Help! what to focus on in a first draft?

[Brooke]

i figured i might as well finally ask this here, because as a professional nit-picker, i'm going crazy.
with the very first book i started, i barely plotted at all, leading it to its demise in the bottom of my closet. with the second book, i spent months plotting out every little detail until i was too far gone stressing to even write the book anymore, and it joined the first.
this is my third time trying to write a novel, and i'm determined to find a balance and finish my book. how much of it do i plan out before i begin writing? i tend to break my stories into parts when i plot -- do i split it into two parts, three parts, four, five, go chapter by chapter, pull a Stephen King and barely outline?
i mean, i know it's not going to be perfect, but even knowing that i become a perfectionist when i plan stories -- picking and choosing the most arbitrary details (what color is her bag? where is the door in the room? how many stairwells are in the building?). i once physically drew out a very detailed map of the school my characters attended, and i used it maybe twice ever, but i still made it "just in case," because i was basically paralyzed with fear that a reader would spot something that didn't make sense. ironically, my focus on the smallest, most specific things tends to make me overlook the most basic things (that school i drew a map of? i never even picked a name for it).
so, my question is, "how much of a story do i plot out before i write, and especially what do i plot out before i write?"

 

[James Charles]

i figured i might as well finally ask this here, because as a professional nit-picker, i'm going crazy.
with the very first book i started, i barely plotted at all, leading it to its demise in the bottom of my closet. with the second book, i spent months plotting out every little detail until i was too far gone stressing to even write the book anymore, and it joined the first.
this is my third time trying to write a novel, and i'm determined to find a balance and finish my book. how much of it do i plan out before i begin writing? i tend to break my stories into parts when i plot -- do i split it into two parts, three parts, four, five, go chapter by chapter, pull a Stephen King and barely outline?
i mean, i know it's not going to be perfect, but even knowing that i become a perfectionist when i plan stories -- picking and choosing the most arbitrary details (what color is her bag? where is the door in the room? how many stairwells are in the building?). i once physically drew out a very detailed map of the school my characters attended, and i used it maybe twice ever, but i still made it "just in case," because i was basically paralyzed with fear that a reader would spot something that didn't make sense. ironically, my focus on the smallest, most specific things tends to make me overlook the most basic things (that school i drew a map of? i never even picked a name for it).
so, my question is, "how much of a story do i plot out before i write, and especially what do i plot out before i write?"

Every writer does it differently. Some do extensive outlines, others nothing at all. It's your style, your way of writing. Just throw down a first draft, then as is always the case even with the most successful writers, the devil is in the revision....

 

[Vagabond Heart]

Hey Brooke.
We all have different ways of doing things, as James said, but I’m sensing that your current way of working isn’t bringing you the results you want?
I’d like to suggest a couple of things I’ve found useful.
One is using Beat sheets, like the Save The Cat one, which screenwriters use. As a way of giving a framework to build on, it can be very effective for certain types of book.
Another is to write a working synopsis that contains all the plot points, but isn’t overlaid with details. Pete has Several seminars on this site, that you can do a pay-to-view on. And there’s one that includes different types of synopses, which I’ve found invaluable.
So perhaps watch the relevant parts of that seminar, then set yourself a page limit for your synopsis? Say, no more than four pages, double-line spaced, or something like that, so you don’t weigh it down with detail while planning your book?
Might that help?
Xx VH

 

[E G Logan]

This is probably going to complicate things further:

What I do is write those scenes first that just shout out at me, practically write themselves. I usually have the beginning and the end, and the other 'big' scenes in roughly plot order. (ch1, ch2, then maybe ch4, ch7....) And I do have some outline plot notes on the side, too.

[Chronological order may be a very different thing from plot order, with flashbacks, etc, and perhaps a second timeline winding over and through...]

BUT this method leaves me with a mountain of bits, rather like the squares for a patchwork quilt. And knitting those together is the tricky and painful bit.
It does mean I bash away happily when the enthusiasm strikes me, and do stuff like editing and putting in approximate order when I don't feel creative at all.

I can see it wouldn't work for everybody.

 

[RK Wallis]

I live by the method in Story Genius by Lisa Cron...

