Word Count: 7,132

Does any of that word count make sense? Not a clue.

Will I make my goal of 50,000 words by the end of the month? Probably not.

Did I learn something about my story, myself, and my characters? Yes I did!

Working the problem…

About 5,000 words in, I ran into a snag. My characters were bored. I was bored, this was not the direction that I wanted to go in. So I did something odd, I jumped back to the beginning. I changed a POV, and then suddenly: viola! I’ve got a snarky character, a new perspective, and the idea that my story really is going somewhere…I just go lost somewhere along the way.

Even though something wasn’t going my way, I found that it doesn’t solve anything if you give up. Instead, you work the problem. You ask yourself questions:

• What can I do differently?
• What don’t I like here?
• What can I change?
• Is it the character?

Remember to ask yourself positive questions, and not place blame. It sounds odd, (and I learned this from a friend,) but if you ask yourself questions that are positively phrased like: what can I do differently? Instead of: what did I do wrong? It tends to work a lot better.

Don’t wallow in failure, be your own positive motivator when you work the problem!

Another thing that I found helpful when I found myself stuck and not sure where to go: I started writing from a different area of the story. Sometimes if you are writing in the beginning of the story, and something isn’t working out your way, skip to the middle.

Who said that a writer had to write all their scenes in consecutive order? Sometimes a change of the writer’s  perspective is all you need to get your story where it needs to go. It might help you see the bigger picture.

Also, lastly, and the most important thing: Keep Writing!

Even though sometimes the going gets tough, I’ll never be able to perfect my work, if I don’t keep working at the rough drafts to get me there.

(Even J.K. Rowling didn’t write her final draft for Harry Potter from the get go.) 😛

Eh, I suppose I better stop yammering, and get back to working. Hope everyone has a great week! Happy Writing!