Grow more creative by not fearing blunders. Notice and feel the feelings that inevitably come with writing messy early drafts. Then say, “I can survive these feelings!” Remind yourself that you must grow easy with messiness.
All ideas, whether they begin as budding flickers of creativity or full-blown bursts of inspiration, start out untidy. This is a truth that we, as writers—and creatives, in general—must fully embrace. As my recovering perfectionist-self strives so very hard to become a practicing “imperfectionist,” I must persistently remind myself that muddles and messes are opportunities to improve my writing. First drafts are ugly babies. Always.
No piece of art is every birthed in its final, lovely form.
We must take the flicker or the burst and give it the nourishment and encouragement to grow and develop. But first, we have to accept and acknowledge its imperfections in its infancy.
An aspect of messiness in the drafting stage of a writing piece involves decision moments, those times when we ask ourselves questions about the many possible directions the manuscript could take, the different ways to tell the story, reveal the characters, or organize the work.
Sometimes, among those multiple options, we must simply pick one and go!
When I was first considering the plot for my novel-in-progress, I was paralyzed for months while trying to decide which way to take the story. I was so afraid that I would diverge down a path that would be no story at all and that I would end up with a huge mistake of an unpublishable manuscript. Instead, once I finally decided on a direction, I found an entirely different and better story than I ever imagined.
No choice in the interest of “cleaning up” a draft is ever a mistake. Even when we feel we have hit a dead end and must backtrack in the story, we have been, during the writing toward that end, honing our craft, improving our skills. Or perhaps that seeming dead-end is simply a speed bump because something else in the manuscript isn’t quite right.
Perhaps the protagonist has done something out of character with no justification. Perhaps the organization of the manuscript isn’t quite what it should be. And quite possibly, when we pick a path, even one we are rather unsure about, we might just discover something about our characters or the story that had never occurred to us before, something that adds magic to the manuscript. Indeed, magic can emerge from our messes.
As we work into and through the many drafts of our writing, we also must remember that an ugly or messy manuscript does not mean that you or I, the writers, are ugly or messy. We must separate our feelings about ourselves from our observations about the work. We must see our writing jumbles and fumbles, not as personal characteristics, but as natural elements within the method of the work that we do.
Ugly drafts are an essential part of the writing process and once we accept that, we can survive the feelings that come up during this stage. We can become more comfortable knowing that an ugly first draft can hold hidden magic that makes for beautiful and satisfying final work.
This creativity tip was inspired by Dr. Eric Maisel‘s The 97 Best Creativity Tips Ever! (2011).
Gina Edwards is a retreat leader, a certified creativity coach, and a book editor. She is also a writer, so she’s intimately familiar with the challenges and elation that come with being one.
She supports all writers—published and aspiring—who want to write as an act of courageous and necessary self-expression.
Walking the writer’s path hand-in-hand with her clients and students, she helps them establish a writing practice and define a creative life on their own terms.
If the story comes neatly and right away you are probably covering old ground. Every time you grow as a writer there is risk involved, and a sense of being lost and definitely uncomfortable.Hang in there.