 

[MattScho]

The best advice i've gotten on this is always move forward. What matters with a first draft is getting it done. As James and Bev said, everyone has their own method. I work from a simple narrative outline (Jon Franklin's is crazy simple. What is the conflict? What is the first obstacle in the way of overcoming the conflict, how does that lead to the second, how does that lead to the third and then what's the resolution.) This is a very, very bare-boned skelton. the point of it is to make sure when you're hanging muscle etc on it, you can keep in mind what the story is and where in broad strokes it is heading, and must end. Lots of people find that too restrictive, others find it undefined. which is the point, you know how your mind works best. Figure out the outline that will work best for you. that may be no outline, or anything in between.

 

[Pamela Jo]

If you've never ridden a horse at a gallop this will be harder to understand. I suppose it is analogous to driving at speed for the first time.

I have an idea, do a plot outline, but mostly I know how I want the reader to feel while reading the story. Then I sit down and give my creative shadow it's head, loose the reins. Rarely have I had the result be what I outlined. The story begins to have a life of it's own. At the same time I steer with legs, and balance and everything else to go where I want to go. Lots of times I'll have a Q look it up on the internet and the answer will provide the next scene.

Lots of writers do a hybrid pants/plot method. That's what works for me. Just remember the first draft is you telling yourself the story. Gallop wild and free.

The next draft I begin dissecting the story and deciding what stays, what goes, where the proper beginning is and if the ending works.

The 3rd draft I have a real handle on the characters, the plot, and stakes-that is when things begin to settle into the final shape.

The thing that changed everything for me is learning that editing means getting the structure right first. Not starting at the beginning and correcting grammar or prose. Your first draft is going to have a wildness to it. Your final draft somehow has to keep that spirit, but be willing to carry the reader on a journey wo throwing them.

From Tiffany Yates Martin:

"In every genre, I generally edit similarly to the method I advocate in my book Intuitive Editing for authors to edit their own work: I start with a cold read of a story, always—basically reading it like a novel, not taking notes, just absorbing the story and getting my feet planted in it. Then I use my version of Sol Stein’s “triage” technique (from his wonderful Stein on Writing): I focus on the foundation of the story first—character, stakes, and plot—and make suggestions anywhere these key elements feel as if they could use development, strengthening, or clarification. Then I look at the supporting elements, like momentum and pace, suspense and tension, point of view, immediacy and impact, voice, etc. Finally I examine the prose itself: is it as efficient, effective, clear, and impactful as possible?"


I'm now reading Sir Terry Pratchett's bio. His speciality was fusing a paragraph or character, or line that he'd cut from another draft seamlessly into a new context so the reader felt that it had always been there. It sounds like that would be a good skill for you to begin to practice.

 

[Katie-Ellen]

The first draft demands that you give us one hell of a wallop. We need that promise first and foremost. Something visceral, good or bad. The promise of an emotional, mythic level wallop. Because the individual experience is always universal.

The first draft says, 'This is where I am taking you, and come with me or don't, but you can't stop me. '


I am one hell of a nit picker myself. Do not do it. Just do not. Figure out why you are telling this story. What is the so what? Why the hell will we want to read it? What is the pay off? This gives your story its urgency and sense of purpose and direction.



Start at the end and work backwards if need be.

 

[Mel L]

Argh, I feel your pain! I'm not a plotter by nature and have read a ton of books and advice on the subject. What I'm only just figuring out is WHY I struggle. The answer, it turns out, comes from another book, one that just may be life-changing for me. It's called 'Whole Brain Living' and was written by a neuroscientist called Jill Bolte Taylor. The book has nothing to do with writing as such, but everything to do with the creative process.
It's about our 4 brains: 1) the left-brain manager self 2) the left-brain emotional self 3) the right brain emotional (fun) self and 4) our right brain 'higher' self. I realize that my creative impulses, the kind I express when I get into the flow of writing, come from the right brain, while my editing and plotting skills are all in my left problem-solving manager brain.
What it comes down to for me: I cannot plot and outline everything in advance because that function steals all the creative joy out of writing for me, but, as others have said here, we all need structure. So each of us has to find a way to go back and forth between those different brains to get what we need at different stages of drafting and editing. Which probably explains why writers are a strange breed indeed!

