Are These 4 Beliefs Keeping You from Starting Your Novel?

Few endeavors are as complex, challenging, exciting, terrifying, joyful, exhausting, frustrating, and just plain fun as writing as novel. Few bring as many tears—or as much fulfillment. And very few are as hard.

For many new writers, the biggest challenge is getting started. First-time novelists often find themselves facing strong internal resistance. Usually that resistance is the result of beliefs—some false, some true—that get in the way.

In my coaching and teaching, I’ve found several basic notions to be at the root of most writers’ hesitation when it comes to getting started on a novel. Here are four beliefs that may be getting in your way—and what to do about them:

1. You need to know everything that’s going to happen in your novel before you start writing it.

Many first-time novelists get stuck on the idea that they have to know every plot twist before they begin. You don’t. In fact, you don’t even need to know how your first chapter will end!

It’s true that some authors have their novels completely planned out before they write the first sentence. Others have at least a general outline. George R. R. Martin calls this type of writer an “architect.” They plan the way an architect plans a house, knowing the size and arrangement of every room before they hammer a single nail. But many writers—and I believe they are in the majority—figure it all out as they go. Martin calls these writers “gardeners.” They stick seeds in the ground with some idea of what’s going to come up, but without knowing how many branches or blossoms it’s going to have.  

If you can’t get started because you’re still working on that outline or trying to figure out the ending, stop! Sit down and start writing. All you really need to begin is: a) a character and b) a situation. Put the character in the situation and see what she or he does. Go from there.

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2. It’s going to take you forever.

The good news here is that it’s not literally going to take you forever. The bad news is that it will probably feel like it’s taking forever.

Despite what NaNoWriMo may have convinced you, novels are virtually never written in a month. While some authors manage to finish novels in a year, it is more common for a good novel to take longer—sometimes much longer. To make matters worse, you really won’t know how long it’s going to take until you finish. That nine-month plan you’ve laid out may end up being five years.

So how can you start something when it looms ahead of you for such a daunting—and uncertain—length of time? By shifting your focus away from the future and onto the page. Think about what you’re writing this moment. Attend to the paragraph, scene, or passage you are working on right now.

Five years from now, you will either have your novel completed or not, but that five years is going to pass either way.  

3. You might invest years of your life on a work that never gets published or doesn’t sell well.

Yep, you might. It’s one of the brutal truths of the writing life. Most writers, including yours truly, have worked hard on novels that never got accepted for publication, or that were published and flopped. And the possibility that you, too, will enter the ranks of writers with at least one unpublished or poor selling novel is pretty high. But there is a way you can be absolutely certain your novel won’t be successful: Don’t write it.

Would you rather be someone who gave it your all and got a novel finished than the person who didn’t even try for fear they wouldn’t end up with a best seller? Get to work. 

4. You might not have the skill or training to write a novel.

Okay, you might not. But you have no idea whether you do until you’ve tried. There are no aptitude tests for writing novels, and no ways of telling ahead of time if you’ll be able to pull it off.

So what do you do if realize you actually don’t have the skill or training you need? Go out and get it—take a course, find a teacher, hire a coach, or learn the way the vast majority of writers have learned over the centuries, by reading and writing a lot.

If you have a novel inside you, you must write it. You won’t be happy until it is on the page, and if it never gets written, there will be a small, empty space in your heart. So, if any of the beliefs listed here—or any other kinds of uncertainty, confusion, or doubt—are stopping you, set them aside. Get to the page. Write.

 

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