written by Bryan Hutchinson

Have you ever thought you may quit writing?

Most writers have at one point or another, usually when facing some sort of difficulty. Maybe you’re struggling with writer’s block, you’re unhappy with your progress, or you received some negative feedback that has you doubting yourself.

Whatever may have caused you to question writing’s place in your future, it’s not an easy decision to keep writing. The practice takes up a lot of time, for one thing, that you may feel would be better suited doing something else. The writing journey can also be frustrating, discouraging, and disheartening, and there’s no guarantee you’ll reach the success you hope for in the end.

If you’re caught in the middle and unsure what is the best choice for you, it can help to imagine the regrets you may have in the future if you quit writing now. Imagine for a moment that you’re 90 years old and looking back on your life. Consider two scenarios: in one, you kept writing. In the other, you left it behind and went on to do something else.

Which decision would you be more likely to regret? These four questions should help you determine the answer.

1. Will I Regret Not Going After My Dream?

One of the most common regrets at the end of life is not going after your dreams. The reasons are many, from trying to be practical to not believing you can do it to wanting to live up to someone else’s expectations of who you should be. In all cases, dreams are put on the back burner until it’s too late.

For a study published in 2018, Dr. Shai Davidai from the New School for Social Research and Professor Thomas Gilovich of Cornell University conducted six experiments examining what’s behind our deepest regrets. Their results showed that “people are haunted more by regrets about failing to fulfill their hopes, goals, and aspirations than by regrets about failing to fulfill their duties, obligations, and responsibilities.”

In other words, we regret more not pursuing our dreams and letting ourselves down than we do failing to live up to others’ expectations.

Will you regret it? Do you dream of being a writer? Will you feel bad if you let this dream go? Or is there another dream you should be pursuing instead?

2. Am I Too Worried About What Others Think?

Most of us worry about what others think of us at least on some level, particularly when we’re starting out as writers.

“One of the surest ways to find unhappiness and limit your creativity is worrying about what others think of you or your work,” writes author Bryan Hutchinson over at Positive Writer. “It’s true, and I am guilty of it. But it doesn’t have to be that way.”

When you sit down to write, do you hear someone else’s voice in your head questioning or discouraging you? Be careful. Placing too much importance on what others think and not enough on what you think is one of the common regrets people have as they get older. Sure, in the moment, the opinions of others may seem important to your success and happiness, but at the end of life, what will matter most is whether you stayed true to yourself.

Will you regret it? As you look back on your life, discounting everyone else’s opinion, do you think you will regret not pursuing your writing dreams? Or will you regret, instead, spending so much time on writing when your heart is somewhere else?

3. Am I Too Focused on Being Practical?

We all make practical choices most of the time, but sometimes, practicalities can hold us back from what’s most important in life.

If you are the one who foregoes a beach vacation to save money for your child’s braces, stays in a job you don’t like to put your kids through college, or puts off retirement to fix the roof, you’re being practical, which is usually a good thing. But on occasion, making the practical choice may be something you regret, particularly if that practical decision means quitting writing.

Sometimes it pays to ignore practicalities. Cutting back on your hours (and your paycheck) for more time to devote to writing may tighten your budget, but imagine how you’ll feel within a year or so when you have a novel to show for it.

Will you regret it? Divide a sheet of paper into three vertical columns. In the first one, write down at least five decisions you’ve made concerning your writing. Examples may include whether you decided to write today, whether you made a change in your life to allow more time to write, or whether you decided to take a risk and attend a writing conference even though your budget didn’t really allow for it.

In the second column, write whether each decision was practical or impractical. In the third column, write what your 90-year-old self would think of that decision. Finally, ask yourself, “If I quit writing now for practical reasons, will I regret it 20, 30, or 40 years from now?”

4. Am I Playing It Too Safe?

Most humans prefer to play it safe most of the time. But on their deathbeds, they regret not taking more risks. This is an important regret for writers to consider because in living the writing life, pretty much everything involves risk, including:

• Thinking you may have writing potential. What if you’re wrong?
• Spending so much time writing. What if, in the end, the results disappoint you?
• Showing others your writing. What if they don’t like it?
• Publishing your writing. What if you get bad reviews?

What we can learn from the older generation is that the feeling of never having tried can gnaw at a person like a wound that won’t heal, whereas failure can be confronted and overcome. In the end, taking risks teaches us much more than playing it safe.

Will you regret it? Think back on your experience as a writer. Try to recall at least three risks you’ve taken. They can be simple risks, like showing your work to a family member or friend or attending a writing workshop. How did taking each risk turn out? Looking back, are you glad you took the chance, or do you wish you had chosen to take the safer route? What does this tell you about your future as a writer?