 

[MattScho]

The first draft demands that you give us one hell of a wallop. We need that promise first and foremost. Something visceral, good or bad. The promise of an emotional, mythic level wallop. Because the individual experience is always universal.

The first draft says, 'This is where I am taking you, and come with me or don't, but you can't stop me. '


I am one hell of a nit picker myself. Do not do it. Just do not. Figure out why you are telling this story. What is the so what? Why the hell will we want to read it? What is the pay off? This gives your story its urgency and sense of purpose and direction.



Start at the end and work backwards if need be.

I'd also suggest that the first draft demands you give yourself one hell of a wallop. There is no need for anyone else to see a first draft. it's a mistake to submit a first draft. the beauty of it is that the story will be there, the characters will be there, but as an old writing coach used to insist: writing ain't writing, re-writing is writing

 

[Hannah F]

I am a plotter. I think the story through. I get to know my characters and setting (a bit like you with your school). When I write the outline, I know my main characters, I know the inciting incident that will start this story, my MCs goals, where they think they are going, the obstacles in the way, and the resolution (where they end up going/what they have overcome). Then I break it into chapters - a couple of lines to a paragraph letting me know what happens in this chapter and its purpose in the story. Now I have the scaffolding and I start my first draft. As I write, I let my imagination find its way through the scene. If my creativity wants to diverge from my plan, I go back to the plan and see if this change of direction will work. If yes, I amend the plan. If no, I tell my imagination to stick to the original. (I will also interview my characters to see what they think).
As I write draft One, I keep in mind that it really doesn't matter if it's crap. No one will see it except me. Once it's finished I can see what needs improving/altering/ditching as I write draft 2.

Then I get alpha readers to just read and say what works/doesn't/confuses etc. Improve/alter/ditch/expand for draft 3. Etc. In each draft I do what I call layering = add detail e.g. using the 5 senses, elaborate on setting - whatever will enrich the scene . . .

The important thing is that draft One is your story for you. It will not be perfect. It might not even be that good. Don't worry. That's what draft 2 and 3 and 4 etc are for. Also, don't worry if you sketch a whole school and use hardly any of it. I like the iceberg analogy: what the reader eventually reads is only the bit of iceberg above the surface. All that's underneath is the work and research and knowledge that we as authors need in order to be able to write a darn good tale.

 

[Rich.]

There's an awful lot of good advice in this thread already, so I'm wading in tentatively here. I don't want to muddy the water.

I think the whole plotter/pantser (planned vs sponteneous) thing is a false dichotomy. It's a spectrum, and I don't really think anyone is hard up to the extremes.

Having said that, you asked:

what do i plot out before i write?

You could do worse than read, in the following order, Techniques of the Selling Writer by Dwight V Swain, Save the Cat by Blake Snyder and The Anatomy of Story and The Anatomy of Genres both by John Truby. After that you'd have a pretty solid idea about – for commercial fiction, at least – what you should be plotting.

But as for...

how much of a story do i plot out before i write ... ?

If you were to read those books, once you'd digested the meat and bones of them, you'd figure out by trial and error how much to plot in advance. Sometimes it's enough to have the shape of a story in your head – or even just the first line. Sometimes a few bullet points will do. And sometimes only a sixty-page treatment will cut it.

Be free with it. Hannah is spot on...

draft One is your story for you

No one else need read it. And (I think) it's always easier to work the clay once it's spinning in front of you. Throwing it down onto the empty wheel is an act of faith and often messy, especially when you're starting out – but it is fun

 

[Josephine]

I've found Lauren Sapala's blog super useful for this. My brain seems to work in a similar way to hers; I can't plot at all, I can't focus when I try to outline or even just think about the story logically, even the bits I've already written, everything just goes blank. I have to say I still haven't successfully finished my novel cause I'm an extremely slow writer but having started to lean into my intuitive side and let the story surface as it wants, the whole process has got a whole lot less painful and more productive. I have to keep letting go of what exactly I want my story to be, and it consistently rewards me by growing itself bigger and bolder than I'd ever have the confidence to have planned.
Have a look at this post for starters maybe...

edited to add: I am also one hundred percent a nitpicker. The line-editor stands at my shoulder ready to whack me on the hand with a ruler every time I use a slightly inaccurate word. I have to just let her do her thing without taking any notice... still learning

