Young Writers Society

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I guess I'm just so concerned about making the words flow perfectly that I spend hours at a time on a single sentence.

^ This is your problem right here.

You can fix anything in later drafts. You will need to rewrite/edit anyway, no mater how much you try and make things perfect, so learn to take a gag to your inner editor and just write the scene. Repetitive sentences? Forget it. The description is long and clunky and just dumps all the info? You need to get that info out anyway; it can get spread out later. The characters have their personality change every few scenes? You'll cement their personality once the story's over and you've gotten to know them better. You can't get the image in your head onto paper right? You will never be able to get the scene onto paper the same as it's on your head, so aim for "close."

In short, it won't be good enough the first time. So just forget trying to make it good the first time. Just get the story onto paper. Once the story is on paper then you can start polishing it. You can't really polish the story properly until it's on paper, mostly because the story starts to take a life of its own. It's really only possible to do when you forget about making it exactly the vision in your head and start letting the characters take over. You'll get a lot that needs rewriting, but you'll also get a lot of gems.

Hope this helps!

~Rosey

Like Rosey said, writing isn't about getting it exactly right the first time. Your inner editor and you will polish and prune and take apart your story, but, until you get that story on paper, there is nothing to take apart. The life of the story comes from the characters and the story being told, and only once the life is there and the story is on paper should you be polishing and pruning and taking things apart.

But I know from experience that getting started and letting that story flow uninhibited can be hard. It takes discipline to get something on paper, and it takes passion to put the effort into it. Spend some time with your characters until you're bursting with them and you have to write. Listen to music. Write character sketches. Anything to bring the characters to life enough that you can't help but write, and then, once you start writing, don't let yourself stop. Taking breaks can be all right, but writing isn't always going to be fun or easy; sometimes you have to sit yourself down and make yourself write, even when the sentences drag and you feel like a horrible writer. Oddly enough, from my experience, it is those times when you are pushing yourself that the characters surprise and deliver.

So, gag your inner editor for a little while, start writing and set goals to keep yourself from stopping. Then you can go back and polish. Hope some of this helps! If you have any questions, feel free to PM me!

Do Nanowrimo. That'll cure you of any writers' block.