What Do Your Answers Tell You?

Now look back at your answers to these four questions and see if you can gather from them an overall feeling about your writing. They should help you determine whether you’re ready to quit and try something else, or if other concerns are interfering with your true desire to continue writing.

In the end, what matters are your dreams and expectations for yourself. Other, smaller concerns will fade away with time, but these will remain with you until your dying day. Remember that when deciding whether to continue writing.

Source: positivewriter.com

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Are you having problems with your main character? In this post, we look at what to do when your protagonist is a bore.

I was chatting to a few students the other day and we were having a conversation about the novels they were writing, and a few agreed that their other characters were more fun to write than their protagonist. This is not ideal, and it got me thinking about our relationships with our protagonists.

Has Your Protagonist Become A Bore?

Why Does This Happen?

We put our protagonist on a pedestal.

I think it is because we like good people. What we consider good is debatable and yes, there are exceptions, but most of us prefer people who share our morals and values. This means that sometimes we end up giving our characters the high morals standards that we strive for and then these characters sometimes become a little boring.

There are no grey areas for them. There are no questionable decisions. There are no maybes.

How Can We Fix That?

1. It’s Just A Name

Remember just because they are your protagonist it does not mean that they have to be good. Just like your antagonist does not have to be evil, your protagonist does not have to be a golden Adonis who never does anything questionable. It may help you to stay away from the words ‘protagonist’ or ‘goodie’ and use the word main character (MC) instead. This is the character we are most invested in. The one around whom the story revolves and the one we are rooting for.

2. They Need To Act

Don’t immobilise your main character. Put them in positions where they need to act. They do have to be the primary decision-makers in their story, and they should be the ones getting themselves out of trouble. They can’t keep passing the buck and waiting around for someone to get the story going. That’s their job. Minions and friend characters are fine, but most of the work needs to be done by the MC.

3. They Need To Be Motivated

If you are struggling with this, you need to re-evaluate your main character’s goal and motivations. Do they really want to achieve the goal? Raise the stakes if they don’t. What will happen if they fail?

4. Make It Hard For Them, But Don’t Make It Impossible

You should stack the odds against your main character, but sometimes we can go a bit overboard. Make it hard, yes, lock them in a room and throw away the key, but at least give them a paper clip to pick the lock. Give them a small win every now and again.

The Last Word

You can do whatever you want, and you will find exceptions, but it’ll be easier to write about an active, motivated character – not a protagonist who is a bore. They should want to succeed or have no choice to succeed. They can definitely fail, but they must at least try.

TOP TIP: Use our Character Creation Kit to help you create great characters for your stories.

 by Mia Botha

Source: writerswrite.co.za

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Today’s post includes a selection of prompts from my book, 1200 Creative Writing Prompts. Enjoy!

Creative writing prompts are excellent tools for writers who are feeling uninspired or who simply want to tackle a new writing challenge. Today’s creative writing prompts focus on nature.

For centuries, writers have been composing poems that celebrate nature, stories that explore it, and essays that analyze it.

Nature is a huge source of inspiration for all creative people. You can find it heavily featured in film, television, art, and music.

Creative Writing Prompts

You can use these creative writing prompts in any way you choose. Sketch a scene, write a poem, draft a story, or compose an essay. The purpose of these prompts is to inspire you, so take the images they bring to your mind and run with them. And have fun!

1. A young girl and her mother walk to the edge of a field, kneel down in the grass, and plant a tree.
2. The protagonist wakes up in a seemingly endless field of wildflowers in full bloom with no idea how he or she got there.
3. Write a piece using the following image: a smashed flower on the sidewalk.
4. A family of five from a large, urban city decides to spend their one-week vacation camping.
5. An elderly couple traveling through the desert spend an evening stargazing and sharing memories of their lives.
6. A woman is working in her garden when she discovers an unusual egg.
7. Write a piece using the following image: a clearing deep in the woods where sunlight filters through the overhead lattice of tree leaves.
8. Some people are hiking in the woods when they are suddenly surrounded by hundreds of butterflies.
9. A person who lives in a metropolitan apartment connects with nature through the birds that come to the window.
10. Write a piece using the following image: an owl soaring through the night sky.
11. A well-to-do family from the city that has lost all their wealth except an old, run-down farmhouse in the country. They are forced to move into it and learn to live humbly.
12. Two adolescents, a sister and brother, are visiting their relatives’ farm and witness a sow giving birth.

Again, you can use these creative writing prompts to write anything at — poems, stories, songs, essays, blog posts, or just sit down and start freewriting.

By Melissa Donovan
Source: writingforward.com

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