Write Through the Distraction Forest

You may have heard the phrase “can’t see the forest for the trees.” Certainly when it comes to writing a book, it can seem like you’re in a dark fairy tale (heck, maybe you’re writing one!). There is a path of adventure ahead when you start, but then you’re led astray down mysterious trails in your own mind. You could get lost there. Maybe you even enjoy being lost in your word forest! But I’m here to offer you a path out of the woods and weeds, so to speak.

Focus on Finishing the Book

A reader and writer asked me how to keep on track, and not add too many expansions or flourishes. They wanted to know how to get from point A to point B without meandering in between. In other words, they don’t want to get lost in Distraction Forest!

My first suggestion is always my best suggestion for writing a book. You may not like it. It’s quite simply FINISH THE BOOK. It’s okay to fall in love a bit with characters and scenarios along the wooded paths (or desert paths, or space paths, or paths of the soul). But you’re writing a book, not a free-flowing, running stream-of-consciousness. If that’s what you would prefer to do, that’s of course your choice…but that’s not a book. We’re talking about book writing.

Whether or not you’ve planned out the book to the letter or you’re making things up as you go along, you should have some sense of a final destination for this book. Make that your polar star, your elven guide, the x on your map for treasure. You’ve got to get there. So just get the writing done.

Get Back on the Path

But how do you do that? How do you finish a book without getting caught up in the characters? You know that characters are important. That descriptions are necessary. But there comes a point at which an artist has to put the paintbrush down. And as a creative writer, you’re an artist. And your writing mechanism is your paintbrush.

Focus on plot. Litter your path with “breadcrumbs” to come back to so you don’t lose your way. You have your characters. What should they be doing? Where are they going? Write their destinations, whether physically or internally.

Be the Swift Deer

The picture in the header is of a forest I photographed in Southwest Virginia. This region, like most of Southern Appalachia, hosts a significant deer population. It’s not uncommon to see deer at different times of day, but particularly at dusk in edge environments. If startled, they lift their tails and run away from you, deeper into the trees and out of sight.

You can get distracted and linger along the path of your book, much as a deer likes to graze on its path through the woods. But a deer does not and cannot linger for long in one place, because of potential predators, and also because it could run out of good food. You’ve got to move on. Pretend you are the deer. And if you need some impetus, pretend a writing deadline, imposed by an editor or by you, is the wolf.

You’re not going to linger around a wolf, are you? I hope not. RUN!

The Deadline is the Wolf

The wolf will get you if you don’t run through that forest. Don’t pause for long. Linger only as long as you absolutely need to.

You have to get out of the forest. Only then can you look back. Otherwise you’re stuck there and might never emerge…in other words, the book doesn’t get finished.

From the Clearing

Run from the wolf, finish the book. Make it to the clearing and you have clearer visibility. You can see everything. There are no shadows occluding your sight. This is when you can look more objectively at what you’ve made it through.

Only when you have finished a book can you alter it appropriately. It is fine to edit along the way some, but stick to the task of getting it done.

Because an unfinished book cannot be edited, sent out, and published. It remains a dark, impenetrable forest full of distraction.

Writing Isn’t a Fairy Tale

So many myths and, essentially, fairy tales surround what it means to be a writer. To make money from it, however, you must be pragmatic. You have to finish your work.

Garnishes and descriptions can be added back in later. Get the words on that page. Get out of the forest. And get it done.

Write on!
Jendia