Today I want to talk about instincts. How to recognise them, how to follow them, and what to do when you recognise you haven’t followed them.
Let’s start with the last idea.
Maybe you’re out at brunch, and you order the eggs Benedict with mushrooms. Then you see your friend’s dish — they got the big breakfast — and you’re overcome with jealousy because that’s what you actually wanted. Maybe you wanted to go to the beach, but your friend suggested going to the cinema, and an hour later you find yourself in the cinema thinking, ‘This room is dark, and the person next to me smells like butter—I wish I were in the waves instead’. Or maybe it’s something more intense and serious, like, I don’t know, you decide to get married, then one day wake up hating everything about this damn slob of a man…
I’ve had that feeling a lot lately. Not ordering the wrong brunch or going to the cinema (or luckily, with marrying the wrong person), but with writing. Let me explain.
🐇 The Rabbit Hole
Writer’s block happens. Some days, for whatever reason, we simply don’t feel like writing. I’d say ‘simply not feeling like writing’ is responsible for writer’s block only about 1/10 of the time. The other 9/10 is because we’re not being authentic to our story and characters. We’ve gone down a Rabbit Hole.
This is often due to crowbarring. We crowbar locations, beats, and characters into our story because we get excited, and sometimes it works! But sometimes it’s shit.
When this happens, we’ve got two choices:
- Attempt to make it work.
- Backtrack to when your story made sense, which means you have to delete the stuff that doesn’t work, which means you lose a bunch of writing time.
I’ve tried option 1 enough to know that it leads to a lot more time wasted in the long run. Trust me — option 2 is the way. What you need to do when we find yourself down a rabbit hole is: Get out of the rabbit hole. Chalk up the wasted time as a loss, and go back to when your story made sense.
Don’t slog through it. If it feels wrong, it is. Once you’ve backed up, change your mindset from ‘I really want the story to do this’, to ‘My job is to reveal the shape the story already wants to take.’.
🔥 The Flame
Remember when you first got the idea for your story? That first electric burst of motivation? The burning, crackling, ‘this is gonna be fucking good’ feeling?
I call that feeling The Flame.
When you get the Flame, you know you’re onto a winner. It’s vitally important you follow that feeling and keep it going as long as you can. What’s interesting about this idea? What images make you feel excited? What atmospheric feeling does the idea evoke?
Later, after you’ve brainstormed where the idea could go, different characters that could feature, plot devices you could use, revelations, potential endings … the excitement ebbs. You’ve wrestled the genie out of the bottle and forced it to take a material shape, and sadly, the shape isn’t what you hoped it would be. The Flame goes out.
This is normal.
You have to change fuel sources from Motivation to Determination. You need grit and perseverance. It becomes easy to ignore the Flame and concentrate on word counts and deadlines instead of instincts.
I posit that our entire job is to keep the Flame alive for as long as we can, all the way through an entire draft if possible. Foster the Flame, and you’ll write faster and with more authenticity than you ever have before.
So, how can we keep the Flame alive? Here are six actionable tips:
⛽️ 6 Ways to Nurture The Flame
- Write without editing
When you’re trying to write from a place of authenticity, it’s important to allow yourself to write freely without worrying about grammar or structure. Just write. Don’t look back. Get to the end first — there’s plenty of time to worry about the minutiae later.
- Experiment with different writing locations
Write in a cafe. Write in bed before your shower. Write at 2 am. Write longhand in a journal instead of typing. Record your voice into your phone and transcribe it later. Try some stuff and see what feels most right to you.
- Write what you’re passionate about
What’s turning you on right now? Have you been obsessed with any TV shows, books, music, academic studies, or philosophical ideas? Put it into your work. Later, when you look back, you might be surprised by random details you added.
- Read widely
Reading widely can help you develop your own unique voice as a writer. Expose yourself to different styles, genres, and perspectives, and allow those experiences to influence your own writing.
- Embrace your mistakes
Characters went in a different direction for some reason? Oh well, I guess that’s the new plot! Embrace your mistakes and allow them to guide you in new and interesting directions.
- Listen to your characters
This is possibly the most salient tip of all. Your characters are the heart and soul of your story, and they often know what’s best for themselves. If they pull you somewhere you haven’t planned for, swallow your pride and admit that — as wanky as it sounds — your characters now have a mind of their own. Allow them to guide you.
🦦 A Quick Aside About Characters and Flow
If you feel like your characters are making their own decisions without your say-so, you’ve nailed it. This is your instinct on autopilot. That’s the Holy Grail. Celebrate!
This feeling is often referred to as “flow,” and it’s a sign that you’re tapping into your instincts as a writer. Stephen King said:
Good writing is often about letting go of fear and affectation … It’s about letting the story, the characters, and the ideas take over.
If you keep those 6 ideas in mind, you’ll have a better chance of keeping the Flame (your instincts) alive, which will lead to writing that reads more authentic and true. You’ll also write faster, because when you’re in “flow state”, this shit is easy.
🌳 Currently Reading: Birnam Wood by Eleanor Catton
Eleanor Catton is a Kiwi writer who won the Booker Prize for her book The Luminaries at the ridiculous age of 28.
Birnam Wood is her latest book, released ten years hence, and I really dug it. There’s a lot of dialogue discussing political ideologies, left vs. right, and quite a few icky characters, but they’re wrapped up in a fun multi-viewpoint thriller.
