How I Write (Or How To Get Past That Daunting Blank First Page)
Do you REALLY want to write something? A short story, a screenplay, or a novel? Is the first blank page intimidating you? One of the most crushing things about writing in my youth was the fact that I had so many neat ideas that I never could get to because I didn't have the skills or patience to sit down and write a proper story for the length needed to actually get to these ideas. And I think that's what writer's block is for many people. You have the idea but not the narrative you need to get to explore the idea.
What I'm going to suggest next is not in any writer's course I've ever seen. I also want to suggest that if it doesn't work for you, that's fine. The following essay is the best advice I can give. The second best advice I can give is that if this doesn't work for you, figure out something else.
When it comes to telling a story I could never just sit down and do it. I've gotten better at that over the years, but mainly because this next trick got me to the point where I was confident enough in my own writing. I never would have been without it.
Do you have a WordPad document program on your computer? A lot of writers create outlines for their stories, and while I think that's cool, what I do is write the scenes, and big ideas, and bullet points I want to get to first. If you haven't created characters yet, you can create the scene, and fill in those details later. Write a scene you want to put in the story. Write the scene that gave you the great idea in the first place in all its glory. Do not worry about the blank page and building towards it. Write the best scene first.
Do you have any other scenes in mind? Get those down next.
If you haven't created your characters yet (which was not a problem for me because I already had) look at the scenes you've written and figure out a basic backstory for the characters that populate the scene, and give them names and basic personalities. You don't necessarily have to give them a vast history. But a distinct personality is good and a way to contrast them with each other. Once you have that, save it. You're good.
Wait a few days until you have a few more scenes or ideas in mind. The second you get an idea, write it down. It doesn't even have to be in order. This document is (so far) just scenes and ideas.
I would guess if you have about ten scenes is when you take the next step. This is the Godsend, and the reason everything else will come together. Once you have your biggest ideas down, and the basic ideas of your characters down as well, the next important step is to give your characters motivations. Why is your protagonist invested in doing the right thing? Or why is your antagonist invested in doing the wrong thing? Probably the antagonist doesn't even view their actions as wrong. Why not? What could possibly justify the antagonist's actions against the protagonist? Does the protagonist understand or agree with why the antagonist sees things the way they do? Why or why not? Are there even any bad guys in your story? If the people are either all heroes, or just regular people, why are they doing what they are doing? Are they trying to return to normalcy something that was messed up? Trying to cope with life and protect their family as best they can? Only looking out for themselves? Is your story made up of only bad guys or criminals? What do they each want? Which of the other characters are standing in the way of their goal and which can be an asset to getting there? Answer every one of these questions for the basic characters you've created.
You see what answering those questions has done, right? It's basically written the entire outline of the story right there, if not in order. Now that you have the juicy basics, write more scenes. These will be easier to write because you know and understand your characters. Better yet, these scenes will be FUN to write to see your characters either working together or brushing up against each other. This is both fun and exciting to see all these things come together.
Once you've come up with a fair amount of awesomeness (and characters with motivations makes that a LOT easier) now is the time to put the pieces together. Take the scenes in the outline and put them in the order in which they happened, while creating scenes to introduce the characters, and connect the various scenes to each other in a linear fashion. The bones of your story are already there, and you job now is to simply put together the puzzle pieces. Which with so many good ideas and scenes already written down, it's pretty easy and shouldn't take you very long at all.
Characters are more important than story. MUCH more. The right characters will MAKE a great story for you. And the way to make the characters right is to give them reasons for doing the things they do.
Another helpful hint about characters. Be far less concerned about them adhering to the psychology popular culture recognizes and accepts, and feel free to make them and the stories they are involved in match your own ideas and perceptions. "Realistic" characters are overrated, especially since most fiction believes heroes need to be dour and unpleasant to be credible. They are wrong. Fun and compelling characters that you can root for and sympathize with are far cooler than drippy heroes who drive you crazy, especially if you know and relate to how they think inside and out. I deal with enough emo twerps in real life. They don't need to populate my fiction just because they populate everyone else's.
Remember this: Nobody on Twin Peaks acts remotely realistically. But we love the characters anyways.
Do not be afraid to outright ignore standard tropes or conventions, or even complications, just because the rest of fiction demands conflict needs to be constant for the project to have value. If you believe in yourself and your characters, you can tell their entire story without stringing the reader along with padding. Just because most fiction says the proper way to tell the story is to hold off telling the actual story until the last possible second, doesn't mean it is. Have faith in your story and characters, and don't worry about adding complications that the story isn't actually about. They won't actually make it better. I find I am usually annoyed by unnecessary complications and conflicts in fiction. Very few projects ever do the idea as masterfully as Doc Brown on the Clock Tower in Back To The Future. Rule of thumb: If it's not as awesome as Doc Brown, it's probably a waste of time.
Let me finally reiterate my second biggest piece of advice. This is how I PERSONALLY write. If it doesn't work for you, that's actually fine. There is no one-size-fits-all way to write a story, and if a writer in a workshop is telling you there is, they are wrong. If you find different advice elsewhere that works better for you, do that instead. I admire people with the stamina and work ethic to be able to stare at that blank page, start from scratch and work out and write the story as it goes along, surprising themselves along the way. The advice I'm giving here is for people who really want to write something cool, but are too scared of the first blank page to go forward. The answer for them is to make sure the page isn't blank when you start actually writing the first draft of your novel or script.
I have been very satisfied with the Gilda and Meek stories I have written using this specific writing style. I suspect if it works for me, it will work for you too.
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