 

[Katie-Ellen]

I'd also suggest that the first draft demands you give yourself one hell of a wallop. There is no need for anyone else to see a first draft. it's a mistake to submit a first draft. the beauty of it is that the story will be there, the characters will be there, but as an old writing coach used to insist: writing ain't writing, re-writing is writing

Quite so. That wallop is the thing to be worked out in getting down that first draft, entirely sight unseen. Written large and loose. I once wrote an entire first draft, got to the end, sat on it some months then decided the wallop belonged, not with the MC, but with a character introduced in the second half of the story. Oh well. Scrap 250 000 words and start again from scratch. And make it shorter too. 85 k or so this time. 120 k tops. More viable.

This one had begun originally as a short story but then it grew organically. I was used to the dynamics and publishing of short story writing. But then I had set out on an exercise, stretching this one longer and longer, partly simply to find out if I could even muster the physical stamina, gluing my backside to the screen long enough to write a novel length manuscript, whether or not it resulted in a steaming pile of utter merde. So that was OK. I finished the thing, but then felt I had not quite worked out ahead of time the story I really wanted to tell, and why I wanted to tell it.

It is possible, or so I tried to comfort myself, that I had needed to do that first rejected first draft to find out what that other, underlying story might be, fetching it up in the bucket from down in the well. Terribly organic and time consuming, but never mind, though they do say a stitch in time saves, um, ninety million (?)


Sometimes we just go a walk for its own sake. No fear or favour. Terribly liberating. But however we approach it, we find out that the execution of a story vision is a matter of craft and ultimately discipline. That discipline of crafting the thing to a submittable standard might well not yield up a green light until the tenth draft. But I take my hat off to those writers who know, or at least think they know, exactly what the story is ahead of getting down that first galloping, walloping draft.

 

[RK Wallis]

mostly I know how I want the reader to feel while reading the story

Such a sage tip!

Gallop wild and free.

Beautiful analogy.

Whole Brain Living

On my TBR list.

Techniques of the Selling Writer by Dwight V Swain

I need to reread this. Such a good book!

I'm shaping big picture ideas for my next book. Going to try writing MG this time. This thread has been really helpful. Thanks for starting it @Brooke!

 

[Hannah F]

Another tip for writing a story is reading them. Read a lot, especially in your genre but also outside your genre. The more you read, the more you get a feel for story structure. What genre are you writing in? Perhaps you haven't decided yet.

 

[Robinne Weiss]

I think the whole plotter/pantser (planned vs sponteneous) thing is a false dichotomy. It's a spectrum, and I don't really think anyone is hard up to the extremes.

Yeah, this. I tend to plan the end and a few major plot points along the way. Then I plan about the first third of the book in a rough outline--what I want the reader to feel, what I want my characters to experience. By this point, I'm eager to write, so I start in on the first draft. At some point I almost always veer off the outline, and then I stop an plan another chunk before getting back to writing. So I'm back and forth between planning and writing several times.

My only deviation from this pattern so far has been my last book, which I simply couldn't write without a detailed, chapter-by-chapter outline, because it's the third book in a series and needed to wrap up a lot of threads in a coherent way. Without my plan, I was terrified I was missing things, and it prevented me from writing anything. With the plan, I banged it out in three weeks.

You've got to find a point along the spectrum, and tools to help you that work for you, and those things may change with different projects. I try to keep an open mind and try new things.

 

[izi 出久]

I am a plotter. I think the story through. I get to know my characters and setting (a bit like you with your school). When I write the outline, I know my main characters, I know the inciting incident that will start this story, my MCs goals, where they think they are going, the obstacles in the way, and the resolution (where they end up going/what they have overcome). Then I break it into chapters - a couple of lines to a paragraph letting me know what happens in this chapter and its purpose in the story. Now I have the scaffolding and I start my first draft. As I write, I let my imagination find its way through the scene. If my creativity wants to diverge from my plan, I go back to the plan and see if this change of direction will work. If yes, I amend the plan. If no, I tell my imagination to stick to the original. (I will also interview my characters to see what they think).
As I write draft One, I keep in mind that it really doesn't matter if it's crap. No one will see it except me. Once it's finished I can see what needs improving/altering/ditching as I write draft 2.

