Just Start Writing

Welcome

Welcome to The Story Stem Workshop, where ideas take root and stories bloom.

I'm an author, editor, ghostwriter, and book coach with a passion for helping writers turn ideas into stories. Each Thursday, I'll share mini lessons on plotting, character development, dialogue, revision, and the creative process, along with behind-the-scenes insights from my own writing journey. Many of the tips and tricks you will learn here are not groundbreaking, earth-shattering ideas, but they are all methods I have used myself or advised my clients to try, and these tips will often provide a different way of looking at writing and the writing process.

This week, we are going to talk about the simple act of just getting started, which for many, is often the hardest part of writing.

Just Start Writing

Some of the best writing advice I have ever gotten came from a college professor. I do not remember this man’s name, but I do remember sitting in the classroom, watching him pace in front of the chalkboard (yes, I’m that old!) in his very stereotypical tweed jacket and tie, and telling the class, "Just write. Put your pen to the page and just write whatever comes to mind. You can always change it later.”

It was like a lightbulb went off in my head. “Well, duh,” I thought to myself. “Why haven’t I thought of that?”

The advice seems so simple. It’s common sense, yet we don’t see this as a very common solution when we are staring at a blank page and a blinking cursor, or in my case back then, a blank piece of notebook paper.

I was in undergrad at the time, barely into my twenties, but this advice has stayed with me through the rest of college, through two graduate degrees, through my teaching career, and into my current freelance career.

I’ve been freelance writing since 2018 and have ghostwritten articles, blog posts, a romance series, fiction books, memoirs, and countless self-help books. Whenever I am stuck or have no idea what to say, I remind myself of this little kernel of wisdom.

My own novel actually started as a short story written and workshopped during my time in my MFA program, and then during the pandemic, I came up with the idea to incorporate it into a novel. I had a loose idea of the plot, and I would sit down every morning and write a chapter at a time, powering through until I had the rough draft. I reminded myself every time I got stuck that I just needed to get the words on the page, and lo and behold, I eventually had a draft of the novel.

There’s a reason WE are writers and that our work is sent to someone else to edit. Our expertise is in telling the story and developing the characters, coming up with plot twists and tricky, emotional scenarios for our characters to escape from, but it goes to someone else who either has a different area of expertise, for proofreading, editing, etc., or is removed enough from the book to look at it objectively. The people who see our writing when it gets to that stage are trained to help us improve what we have already written, but we have to give them something to work with. That’s where “just start writing” comes in.

So choose a scene or a chapter that excites you, even if it will eventually be the middle of your book, and just start writing.

Come back next week when we will talk about how to plot your book or novel from the beginning.