How I Unstick My Writing Process

Resistance is real but so is overcoming it

Dear Lindsey,

This year, I’ve been in a weird liminal space between debuting my novel, THE HOUSEWARMING, and rewriting my current novel-in-progress. And in that liminal space, I’ve bumped up against a LOT of stuckness.

As you know, I’m happiest when I’m in the thick of a project, so it’s strange being at the end of one project and the beginning of another at the same time.

I feel like I’m meandering around in a liminal space when all I want is to be deep in the obsession phase with this new book. You probably remember that I drafted this book while you and I were querying our novels together in 2022.

Drafting this book helped take my mind off my inbox, which I was so grateful for because, as we both know, querying is mentally exhausting!

I loved the process of drafting it. It was my third time writing a novel, but the first time I used a planning/outlining system. The process was so enjoyable and so much quicker!

And my first draft felt, for the first time, like something coherent versus a disorganized mess I had to sort out.

Photo by Julia Joppien on Unsplash

But then, soon after I finished that first draft in 2022, I found an agent and started working on revising THE HOUSEWARMING. The revisions shifted the book from upmarket/book club to suspense, and as a newbie to the genre, I had to do several top-to-bottom rewrites to get it right.

That took about a year and a half, and even when I had a few months between drafts to clear my head, I never had quite enough time to fully return to this other project.

I kept thinking about it, though. All the time! I was also reading more than ever in the suspense/thriller genre, and took classes on suspense writing. This, along with revising THE HOUSEWARMING, fully rewired my brain.

I now think in a suspense-forward way.

Last spring, when I finally returned to my other project while my debut was on submission, I realized it no longer worked as I’d first drafted it. I could see where it was lacking suspense and knew I would only be happy if I reworked it like I had done with my debut.

But then, soon after I rewrote the first act, I got a book deal!! And then I was once again putting my entire focus on THE HOUSEWARMING while this other project waited quietly in the wings. I really can only focus on one major project at a time, for better or worse. But again, I was thinking about it constantly and wishing I could work on it.

And then earlier this year, I returned to it again once my major edits on THE HOUSEWARMING were completed. I tinkered with it. Read the first act a few times. Made SO MANY NOTES.

But in general, for the last couple of months, I’ve been pressed against this wall of resistance whenever I sit down to work on the other book.

The stuckness has been bewildering! I love the novel’s concept, I love the characters, I want to write it. But something has been holding me back. In general, I don’t believe in writer’s block.

I do think we all experience resistance, yes, but I don’t subscribe to the belief that there are no ideas left or that the ideas are blocked. Ideas are abundant.

So my problem wasn’t a block, necessarily. It was something else.

Photo by Steve Johnson on Unsplash

I think I figured it out recently: I want the rewrite of this novel to be as efficient as writing the first draft, which I did in just three months (thank you, 90-Day Novel by Alan Watt!). I wrote with such joy and clarity. I felt like I knew what I was doing—a rare and beautiful feeling for me while drafting!

But to have that kind of efficiency again, there are some aspects of the story I need to figure out. And the more I think instead of write, the less I figure out. The less I figure out, the more stuck I feel.

The more stuck I feel, the more convinced I am that there’s something wrong with my writing process or maybe with the entire book or with me as a writer.

And then I distract myself instead of facing the draft head-on. I empty my inbox, catch up on Substack reads, do some laundry, scroll some social media. You name it, I’m distracted by it.

The other day, though, I decided to stop circling the drain of stuckness. I think I reached the end of my rope with the belief that I can’t move forward with revision unless I know what the plot points are, or what the ending will be, or how to pull off a certain twist.

I KNOW this isn’t true! I’ve written two other entire books without knowing as much as the next scene, let alone every major plot point. And yet I convinced myself that this book requires a special kind of knowing before I can work on it.

How silly of me to forget it’s through writing that I gain clarity about the writing.

I’m not one of those writers fortunate enough to receive the entire story, start to finish, in a divine download.

I’m the type who gets a tiny seed of the story and then must tend to it for years while it blooms wild and overgrown.

Through the tending, I find the true story. I weed and prune and shape it for as long as it takes, but the only way to meet the story is by being WITH the story. Not by thinking about it or forcing it to clarify for me.

I have to write to understand what the story wants to be.

I still don’t know exactly what I’m doing, but I’ve eased back into draft 2 of this project and believe that I’ll find the true story along the way. The more I work on it, the more ideas I have, and the more story energy builds.

And whatever mess happens in this draft, there’s always the next one to smooth things out.

For me, writing begets writing. Not writing begets not writing. Even when I’m lost, it’s better to be meeting the page than avoiding it.

Xoxo,

Kristin

Tell me in the comments how you deal with feeling stuck. How do you move past resistance? What tips do you have for other writers?

Preorder THE HOUSEWARMING here!