Procrastination

I’ve just finished reading the June issue of Writer’s Digest, and basically one author’s comments about procrastination has sparked my desire to write this.

The intent of this post is to do two things. One, it’s to say that I’ll be leaving this blog with only three posts (perhaps more) as a beginning. Second, it’s to expose the greater truth to procrastination.

For one I’m leaving for a volunteer job that spans from June to August, and being where this place is makes it difficult to be involved with the Internet. I hope during that time many people will have discussed what they’ve read here and I will return to answer many different and interesting comments.

Before I launch into the second point of this post I should mention a third. I am unapologetically Christian, but I am also unapologetically against the average spirit of a Christian. By reading this blog I will be saying things that are slanted in a Christian worldview, but it should in no way be the normal Christian worldview. I don’t mind shaking people’s foundations so long as I’m speaking the truth. I expect that I will be wrong in some things, but in others I cannot deny what I believe. I am a Christian, and will remain in such a state because I cannot deny a God that has never denied me.

Now, for my second point…

Procrastination is putting off something you know should be done now. I’m very familiar with it, especially when you’re talking about a 2400 page project (which is the story I’m writing). Something that big isn’t something you can just start and then end. It’s either a total immersion or a sputtering progress of about one page every other week.

Putting something off because you have to do other things is not procrastination. With that you have a different feeling associated with it and you don’t feel bad about leaving it, you simply know that you want to do it sometime. Procrastination is when you have a chance to write and you decide to use that time for relaxing or something else that is not a priority. It’s simply a choice not to get into the story.

For whatever reason, the story we know we’re supposed to write has a grip on us that demands proper attention. It’s a different feeling when we plug ourselves into the story. To some levels it’s a new plateau of being alive…it’s as if we’re setting something inside free. Why is it then that we choose to put it off?

I would compare writers to a runner. Those who run obviously keep doing it because they find some level of enjoyment. They may not have the life calling that we feel we do in writing, but with this illustration it’s close enough.

What does a runner do? Run. How does he get used to distances like 10-15 miles? He runs. So comparing writing to running, plugging into your world and setting that inner person free is like a muscle. If it stays unused you develop atrophy and you have to retrain the muscle. You can develop fat through procrastinating, or indulging. This is what procrastinating is.

By putting that inner person through workouts you refine your ability to write, which translates into a world that is much more magical to you, which ultimately gets through to your reader.

The worst thing to do in a situation of repetitive procrastination is to criticize yourself for what you’ve done in the past. That’s a sure-fire way to get back into procrastinating. The idea you should have in your mind is that this next stretch of time will not be the same way. Ultimately, if you’re honest with yourself, you’ll know when you’ve procrastinated and when you’ve done something good.

I’ve heard authors say that their procrastination is a tool in the way that they’ve learned to deal with it. Let me tell you from personal experience, I’ve had my story uncompleted for the past seven years, which has led me to this conclusion: when you choose not to write (procrastinate) nothing gets written.

It’s up to you how to deal with your own habits of writing, but please don’t justify procrastination, there’s really none for it.

Not a how to...but a little advice

Let me clarify one thing. A classic is made by the way you think it should be written, so in that way I wouldn’t follow much past what I can believe in, which is myself and God because I’m writing the story, not some other person. But to clarify, your story can still stink.

Because I know that authors can get the big head pretty quick let me also clarify, there’s still plenty more to learn. Being at the top means there’s only one direction to go. By staying in the position of a learner rather than a teacher, you effectively make yourself bi-directional.

The following posts will be on the general mechanics of a potential classic. Once again, I cannot tell you “this is how you create a classic” because there’s no way to do that. I can tell you how I hope to do mine, but outside of that, it depends on how you write it.

Let’s start with plot.

“When my son, Nate was four, he wrote a novel. It was four pages, each page containing one sentence. Very Hemingway-esque.

Nate spelled the words phonetically. Here is the entire novel, sans the crayon illustrations. The spelling has been updated for modern readers: Robin Hood went riding. A bad guy came. They fought. He won.”

--James Scott Bell, Plot & Structure

I felt the best way to outline a novel’s plot was in the words of a four-year-old. In it’s most basic form is there anything more to it? Us writers with the Master’s Degree’s always seem to make the word Plot have to mean something so much more than that. Let me tell you, there’s more wisdom in the words of little kids with all their innocence than can be learned from a 60-year-old with all his exposure.

A plot is about your main character going on about his normal life, and then something happens. He wrestles against this change, this antagonist, and wins. Life-Change-Resolution.

It’s been said that the worst thing you can do is start out your book with a character getting up in the morning. I’d say do it. But only if the reason for the universe is sitting for no reason right next to his toothbrush, and now the entire universe is after your character. Plot is about introducing change and then resolving the change.

