Starting anyway
When I was about 14, I started writing my first book. Or at least, I made a feeble attempt at it. I downloaded an app and scoured the internet for a good cover photo. Which definitely wasn’t mine. I then thought up a topic and started writing the first chapter. No outline, no characters, no plot.
It won’t surprise you that I never finished. Not even close. I think I made it to the third chapter before I had no idea how to continue. Everytime I started the project up again and read through what I’d written before I made a lot of changes. The writing was never good enough the next time I read it. It was a very draining experience.
From that moment on I was convinced I couldn’t write a book. A project that big, that massive, I just couldn’t complete. I wasn’t cut out for something like that.
To be completely honest with you, I still kind of think that. Of course, since then I’ve learned a lot more about how you actually write a book. I know you have to start with a first draft and slowly work your way to the editing phase. Getting to that first draft is the hardest. It requires the most creative juice. You need to be able to look past the imperfections and work through it.
I’ve still never written a book. It’s one of my biggest dreams. But I’m not sure if that’s because I think any writer has to write a book or if I really want it.
Me thinking up new random stories ;)
After that first attempt when I was 14, I didn’t stop writing. I just stopped trying to write books. I never thought any idea I had was good enough to write an entire book about. But I couldn’t stop writing altogether, so I started writing short stories. And to this day, I still do.
I really, really like writing stories. I love starting on a blank page and just making things up as I go. Thinking up persons and storylines that don’t have to have a well-thought out structure or character arc. I just write about people and zoom in on little snippets of their lives. Somehow that becomes a story. Sometimes they end on a cliffhanger. Sometimes they just go to sleep and their day ends.
I know that technically I am able to write a book, but at the moment it seems like too daunting a task. I also know that’s probably because I’m afraid to put in all that work, for it to then flop. Or worse, that I’m not proud of it. I’m going to work on that in the future. But I’m not going to deny myself the pleasure of writing just because I’m not able or willing to write a book yet.
I’m simply going to write unfinished, imperfect stories and publish them anyway.
Because publishing a couple pages with an amateur picture taken by me is something that I enjoy immensely. Even if I haven’t written an outline, in-depth characters or a solid ending.
Every little story says something about me as a person. It shows the things that interest me, the hardships I go through and the doubts I have. Even if I never make it to a book. I’m a writer, nonetheless.