Then I get alpha readers to just read and say what works/doesn't/confuses etc. Improve/alter/ditch/expand for draft 3. Etc. In each draft I do what I call layering = add detail e.g. using the 5 senses, elaborate on setting - whatever will enrich the scene . . .

The important thing is that draft One is your story for you. It will not be perfect. It might not even be that good. Don't worry. That's what draft 2 and 3 and 4 etc are for. Also, don't worry if you sketch a whole school and use hardly any of it. I like the iceberg analogy: what the reader eventually reads is only the bit of iceberg above the surface. All that's underneath is the work and research and knowledge that we as authors need in order to be able to write a darn good tale.

My process is similar to Hannah's, although the past few months I've had to step away from writing to focus on work. I see the light at the end of the tunnel, though.

Why have you not finished the first two? Were you unsure where the story was going? I think to determine how you should prepare to write a story, you should consider what stopped you the last two times. At what point did you put the manuscript aside and decide to not keep the story going?

 

[Mel L]

I've found Lauren Sapala's blog super useful for this. My brain seems to work in a similar way to hers; I can't plot at all, I can't focus when I try to outline or even just think about the story logically, even the bits I've already written, everything just goes blank. I have to say I still haven't successfully finished my novel cause I'm an extremely slow writer but having started to lean into my intuitive side and let the story surface as it wants, the whole process has got a whole lot less painful and more productive. I have to keep letting go of what exactly I want my story to be, and it consistently rewards me by growing itself bigger and bolder than I'd ever have the confidence to have planned.
Have a look at this post for starters maybe...

edited to add: I am also one hundred percent a nitpicker. The line-editor stands at my shoulder ready to whack me on the hand with a ruler every time I use a slightly inaccurate word. I have to just let her do her thing without taking any notice... still learning

Thank you for this! Great post. Helps me legitimize my 'pantser' side... Good to know there's help out there!

 

[MattScho]

My process is similar to Hannah's, although the past few months I've had to step away from writing to focus on work. I see the light at the end of the tunnel, though.

Why have you not finished the first two? Were you unsure where the story was going? I think to determine how you should prepare to write a story, you should consider what stopped you the last two times. At what point did you put the manuscript aside and decide to not keep the story going?

This is a great point. Understanding why we quit is important before we dive back in on another project.

 

[Brooke]

Why have you not finished the first two? Were you unsure where the story was going? I think to determine how you should prepare to write a story, you should consider what stopped you the last two times. At what point did you put the manuscript aside and decide to not keep the story going?

with the first story, it was a mix of things -- low confidence in my writing, lack of work ethic, unsure how or where to even start, worrying no one would want to read it, etc., and of course, the fact that i leaped in to writing the first chapter with little to no clue where i was going aside from a couple main plot points. i got stressed and gave up really quickly after realizing that if i wanted to write a book, i had to actually write it.
when i started my second one, the main thing i wanted to avoid was jumping right in with no plan like i did before, but i ended up going a little too far with the planning (as i said in my original post), and it eventually just wasn't even fun anymore to write it. i loved the characters and the story, but i had basically tainted it with how much i overthought everything, that i realized i'd never finish -- and even if i did, the writing would be clouded with so many tiny, unimportant details that it would take away from the story itself.

 

[Barbara]

Totally get what you say about planning the story so much, it's out of your system. I've been there. I fixed it by putting the MS away for about half a year, then coming back to it and changing some of the major plot points, which, when I read the story again after all this time, I saw didn't work. The changes also meant I needed new character. I found the excitement for it again.

Like many have said already, it's a case of finding what works for you, and the only way you can do that is by doing it and learning from it. To be a good writer you have to find your own, unique groove; your own magic. Try, fail, try again until "it's you" and fits.

