The Right To Write

Motivation

Thanks to TheNebulaSavant, who requested this section. Please check out his work and motivate him to continue it. If only his full potential would carry out in the rest of his novels.

I'll start off by saying lack of motivation is the death of every nine out of ten books, in the realm of professional authors. On Wattpad, it might very well be the funeral of every 99 out of a hundred.

One day you had a genius idea. You were going to write a book! You pictured interviews, your book stocked in book stores, prizes, should I go on? Then the next day you found yourself in a pile of balled up blank pieces of paper. 

Sound familiar?

You may have never even finished a page or a chapter, or you may have gotten to the middle and deteriorated from then on. Whatever the situation,  you may have found yourself caught in a corner of hopelessness. But here are a few tricks that might kick you right into it again.

Write from your passion. Write because you care about what you have to say. Write because what you have to say is what you wish the world was like. Write because it matters to you. Your story should be based on the message you want to convey, the message that matters to you.

Is something wrong with our society to you? Do you wish you could change it. Well guess what, you can! And it's the one thing you have to strive for, a purpose. Believe me, the biggest compliment you can ever get from your book is this has changed me. Because then, you have fufilled your purpose.

Don't write for others, write for yourself and your cause. Don't write for the world, write for your world.

Connect your other passions with writing. If writing is already a full-time passion for you, then this field may not help you. But if you have other things in life you enjoy, connect them with your writing.

Either you write about them, or you physically incorporate them into your writing life.

Love sports? Write about sports. Love music? Find songs that fit the mood of your book, or base a book on a song that inspired you. Even better, create a whole playlist that matches your book. Love drawing? Draw your characters, your favorite scenes, anything that has to do with your book.

Anything that will substantiate the passion you have for your book. And if you're tired of writing your book, don't force yourself to write it anymore. Just switch to any passions and relate them to your book.

Get a writer friend. This step is crucial because if you're the only one that understands your book, it'll get you no where. You need someone else to care about what you're doing, specifically another writer.

You need those true friends that will threaten to kill you if you don't finish Chapter Three by Monday. Because in the writer world, that is a genuine friendship. They will most likely be the reason you'll reach that one out of a hundred.

Simple. Get one. Create a mutual relationship. It may take you a while to find one, but there are some writers out there just waiting for you. For all you know, it could be your nextdoor neighbor.

Love your protagonist. This may affect you depending on if you're a character-driven writer or a plot-driven writer, which I will discuss in depth in the future. But essentially, it is the preference of either plot or character. If you prefer your characters over plot, you need to love your characters.

Create a wildly interesting character, one that especially appeals to you. Write about your own role model. Anything that would catch your eye and hold your gaze in place. Write about a problem-solver who means something more than a hero to you.

Plan ahead. Yes, even for you, writers who have absolutely no outline. First off, non-outliners, you need an outline. Second, I'm not here to talk about that.

I'm here to tell you that there are something you need to look forward too in writing. Whether it's an epic battle scene or an emotional confession. Don't be completely caught up in what is occuring in the present moment. Let your mind go off a bit into the future of your book.

You may or may not want to proceed and spill out the planned scene onto a piece of paper. Or you could keep the idea and wait to write it in all it's full glory. All that matters is that you have something to look forward to as you write your book.

So pull out pieces of the future before the future comes.

Write for someone. This helps on levels more than motivation. This also assists in bringing out your distinct focus on message and writing style. Feeling motivated to please a certain person, to dedicate a story to a certain person may greatly help you feel like you need to write this book.

Set goals and rewards. No one is expecting you to write a book except yourself, so self-doubt and lack of motivation may greatly affect you. But you need to be your own monitor. Either arrange certain word count to reach by a certain time, or a number of hours to reach by a certain time. After this, you have the pleasure of feeling accomplished. Go buy yourself a chocolate bar or do something that makes you happy. Because you have fuflilled your purpose.