The twists come in mostly while resolving the change.

For example, Eragon was pretty popular when it came out. What happened in the story? It started with a chase just to get you interested (which was well-suggested by Paoulini’s mentor), and then it showed Eragon. He was minding his own business hunting for food for his family when wham…change came. The story is about how everyone is now dealing with that change. There are two (and hopefully a third) books explaining how a desperate throw from an elf changed the life of Eragon and the town that he lived in (it’s been awhile since I’ve read the book and all I can think of is Therinsford).

The only constant in life is change.

The change has to be dramatic though. Something like the reason for the universe plopping into someone’s lap. It can be something less dramatic, but you understand the point. It shouldn’t be a normal life hitch in the plans; it has to be something larger that shakes the foundations of your character enough for the tremors to knock your reader around.

Another thing I’ve heard from a few teachers is “identify the thing that is most dear to your character and then take it away from him.” He loves the house. Destroy it. His wife is the dearest thing to him. Kill her with cancer. Sound bad? Certainly. But what would the story be like? Can you take that and turn it where the reader also loves the house or the wife? Then when it falls and she dies the reader is right there screaming their lungs out. They may not be too happy with you at that moment, but they’ll remember the story.

Even while I suggest it though, I should also mention that it is not a pat tactic. For instance, in Christopher Pauolini’s Eldest the mysterious guy you want to like is now the bad guy at the end. I personally thought that was a stupid twist. The move is completely mainstream, completely commercial fiction. Understand that it is a good way to make your story stick with your reader, but don’t just use it blindly. It has to mean something more than “my editor suggested it.”

With this thing called plot, it can be complicated or not (and both can be good). The bottom line is still what was said before: Robin Hood went riding. A bad guy came. They fought. He won.

Plot can be very hard to think about for some. If it is for you just understand that plot is about presenting a problem to your characters normal life and then resolving the issue by the end of the book. It’s nothing bigger than that. The creativity is yours after that point.

Introduction

“…the chief commodity a writer has to sell is his courage.”
--Harlan Ellison, from his anthology Dangerous Visions

How do you define a “classic story”? Can you? For the most part…yes. But then, that depends on who you ask. For instance, the discussion of “how to create a classic” is a story I’ve tried to sell to many writing magazines. The dominant response from them in so many words is: “You cannot define a classic. It’s something that defines itself.”

I would agree with this conclusion in the context of looking for a “how-to” article, which isn’t impossible to write, but it would be extremely hard and would have an unpredictable outcome at best. I personally believe a how-to article on making a classic would be counter-productive, and would completely distract from the reality of a classic.

A classic is, to put it simply: passion and focus.

Could those two things be taken away from something like Moby Dick, A Christmas Carol, The Lord of the Rings, The Odyssey, and so many others, and still have the same story? Would you even have the story if the authors didn’t have those two things…

My personal journey isn’t a good example yet but I’ll speak of it anyway, because a lot of authors, published or otherwise, will most likely be on the same quest as I am.

Ever since I was 11 years old I began writing novels, and at 12 I began my first Fantasy novel. Since that point I’ve run into many different teachers that have opened my mind to different ways of writing. I’ve read many books on the subject, most all of them have been beneficial. The same goes with my teachers. But it’s one in particular that stretched me just enough to find the conclusion that I have now about a classic.

My story is made in such a way as to emphasize the fact that my characters are on a long journey fraught with peril. My teacher didn’t like that. In fact it was denounced many times in front of my class.

This challenged me. It made me upset because I couldn’t see how my teacher had the right to stand up there and talk about how I “should” do my story as if it were hers this whole time?

So I scrutinized what I was learning by going to other sources. I don’t like it when people simply write off what others say, so I wanted to be different and actually look for her to be right. So I took what I learned from her and looked around for the truth.

I read books like, The First Five Pages (Noah Lukeman), Plot & Structure (James Scott Bell), Creating Plot (J. Madison Davis), Creating Scenes (Raymond Obstfeld), and Dialogue (Gloria Kempton). Without getting into every little detail that I learned right now, I’d say that the best thing I learned could be summed up in this sentence: “…the chief commodity a writer has to sell is his courage.”

That sentence was the embodiment of my truth and I found myself justified for writing the way I felt I should write my story.

Let me be painfully honest with you all, even to the possible detriment of myself from the get go. I don’t expect my book to fly at the beginning. I don’t expect great sales as soon as I hit the bookstores. I do not expect it.

That’s what makes a classic in a sense. It’s not everything that makes a classic, but as an introduction it is fitting, because the attitude of a writer is his greatest tool. As I post more and hope that others will discuss what I post, I believe there will be a point where you’ll find your own way to make a classic. It is your story after all.

Respectfully,

Levi Hendrickson