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How to Get Past the Fear of Not Being Able to Finish Writing Your Novel
This is how to keep going when the end is too far ahead for you to see.
Writing a novel is a big, unwieldy job. It’s messy. It’s a little scary — okay, it can be a lot scary.
I mean, think about it. When you write a novel, you’re literally plucking a story out of nothing but thin air and your imagination. You’re putting together words in a way that no other human being who has ever lived has ever done.
Seriously. It’s intimidating.
One of the reasons why it’s so intimidating is the sheer size of a novel and the length of time it takes to write one. I’ve worked with thousands of writers over the last decade. Tens of thousands, even. And for the vast majority, writing a first novel takes years.
It’s a project that’s so big, you can’t really see the end of it.
It took me a long time to get to where I could finish drafting a novel.
A process, by the way, that I don’t particularly enjoy. If the joy of having done it wasn’t so incredible, I don’t think I’d be able to make myself do it.
I am a singularly disorganized person. The queen of systems, because otherwise I can’t get even simple things done. I have…
