Whenever writers talk to me about being prolific, the objections writers raise tend to slide into two ancillary subjects:
- Fast writing = crap.
- My life/my process doesn’t allow fast writing.
Both of these arguments aren’t really arguments at all. They’re 1) a mindset and 2) a choice. Or, really, they’re both just mindsets.
They’re damned invasive mindsets, too.
Many authors recognize the fallacy of both arguments when presented with raw statements like this, but sub-consciously, they cling to them. They demonstrate this when they spend one hundred words or one thousand words arguing against prolificacy, for the argument always boils back down to these two stances.
I get it. I do. If you don’t think of yourself as prolific, any discussion about the benefits of prolificacy prompts a range of emotions; resentment, anger, envy, jealousy, guilt, self-loathing, other-loathing…and denial.
It’s possible you’re just not ready to hear the message yet.
I spent the first fifteen years of my writing career blindly faithful to “write it and your readers will come”. It took near-disasters, soul searching, research and reading to even consider the idea of writing to market without my hackles lifting.
For years I also believed that fast=crap, too. I thought I had off-loaded it, but deep in my soul I was still clinging to the old ways of thinking that are built upon the belief.
Writing Fast = Crap?
This is a smoking lava field for writers…and readers. When you hear about “writing more” and your first instinct is to say “yeah, but…!”, then you may have underlying beliefs that are tripping you up.
I’ve written a whole series of posts dealing with this myth.
Writers who are ready to be prolific.
If:
- You’re already a prolific author, or
- You would like to be prolific, or
- You are even a little bit curious about writing faster, or
- You’re an indie fiction writer who wants to improve their bottom line,
Then you might be ready to explore how to write faster, write more and maximize your fiction output.
But you might have to clear out a few myths and attitudes, first.
