In the last episode of The Writing Coach podcast, I outlined my six-step roadmap for creating and publishing a book.
As I mentioned in that episode, I believe the most difficult stage in that entire process is writing the first draft.
That existential battle with the blank page can be epic!
Too many writers start out strong on the manuscript and then crash and burn for a number of common reasons.
In today’s episode of the podcast, I outline the three biggest problems I see writers grappling with while writing a first draft. I then outline several techniques you can use to overcome those challenges and finish your first draft strong.
Listen to the episode or read the transcript below:
The Writing Coach Episode #144 Show Notes
Get Kevin’s FREE book: NOVEL ADVICE: MOTIVATION, INSPIRATION, AND CREATIVE WRITING TIPS FOR ASPIRING AUTHORS.
The Writing Coach Episode #144 Transcript
Hello, beloved listeners, and welcome back to The Writing Coach podcast. It is your host, as always, writing coach Kevin T. Johns here. This is my second podcast going out this weekend, or over the last couple of days. I released an episode on Friday going over my six-stage book production process roadmap, laying out the roadmap for how to get a book published.
During that podcast I talked about how I believe that the first draft is probably the most difficult stage in the entire book production process. That’s the exact reason why I created my FIRST DRAFT group coaching program that’s specifically focused on helping authors get that first draft written in a fun and supportive environment.
I’m so excited to tell you the doors are open. We’re bringing in a new cohort into this week. To get all the details about that program, head over to www.kevintjohns.com/first draft.
Because that program is bringing in new folks this week, I obviously have first drafts on my mind. So on today’s episode of the podcast, I want to talk about the three biggest problems I see writers face when trying to get that first draft completed. So why is this first draft so challenging? You know, I’m a big planner. I’ve got my story plan program. I like to work with authors to get them set up for success as much as possible prior to writing even. So I still say I think the first draft is the hardest part. Why is that? Well, even if you have an incredible outline, even if you know exactly where you’re going with your book, emotional challenges can get in the way.
We’re human beings, we have emotions, and as artists, we might have more, we might have more emotional availability than your average person, and it’s really easy for emotions to get involved. There’s also energy issues. This is something I’ve talked about a little bit over the last year, this idea that for a long time, I thought about finding the time to write as a productivity process involving carving out the time. But as I’ve gotten older and dealt with health issues, I’ve realized it’s not just about time, it’s about energy. How do you monitor your energy? How do you track your energy? How do you use your energy to get the most writing done? Without burning yourself out, you are also probably going to lose enthusiasm for the project somewhere along the way. This is the thing about writing a book. It’s such a big complicated process.
And somewhere along the drafting, probably about 20,000 words in, I tend to find people start to lose that initial enthusiasm that they had for the project. And if pure unbridled enthusiasm is all you’re relying on, you could be in big trouble when you hit that point. There’s also always a shortage of time. We are so busy and life seems to be just getting busier and busier, especially with phones and social media and so many things demanding our attention, trying to pull us away from our creative work, and all of this leads to a lack of productivity. It could get really frustrating if you’re not making the progress on the first draft that you thought you were going to make, or if you’re not moving as quickly as you would’ve liked. Another thing that I see a lot of is just a lack of craft knowledge.
A lot of people know the big broad strokes of writer’s craft; something like the Hero’s Journey or the four-act structure. These things people tend to have heard about or know about, they probably understand that their character needs an arc, but there are so many micro-level details to crafting an effective story and especially an effective scene. A lot of writers go into the drafting of that first draft with a skill set gap that they don’t even necessarily know is there. And so all of these issues can really easily send the creation of a first draft of a book way off course. So I just laid out a bunch of issues that you’re almost certainly going to run into to some extent during the drafting of your first draft. But let’s look at the three biggest problems that I see people really struggling with and getting in the way of them successfully completing a fun and focused first draft.
That’s something I really believe in. I used to again, really focus on output and productivity, but more and more I’m interested in making writing a fun process. Yes, we want to build momentum, and we want productivity. We want to be focused on what really matters to us, but we also want to have fun doing it. And having fun doing it is actually what makes things a lot quicker and more fun and overcomes a lot of those challenges right off the bat. So let’s look at problem number one, distracted focus. So often, for so many of us, life gets in the way. We want to write a book, it’s important to us, but we have to work overtime at our day jobs, or our kids need to be driven to dance class, or we’re dealing with health issues. All of these things can get in the way and draw our attention away from our focus on our book.
In addition, like we talked about, there’s just a lack of time. We really need to carve out pockets of time if we are going to remain focused on our book and on our manuscript. There’s also “squirrel syndrome.” I saw it. And this is the idea that a lot of creative people are constantly getting new ideas or better ideas, and they jump from one project to the next. And what happens is because they haven’t stayed focused on any one thing, they never finish anything, and they have a drawer full of half-written unfinished projects because they never stuck it through with anything. Another reason people deal with distraction is they just don’t have any accountability. There’s no one to hold them accountable when they don’t get the writing done that they need to get done. There’s also something I call the revisions maelstrom. This is like a whirlpool that I see writers get into where they write the first scene, they write the second scene, maybe they even write the third scene, and then something tells them, Oh, you better go back and fix up that first scene.
