#i just needed to finish something bc im currently in a huge rut | Explore Tumblr Posts and Blogs

silentwalrus1 · 5 years

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I was just wondering how you decide when to start posting your fics? It seems like you have loads more of your WIP than you’ve posted (for some of them at least) and so what makes you decide the time’s right to release them into the wild? I can’t post anything until it’s 100% finished in case I have to go back and change anything

i write non-sequentially, so generally, my wip is a giant colander full of huge gaping holes. I write scenes out of order, i write half a scene and then stop, i write a scene with like 4 missing sentences in the middle that i literally placeholder with BLAH BLAH SOMETHING HERE and then have to go and fill in later. If a work is chaptered, i try to designate chapter break points where it’d make sense for the story to have a chapter break; then i work to close the gaps chapter by chapter. So forex i’m closing the gaps in ch 2 of caya currently, and when there are no longer any holes, i post the chapter and move on to filling in the next section.

ime, finished is when you say it’s finished. my entire background + career is in producing creative work to spec and to deadline, though, so i literally can’t conceive of a piece “never being finished” - there’s always a cutoff of “done” bc it has to go out the door by XYZ time, meeting ABC requirements. Of course, there’s instances where i’ve thought “i could’ve done better on that one”, but ya can’t fixate on that - you analyze what exactly you could have improved, and you apply it to the next piece, and that’s it.

in fandom, we have the gift and curse of being able to mess with our work indefinitely: if you want to go in and edit your story or update some art nobody can stop you! i do last pass edits in ao3 all the time! but on the other hand, if you never have an outside deadline or final sendoff for anything, you can get stuck in the “omg but i can improve this” rut.

i think it definitely takes practice to develop the yeet attitude, especially if you’re not naturally inclined to it; my job + bg has me tossing out literally dozens of “pieces” a day, so at this point i literally smash post the SECOND i type the last word on a fic (and then have to scramble to actually do last pass edits when it’s already live). this is because any perfectionist demons i may have had, born weak and shriveled as they were, have long since been strangled to death by constant exposure. you just gotta post it, man. who cares if it’s not perfect. you have to make room for the next thing.

and hey, it’s fandom! if you do need to go in and fix something later, you can! personally tho, unless it’s a HUGE comprehension-mess mistake, i dont bother. just thinking about constant editing is exhausting. we gotta go on to the next thing!!! adventure awaits!!!!

#yap yap #i have a LOT of wips in rotation so i kinda bounce from one doc to another #i started posting mob wife and how to lose a guy bc ive had those backburnered for YEARS #and i needed a kick in the pants to work on them more #writing #BASICALLY MY ADVICE IS FORCIBLY BREAK YOURSELF OF THE HABIT #YEET THAT SHIT OUT #GO STRAIGHT FOR THE DEEP END AND KEEP GOING #IF YOU WANNA BE ABLE TO STOP REVISING THEN JUST SMASH THAT MF POST BUTTON AND SLAP YASELF THROUGH THE AFTERMATH #Anonymous

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