay with the old idea until it is finished or I forget about it completely.
I used to do this ALL the time... until I finally found an idea that captured my attention beyond the others. And I'm still working on it.
But sometimes I find little ideas that are too good to pass up and I either (if it'll fit in) add it to the story I'm working on or make a short story out of it.
I'm probably not much help, but I'd follow Ink's advice
-Kiley-
The statistics on sanity are that one out of every four Americans is suffering from some form of mental illness. Think of your three best friends. If they're okay, then it's you. - Rita Mae Brown
I know all about the chain of unfinished stories. I might resort to Sureal's head-smacking advice.
People have given you some good advice... perhaps when you get a new idea, you could scribble it down somewhere, then ignore it while you work on a different story. And after you had forced yourself to complete that story, you could go back to your other idea and work with that.
Savvy?
"I myself am composed entirely of flaws, stitched together with good intentions."- Augusten Burroughs
this hasn't happened to me too often, but I know what it is like, and their is reason behind it.
I'll take myself as an example. Currently, I'm working on my novel To Keep No Secrets and I do have an idea for another novel, which I'm research currently, and I haven't worked on Secrets (as I call it for short) in probably over a month, but I won't start writing that second novel I have an idea about because I'm still interested in Secrets, I still want to write it and finish it and see where it goes. I love the characters.
Even if you continually come up with more and more ideas (which is probably good, my problem is not having ideas) you do not need to act on these ideas. Keep them all in a note book. Of course, if you are uninterested in your current project, you'll want to jump to this new idea because it has your interest, which is the tough part.
If what ever it is you are writing can't even hold your interest, it probably won't hold the reader's interest either. So basically: you need to care about your story, be interested in it, and want to continue it until you finger tips are numb and your eyes are bleeding. Though, less violent and painful if at all possible... One way to fuel your interest is to outline the plot, because then you know where the story is going and you might be excited, because you want to get to the other parts. Which sort of makes me think of Nanowrimo, the whole point of it for me was to write through the boring scenes, to get to the good scenes. And your first draft can be like that too. First drafts are always icky. So if you outline, you might have an exciting scene in chapter three so you will keep writing until you get there to write that exciting scene; if you are interested in your story this way up to the end, chances are you will finish. Unless you are a procrastinator, which a lot of people are!
I hope all this helped you out Keep a notebook of all those ideas. Oh, and if you've never outlined your stories before, you could probably find a guide on how to somewhere on YWS or even through googling, but you could also PM me and I'll explain my method of doing it.
Bonne Chance!
βIt's necessary to have wished for death in order to know how good it is to live.β β Alexandre Dumas, The Count of Monte Cristo
Basically what Claudette said, jot down your new ideas in a notebook or something. That way you could keep working on your old story idea and still keep track of new ideas.
Also, you might want to read 'The Idea Workshop' (I think is what it's called) and I think it's really good when you have tons of ideas. Look it up
-Kiley-
The statistics on sanity are that one out of every four Americans is suffering from some form of mental illness. Think of your three best friends. If they're okay, then it's you. - Rita Mae Brown
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