This below is what I do these days. It may or may not help you:

I start with the idea and the protagonist and the kind of character journey they have to go on. I make notes on what makes him/her interesting, what kind of story would keep a reader reading. What conflict could they face to make them who they need to be. Then I write a log line. Then I expand it to a 'blurb' (not the blurb I'll use later) by adding ingredients, then I expand to a very short synopsis adding more ingredients (half a page to a page, focusing on the beginning middle, crisis point / climax point, and the end, and who will thwart the MC, what the the MC has to overcome, the character journey, and who they are at the end). That way I know I have a story that works and a character who changes under the pressures of their challenges. Then I start writing, aiming for the climax point (it might be a bendy road in any old direction but I don't care, as long as it leads me there). I know where the character needs to be at the end but the path to that end might change. I'm always ready to change track if the story takes me. If I change track, I check to make sure it'll still get me to the correct end.

I hope this makes sense.

Anyhoo, like I said, that's what works for me.

 

[MattScho]

One of the frequent bits of advice we get on here is that it takes most writers about six books before they really understand what they're doing.

 

[SarahC]

There's so many great pieces of advice on here already, but I just want to add some practical tools you might want to check out.

Story structure - free to use for one WIP at a time. I'm a fan of the Save the Cat method that I think someone mentioned earlier, but there are a lot of plotting methods and structures on here to play with.

Scrivener, or some other organisational tool. I have a disorganised mind and Scrivener helps me organise it. I don't think I would ever have finished my WIP without something like this. I'm sure there's other software available, but definitely getting away from endless scrolling through Word documents was a mind-saver for me.

 

[LJ Beck]

Awesome thread. Loved reading everyone's process and so much great advice.

Something to keep in mind is that writing a novel is complicated. There are a lot of moving parts. A lot. A friend of mine creates massive charts to track it all, like emotional arcs, themes, plots, conflicts, subplots, etc. Depends on your story. Depends on you. But don't underestimate that it's a lot. Manage your expectations, which will help you to keep going. Writing a novel is not easy. You won't get it all in one go. My friend and I have to constantly remind each other of that.

To me, first drafts are to find my story (theme, conflicts) and understand my characters. If you're writing genre, it's to experience your magic system/world building, or whatever "non-real" element your story demands. Trying to do more than that can be super overwhelming, and cause brain freeze. I prioritize what to focus on in each draft. (Like what Hannah said.) I work big picture down. I make notes of questions and things I need to work out as I go. I take pauses from writing to brainstorm when I need to, or outline when I need to. It's messy, and that's what a first draft is. Messy. There are no rules. You have to be okay with that.

The one thing I have to have when I start writing is a strong core idea that makes me excited to tell that story. I always come back to that when I'm writing. Does this contribute to that core idea? That keeps me from getting too carried away, and straying too far, leaving me wondering what the hell I'm even writing about. It also keeps me motivated and excited.

As others have said, it really helps to study the craft of writing, read books on writing and structure, take classes, etc. You don't have to DO any of what's on offer, but something might resonate with you, and you might take bits and pieces from here and there and turn it into what works for you.

Bottom line, finish your first draft however you can. Keep going until you finish it. Practice the art of letting go. Doesn't matter if it's a mess with a million notes. The main goal of a first draft is to write "The end."

 

[Peyton Stafford]

I've found Lauren Sapala's blog super useful for this. My brain seems to work in a similar way to hers; I can't plot at all, I can't focus when I try to outline or even just think about the story logically, even the bits I've already written, everything just goes blank. I have to say I still haven't successfully finished my novel cause I'm an extremely slow writer but having started to lean into my intuitive side and let the story surface as it wants, the whole process has got a whole lot less painful and more productive. I have to keep letting go of what exactly I want my story to be, and it consistently rewards me by growing itself bigger and bolder than I'd ever have the confidence to have planned.
Have a look at this post for starters maybe...

edited to add: I am also one hundred percent a nitpicker. The line-editor stands at my shoulder ready to whack me on the hand with a ruler every time I use a slightly inaccurate word. I have to just let her do her thing without taking any notice... still learning

thanks for the link. great stuff.

 

[Peyton Stafford]

with the first story, it was a mix of things -- low confidence in my writing, lack of work ethic, unsure how or where to even start, worrying no one would want to read it, etc., and of course, the fact that i leaped in to writing the first chapter with little to no clue where i was going aside from a couple main plot points. i got stressed and gave up really quickly after realizing that if i wanted to write a book, i had to actually write it.
when i started my second one, the main thing i wanted to avoid was jumping right in with no plan like i did before, but i ended up going a little too far with the planning (as i said in my original post), and it eventually just wasn't even fun anymore to write it. i loved the characters and the story, but i had basically tainted it with how much i overthought everything, that i realized i'd never finish -- and even if i did, the writing would be clouded with so many tiny, unimportant details that it would take away from the story itself.