And well, while you’re there, maybe that second scene needs to be revised too. And now we’re back to that third scene, and maybe they make it to a fourth scene, but then they’re like, Nope, no, wait, I, I gotta go back again. And we end up in this endless cycle of revisions where we’re going over and over the first half dozen scenes in a manuscript without ever getting to the completion of the first draft, let alone the book as a whole. So what are some solutions that we can implement to prevent us from getting distracted during our writing? Well, proper project management. Writing a book is a huge project, and you really need to treat it as such. I know we like to think of our creativity as this kind of magical thing guided by our enthusiasm, but a book is not a short story.
A book is not a song. A book is not a painting. This is not something you can do in an afternoon. It takes project management to ensure you have a strategic plan ahead of you and that you’re tracking milestones and really making sure that you’re making the progress you need to make if you’re ever going to get the book done. Community is another great way to stay focused. If you are surrounding yourself with other writers, if you’re going to writer events in your community, if you’re perhaps joining writer online forums and groups and whatnot, you see other people who are invested in the same thing you are and who are making progress on their writing. And that community vibe is just a great way to allow you to stay focused, to say, Oh yeah, you know, so and so from my group is making great progress.
I need to do that too. This can also be where accountability comes into play. Have a writer from your community hold you accountable. Say, did you get the pages written that you were going to get written, or you said you were, This is where critique groups could be useful. If you know you have a critique group on Friday and you have to have pages ready to read to the group, that’s great motivation to get that writing done. Obviously, as a writing coach, I think the best solution here is hire a writing coach to keep you accountable. If you have weekly meetings with someone with like me, and you’re paying money to be on those calls and to get my feedback on your pages, you’re a lot more motivated. Get those pages done. That said, I know not everyone has the money to invest in a writing coach.
And on the accountability front, you don’t have to pay someone. It could be your partner, your husband or your wife, your boyfriend or your girlfriend. Say to them, I need you to hold me accountable. Give me a weekly check-in. Or it could just be a friend of yours. It doesn’t have to be another writing buddy. It can just be a friend who touches base with you once a week and says, Did you get the writing done? You said you were supposed to get done. So it can be really hard to go it alone, but via this group atmosphere, you can get accountability, you can get support, and you can also get tips on the project management side of things. How do other people organize their writing and their book production process? And what can you learn from what other people in your community are doing to stay on track?
Problem number two that I see is the micro-level skillset gap that we talked about a little bit earlier at the beginning. The reality is you don’t know what you don’t know. And as Ernest Hemingway once said, We’re all apprentices in a craft where no one ever becomes a master, which means there’s always more to learn when it comes to the craft of writing. And there’s lots of places where you can learn that big picture, macro-level stuff. But where do you go to learn how to write a great scene? Even something I see so often is point of view, so many manuscripts come to me, and the point of view is all over the place. Why is that? Well, because no one teaches point of view, even if they are teaching writing, it’s macro-level story structure stop. No one is getting into the nitty-gritty of how to actually tell a story.
And so a lot of people have these skill gaps that they might not even be aware of until someone like me points out, Hey, your point of view is all over the place. So what can we do about this problem, this skillset gap? Well seek out training resources. We are so lucky to live in a world where there are endless books on writer’s craft. There are also YouTube videos, there are podcasts like this one. There are tons of resources out there. You just have to go looking for them. I know, 10 years ago, when I was getting started in writing and publishing and coaching, there were basically just books. You know, I was reading book after book, I was buying them from Writer’s Digest, I was going to the library. But today, there are online courses. There are just so many more ways to get writer’s craft training and information. So you just gotta seek it out and continue to fill those gaps and be like, Hemingway, who said, We’re all continuing to learn throughout our writing careers.
Another option is to get expert feedback on your work. I’ve talked about this before. I’m somewhat suspicious of critique groups, especially a critique group of amateurs because there’s no guarantee that the feedback that you’re getting is actually good feedback. Whereas you, if you go to an expert, if you go to a professional editor, if you go to a writing coach like myself or a different writing instructor, you’re getting expert-level feedback. I have read hundreds of manuscripts. I’ve read hundreds of writer’s craft books. I have a master’s degree in English literature. I’ve been working with authors for 10 years. I’m not some kid in your critique group who’s just spouting my personal opinion. I have years of experience in education to back up my feedback that I give you on your work. So seek out the advice of experts and adopt that always-learning mindset.
