When Writing Seems Really Hard

In case you're thinking of picking up writing as a hobby or as a profession, let me give you a piece of advice... writing is REALLY HARD.

Okay. It's only hard sometimes. But still.

Like today (I'm blaming the fact that it's Friday the 13th, and I'm a writer so I can do things like that), I'm having such a hard time getting started. I finished the first draft of The Fire's Princess yesterday and I've got to take a break from that world for a while before I can go back to it with new eyes. So I want to get started on a new series just to give myself some time away from Elemental Royals as well as a stretch writing something new. But it's so hard to get out of medieval fantasy and completely onto another world. So prep work! Good start, yeah?

Prep work is a pit fall. Because you can do prep work forever. Literally. I could sit in front of my computer and look up information and diagrams and pictures for days, weeks and months before I ever actually write a single thing. I an do character outlines and figure out things about the characters and the world, but I might never really put a word in those characters' mouths. So I like to do prep work as I go instead of all at once. Because if I get caught in prep work at the start, I'll never actually start writing.

Add in to that writer's block and actually coming up with ideas in the first place, and sometimes it's so hard that it's depressing.

But then there are those days when it's so rewarding. You get in that grove. You find just the right song that puts you in the perfect writing mood and you get started and there's no stopping you. It's almost like a caffeine rush and a manic state all at once. It's breathtaking and brilliant. Who needs drugs when you have the rush of writing? Of being able to craft brand new worlds and stories and people?

So sometimes writing seems really hard, but I live for those days when it's breathtaking.