A story won’t write itself. That’s what I say to myself when I’m not writing when I should, or when I’m too tired to write. It won’t write itself; I need to keep adding to it, to keep the characters alive and to make the story tangible and real on the screen or on paper.
There can be too many obstacles that deter us from writing. It’s easier not to write than it is to write. We can come up with a laundry list of excuses not to write it, or say we’re not in the mood to. But no matter what excuses we come up with, a story isn’t going to write itself. It’ll sit idly in our thoughts, idly in our imagination until we write it.
Once we start writing, at first, it can be difficult and cumbersome. It can feel like trudging through a muddy trail, or navigating through a foggy forest. I’ve had roadblocks where I just didn’t know what to write from one sentence to the next. It was as if the story ran out of gas, or else I ran out of energy to write. But at some point, if we keep writing, the story will inexplicable propel itself into existence, and there isn’t enough energy for us to keep up with it. It’s as if we’re in the driver seat, and the story is leading the way, but as we write, we can’t make excuses to stop. To stop is tantamount to letting the story wither and fade out of existence.
Fallton Havenstonne 