The Hemingway mindset of a lifelong apprentice. Continue to learn, develop, experiment, and look for ways to improve with your writing. Problem number three that I see so much is the emotional rollercoaster ride that is writing a book. Again, like we talked about at the beginning, there’s so much enthusiasm and excitement and you know, possibly naivete going into the writing of a book. And then there’s moments of despair. There are moments of second-guessing. I mean, so many writers start out strong with that manuscript and with that first draft, and then they just hit a wall and they lose interest or they lose enthusiasm for the story and they start to second guess themselves. Or they second guess their approach. They second guess whether this is even the book they should be working on or whether they should even be an author or a writer at all. I mean, it sounds funny, but this happens again and again and again.
We get into these mindset loops where we just second-guess everything about ourselves and our work. So how do we address this emotional rollercoaster ride? What’s our solution? Ongoing emotional support, <laugh>, like if you’re having troubles in your regular life, you talk to a family member or a friend or a therapist, talk to people about your writing. Seek out people who understand what it’s like to be a writer and the types of emotional challenges that you’re going through. Also, seek out positive feedback. So many of these critique groups and other things, people go into them asking for a critique. Even when they’re giving books to their partners or to their friends or debate or readers, they tell them what they’re looking for is a critique. But, most of the time, what these authors are looking for is positive feedback. And I think that’s perfectly all right.
A book is a huge long process. You’re midway through, it’s not done yet, but you are looking for someone to tell you that what you’ve done so far is good and to give you that energy to continue to keep going with the manuscript. So seek out those opportunities. And the best way to seek them out is to ask for them. Say to whoever’s reading your work, Please tell me what’s good about this. You can also seek out community for advice and for different perspectives. You can ask someone who maybe isn’t into your genre to take a look at your work and see what their take on it is and something that might have you really down, might have you feeling like you are not executing the way you want, or that your story’s not good. You might get that outsider perspective of someone who says, You know what, I actually, I think this is really good.
I’ve never read a book like this before. So often the things that we’re good at we take for granted. I have so many writers who tell me they’re insecure or they don’t think they’re good at something or just don’t think they’re good at writing. And meanwhile, they’re so excellent at certain aspects of the creative process and of writing a book. And we all have things that we’re good at and we all have areas where we can improve. But the problem is we become blind to the things that we’re good at. And then all we do is end up focusing on the things that we’re not good at. And so as you can see, a lot of what I’ve talked about here is really about seeking expertise, seeking advice, seeking training, and seeking community. And it’s a lot of work to go out and find all those things.
As I said, I spent years buying writing instructional books and getting them from the library, taking courses, and attending webinars. I know even in today’s world of the internet where you can find writing groups easily, knowing the quality of the people who are going to be in those groups, or whether they’re going to be able to be there to provide we the type of help that you need isn’t easy. And of course, getting in touch with experts, getting regular feedback from an expert can be a difficult challenge. You’re not def you’re not sure who to reach out to or if you can afford it. And so all of these things are solutions to the problems we’ve outlined, but they’re also a lot of work for one person to do on their own. And seeing this, that’s why I created my FIRST DRAFT program
I’ve done all of this for you. I’ve pulled together 20 writer’s craft training courses that you get access to when you join the program. I’ve pulled together a community of supportive creative authors who care about writing and who want to do it in a fun and supportive environment. I have ongoing weekly question-and-answer group coaching sessions where you can ask an expert like me for advice, but you can also collaborate with a community of writers and get advice from a wide group of people with varying levels of writing experience. And in FIRST DRAFT we also have hot sea calls once a week where I go over one of the group members pages and we do this micro-level analysis of the scene. And this is the exact same thing I do for my thousand dollars a month. One-On one clients. The one-on-one people I work with, we get together once a week.
Normally they’re giving me say, three to five scenes and we’re going over them in detail. Well, that is an amazing experience, and if you want to work with me one on one anytime at over my website and book a consultation call with me. But it’s also very expensive as you just heard. And so via FIRST DRAFT, you’re able to get that one-on-one experience by being on the hot seat, but for a fraction of the cost. And you get it along with all these other things like the training videos and the question-and-answer calls and a private community away from Facebook. It is not a Facebook group. We get away from the distractions of social media and we just have fun and support one another in our craft development and in that difficult stage of writing a first draft of a book, it’s not easy, but I want to help you do it.
And that’s why this week, the doors are open. Head on over to www.kevintjohns.com/first draft and you’ll get all the details about the program there. That’s where you can get signed up. I’ve only touched on, really briefly, what the program is about. So do check out that page and get all the details and see if FIRST DRAFT is right for you.
I can’t wait to have you join the program and to work with you and to see you get a first draft of a book done in six months or less and have a first draft that reads like a third draft. And that was fun to create. That wasn’t some all as lost struggle of heartache and misery and stress. It is a reasonably paced fun program, and I’d love for you to be a part of it. So head on over to www.kevintjohns.com/first draft.
That is it for this week. Thank you so much for tuning in. I hope to see you inside of that program. Doors close in a week’s time, so head on over and get signed up now. Otherwise, I will see you on the next episode of The Writing Coach.
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