The best writing advice I've ever received.
Just a quick blog post today.
This is a question I get on occasion and I love that it cuts right to the heart of the matter. Of all the advice I’ve been given (solicited or not), what’s the best one, hands down, bar none?
Let’s start with the runner ups:
“Just write.”
“Butt in chair.”
“Write every single day.”
“Write one word a day.”
“Write drunk, edit high, publish sober.”
Alright, maybe that last one wasn’t quite what Hemingway thought, but we’re getting there. The best piece of writing advice I ever got was this:
“Write something you’re excited about.”
Now, maybe this isn’t the earth-shattering thought you were expecting, but time and time again, this is the piece of advice that’s brought me back to the keys; especially on days when the last thing I wanted to do was write. Which happens…On occasion….Moreoftenthisyearthananyotheranyway–
Think about what it was like the first time you fell in love. That person who you just had the most specialist of specials connections with. There was a spark that probably started a small flame inside of you where all you could think about was that person. “I wonder what they’re up to?” “Man, I sure would like to talk to him/her.” “I wonder if they prefer Animal Style at In-N-Out Burger?”
You get the idea. It’s so much easier to write something when you love the idea and are passionate about it getting made. Not because someone somewhere that you people love contained thrillers right now and that your dumb little magic romance shop idea that you really like is a waste of time, but that genre that everyone’s buying right now? Yeah, that’ll be the fastest script I ever sell in my life.
All nonsense. Rubbish.
You can write to market all day long and hate what you write as much as you hate your job, or you can start by finding a story, an idea, a character, a McGuffin, a WHATEVER that will bring you back to the keyboard day in and day out, overly excited because you just can’t wait to write more.
I’ll put it to you another way.
Think about your favorite movie/book/tv series. What brings you back to the chair every time to watch or read? Is it the concept or the characters or the comfort? Well, that’s what you need to bring to your own story!
The same thing that will bring your audience to your story should be what brings you there every time.
Maybe this is too pie in the sky for some folks, but I’m a french silk cumulonimbus kind of guy. I can’t think of any story that I’ve finished that I wasn’t excited as hell to write. I can however look to my slush pile and definitely see the scripts that I gave up on for numerous reasons:
“That was a ‘one for them’ idea.”
“That was to try to get on the blacklist.”
“That was a biopic for someone I didn’t care about because I wanted to get reps.”
“I got bored with it.”
Such weak sauce. I know there’s someone out there reading this that has ideas up the wazoo and has written pitch document after pitch document for their management or agent and didn’t care if any of the ideas got a greenlight.
As someone who has sold and optioned nothing yet (more on goals in my next post), because he spent the first 5 years of his writing life trying to sell something and didn’t care what it was, trust me when I say STOP.
Write from a place of pure excitement and I can [almost] guarantee, excitement will follow.
And it won’t just infect the next person that reads it, because you do want that too, but it’ll infect YOU when you pitch it to your friends and family. It won’t just be this:
“Well I kind of have this idea for a show like 24.”
“Oh yeah?”
“Yeah. Maybe it’s like, Jane Bauer instead of Jack…I dunno, one of the commenters on deadline said female leads are hot right now so I’m just plugging one in.”
“Don’t they have to be hot in order to be cast?”
“Zing.”
It’ll be this:
“DUDE I have the most awesome idea for a freaking TV show. You know how Prison Break was awesome as hell?…Mostly awesome?…Just season one? Fair enough, but my idea blends the tattoo mystery with a procedural like the Black List and it’s awesome and character-driven and I can’t NOT work on it!”
(I haven’t seen a ton of Blindspot, but I remember being JACKED when I saw that teaser and read the pilot)
This might not work for every genre or every story subject matter you pick, but I sure hope it’s your thought. So if you find yourself working through a script or a book that you just aren’t excited about, maybe you wanna shelve it until you find that excitement that’ll bring you back every stinking time. Here’s a picture of my dog.
Thanks for this. I think we all need to be told again and again that doing writing just to get somewhere isn’t as helpful as loving what you’re writing. That being said, I do think there’s a way to get the work done you need to and love it. A slight twist to this advice, an added note, is find a connection to what you’re writing. You may be asked to write something or have to write spec for fellowships. It can be hard, cause it’s someone else’s world. But if you find your connection to plot, character, setting, that passion will show on the page.
That’s right! Very well said Julia!!