Why You Should Just Sit Down and Write Your Book

As many blogs and posts and tweets about writing will tell you - sometimes getting started is the hardest part. 

All writers know the feeling, the burning itch in the hands and in the mind of a story that just needs to be put down on the page, but something holds them back. 

They're either waiting for the perfect moment, waiting until they have the middle bits of the book figured out, or - and this is the worst one yet - they just keep making excuse after excuse on why they haven't started it yet. 

We've all been there, I've even been there myself recently. 

I've had this idea for a YA LGBTQ Psycological Thriller novel for years, and for some reason, I just couldn't bring myself to put it on the page. I was afraid that it wouldn't turn out as well as the story I envisioned in my head. I had other projects that would be much easier to publish and I knew they already had an audience whereas my new novel idea didn't quite have a home yet. 

But then the wonderful event of Camp NaNoWriMo, the July version of the world-famous November event where participants are tasked with the nerve-wracking caffeine-induced madness of writing an entire 50,000-word novel in only thirty days. Though the difference between this event and the one in November is that the participants get to set their own goals and word count. 

For this past event, I threw all hope of caution in my story to the wind and tasked myself with writing this novel idea that I have been putting off for years. 31 days - 60,000 words. 

Sure there were some days when I showed up to my computer to write after a long day and typed the necessary words for the day with my eyes half closed with almost no recollection of what I wrote that day - but I did the most important part. I wrote. 

In preparation for this event, I made a simple chapter-by-chapter outline for my novel idea, as I do with all of my novels, and with my alarm set for the first of the month and a few cans of energy drinks on standby. When the day came I opened up a blank document and just got to typing. 

The first few days flew across the pages, I was not only making my word count for the day - I was passing it more often than not. And though there were a few setbacks on days when I experienced burn out all in all the event was a success and the perfect motivator for me to stop making excuses and to just sit down and write the damn book. 

At the end of the 31 days, my novel wasn't done. In my writing, I had added more chapters that my novel needed to make it more complete, but at the moment I am only two chapters away from finishing my novel. 

The lesson this taught me is that there is no reason to wait. 

There isn't going to be the perfect day to write your novel, where the weather is just right, and you feel that you're finally ready to write your story, because if you keep waiting for that perfect moment - it's going to just fade away and it'll never get written. 

If you need all the stars to be aligned for you to write your novel well - 

⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐

Here they are. All in a row. 

Now go open the writing software of your choice and get to writing. 

Now is the time to finally write that book. 

This is where I would normally wish you the best of luck and tell you to get to writing, but you don't need that now, do you?

You're ready to write I can see it now. 

With love, 

B. King xo xo

Want to write with me live? I'm now on Twitch! Come join me in some writing sprints every Wed-Thurs-Fri-Sat at 10:30 pm EST

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