Based on the short piece you shared, I would read the first two. If you do not want to share them in Litopia, you can DM them to me.

 

[Peyton Stafford]

I've found Lauren Sapala's blog super useful for this. My brain seems to work in a similar way to hers; I can't plot at all, I can't focus when I try to outline or even just think about the story logically, even the bits I've already written, everything just goes blank. I have to say I still haven't successfully finished my novel cause I'm an extremely slow writer but having started to lean into my intuitive side and let the story surface as it wants, the whole process has got a whole lot less painful and more productive. I have to keep letting go of what exactly I want my story to be, and it consistently rewards me by growing itself bigger and bolder than I'd ever have the confidence to have planned.
Have a look at this post for starters maybe...

edited to add: I am also one hundred percent a nitpicker. The line-editor stands at my shoulder ready to whack me on the hand with a ruler every time I use a slightly inaccurate word. I have to just let her do her thing without taking any notice... still learning

Thank you for the link to Lauren Sapala. I subscribed to her newsletter and downloaded her Firefly Magic to read. As an INFP, getting wisdom from someone who understands the IN mindset as it applies to writing is great. Have you read her book? Your thoughts?

 

[MattScho]

...and it eventually just wasn't even fun anymore to write it. i loved the characters and the story, but i had basically tainted it with how much i overthought everything, that i realized i'd never finish -- and even if i did, the writing would be clouded with so many tiny, unimportant details that it would take away from the story itself.

The old cliche, having written is fun, writing is hell.

 

[Brian P. White]

With my novel, The Death Doll, it started with the main character. I spent twenty years dreaming of a zombie hero ever since watching Return of the Living Dead Part III, which changed with each new zombie movie I watched. I also grew up with porn, so there's that, but in this case I happened to like a certain starlet enough to want to see her do more acting. I kept seeing her in my mind playing serious roles with real gusto, and my ideas grew tougher. I thought about this while watching The Walking Dead, projected her into the story, brought in those twenty years of zombie hero dreaming, and BAM! I had my character.

Then came the story. After I created Didi, I quickly threw down a few chapters ... and then I got stuck. Life also got in the way and I put the book aside for a few months, but when I had time I came back to it ... and found myself still stuck. I like to create outlines as I go or after, but writing one BEFORE the story turns me off. It just feels cold, calculated. What I did instead was write a synopsis, a mini story to myself to figure out where she's going. I wrote three. So, I started off blocked and ended up with the bare bones of a trilogy. I had my character, I had her path, and the rest basically spilled out over the course of a month. The scope of the series grew beyond three, and I'm still writing them, but I managed to write a complete pilot novel and its sequel, and I'm almost done with the third.

I'm a big believer in "write it now, edit it later", even if certain experts caution against this for fear of getting stuck in the quicksand of a story that just may not work. I proved this wrong in my case because I've managed to rewrite both of those books into something great (IMHO).

If you're not sure where your story is going, try starting small and working your way out. Here's an "expansionist" method if, like me, you don't want to start with a cold outline:
1. Write a blurb. Who it is, what they want, and what's standing in the way.
2. Expand the blurb to a synposis. Give a few more details for each thing and see if it gives you ideas on the various obstacles in the path. Basic cause and effect go a long way in this.
3. Fill in each part with dialogue to get you from one point to the next.
4. Fill in the scenery. How does your character experience their environment along with their situation?
5. Note any ideas you have on the side while you push to finish the draft. Keep all notes and drafts!
6. If the story takes you in a completely different direction, follow it. If nothing else, you should still have all your notes and previous drafts to fall back on if you get stuck or find the new direction doesn't work.
7. Either way, finish the draft and put it away for a little while. Work on something else and come back to this one with fresh eyes.

A sounding board also helps. I'm always interested in helping people develop their ideas, so you can hit me up anytime.

I hope this helps. Keep writing, and Live the Dream:^)