The most important step

The biggest challenge when you begin to write is to get past the notion that things are supposed to look a certain way.

Often, the questions beginning writers ask are: How do I write a slug-line?  How do I do a voice-over or a person speaking off-screen?  How much description do I give of a place or person?  When do I capitalize words, sounds, or names?

Formatting is a skill that can be learned with time.  Similarily, it is pointless worrying about how to get an agent or a producer to see your script even before you have one ready to show.

The most important first step is to start writing and start finding the action of your story: Somebody wants something but something is in the way.  This is how they try to get around it and either they get it or they don’t.  Then what happens?

Just write

If I have one goal, it is for you to write.

There are no real secrets anymore.  The information can be found online and free.  If you don’t trust it, keep searching until you realize the same ideas are repeated over and over.  If you still don’t trust it, buy a couple of books and follow the advice. Just write.

If you don’t know how to format your script, get one of the many free programs that are online.  If you don’t trust them, buy one of the expensive programs.  If you don’t have the money, quit complaining.  If you don’t have a computer, then grab pen and paper.  Just write.

Now practice.  Write over and over, again and again.  Write till the pen runs out of ink and get a new pen.  Write till your head aches and your hand cramps from pecking at the keys too long.

Learn from your mistakes.  Do it better the next time.  Get past the theory of reading books and following the advice of teachers and turn it into wisdom.

That’s the reason this blog exists.

Resisting Structure

Acts are containers to hold your story. If you are using Classical Act form, you have 4 containers.

Now add another container or take one away.  You story is reshaped, requiring you to make new choices of to tell it.

Often, beginning writers resist Classic Act structure and dump structure entirely, then flounder as they try and find the shape of their story.

Structure is a tool to help you get from the beginning of your story to the end.  How many acts you choose to tell it is up to you.

Your Choice

There is no simpler way for me to tell you this:  If you want to write, you can do it.  It’s up to you.

I hear a lot of reasons why people don’t write.  They always sound good but they have to be because they aren’t for me.  They are for the people giving me the excuse.  I know because I used a lot of them before I started writing again.

It took time and energy to lie to myself and others why I wasn’t writing.  If I was working back then at the pace I am now, I could have completed at least 90 drafts, I could have been past my 10,000 mistakes and my 10,000 hours of practise.  I regret now that time I wasted.

Now, it is your time to choose but remember it has nothing to do about time, or money, or skill, or talent, or the right writing tools, or a place to write.

It is about you making the choice to begin.

This is for when there is nothing

Write. Do the work.

This is a part of the practice of becoming a writer. It is about making the mistakes and writing ugly stuff. It is about learning what you like and what you hate. It is about not letting yourself pretend that you are working just because you are researching or thinking about the story or waiting for inspiration.

It is about learning about how you work and that learn to run on empty is sometimes the process and then, at the end of it, for the rest of the day, fill the well.