It is one of the most disheartening thing when you find you just don’t have the motivation to write anymore.
For how to get inspiration to write a book, and how to create a schedule for your writing, you have to go to those links. That’s now what we are covering here.
You have the story in mind, but you just have no drive to outline it, to draft it, to edit it, or to do anything. It burns, because you really want to have the drive to do it. But you just don’t. When in this state, what’s a simple way to make sure you get the drive to actually begin writing your book?
In order to get motivation to write your book, you’d first need to change your physical conditions so that energy begins moving through your body until you have latent kinetic energy. This energy is the one that fills you with the energy to do something. Then, you need to change you psychological condition which can be done by infusing your body with the desire for writing, a crave for the gains of writing, and a fear for the act of not writing.
A mouthful indeed, but I swear, it is a practical step by step process that you can enact. Try it once, and it should work immediately. It always has for me.
However, let me get into this article, and explain the mechanics behind this technique and why its so effective. And of course, how to get about doing it.
We shall begin:
1. Why Is It So Hard To Write A Book?
It is so hard to write a book because writing a book requires you to concentrate over a long period of time, which is not something normal for any other sort of creation process.
Writing a book is probably one of the hardest things in the world, and if you think about it, it makes sense why.
It is not physically demanding like mining. Instead, it is psychologically demanding, like writing a test. However, it is a test that you will have to write for days, and months on end instead of one session.
The closest thing that is similar to writing a book is a sort of assignment from university, but even with that it tends to have clearly defined time deadlines, and also you mostly write down what you research online.
When writing a book, you need to concentrate, and pay attention to the words you use.
Are they proper and accurate? Then you need to focus on how the words work together. Do they create the appropriate atmosphere for the scene? Then, you need to focus on the content of the words. Is the world cohesive? Are the character’s actions cohesive?
This is a lot of concentration to do, and it is concentration you must do for hours a day, for days of a week, for weeks on end, and for months at a time. It’s no wonder authors suffer such severe mental distresses. No one would be able to bare all of that.
Not without a healthy dose of motivation. And that bit is an often misunderstood concept in itself.
2. Why Am I Not Motivated To Write A Book?
The reason you are not feeling motivated to write your book is because your motivation has been burned out due to improper writing practices, and also not refilling your motivation gear.
I think the primary problem I see with most people is that they have 2 primary misconceptions of what motivation is.
#1 Motivation is limitless.
No motivation is not a limitless pool. Instead, it can be used up, and then you will need to recharge it. Numerous studies have been done that show how motivation to act could be exhausted.
In one study, they had two groups.
One was asked to do a series of questions, while another relaxed. Then, they were given a test. The relaxed groups always did better, because they’d saved up their willpower.
People often burn out their motivation through working tirelessly and with no breaks when they feel passionate about their work. Then, they start to tire, and the writing becomes physically stressful.
Also mentally stressing, as you must try to keep the story, plot, and characters in mind. Then, this lead to anxiety about writing, and they start avoiding writing. Then you thin about how you wished to be a writer, and get depressed at your “failure”, so you run away from the whole notion.
#2 Motivation is a burning fire.
That is passion, not motivation.
Motivation is when you feel like doing something, and you feel capable of doing it. You feel a kinetic (movement) energy.
Professional writers write for hours without feeling a sense of burning passion, and they finish the book. Beginners only wait for the passion, and as a result, never finish writing their work. Motivation in my eyes, is no different from willpower.
However, it is different from excitement. As a result, motivation can be consciously recharged, unlike excitement which can’t be recharged.
3. What Drives Authors To Write?
Authors are driven by a motivation built from a desire to gain something, to do something, and a fear of not losing something.
As mentioned, motivation can be charged like willpower.
Willpower is charged in a number of ways, and there are more detailed steps to take here. In short, you need to do something you do not want, such as a cold shower, or wash your teeth with the wrong hand.
However, for more writing concentrated efforts, it is important to understand the principles behind it first. Authors motivation is built from these 3 place; a desire to gain something, a desire to do something, and a fear of not losing something.
A desire to gain something.
Basically, this means wishing to gain something material.
This can be surface level things like fame, money, and power. But it can go deeper. You could wish to have influence on others, as others had influence on you. You could wish to see your book in a book store.
I used to visit bookstores, and stare at the genre I feel my books would be. Then, I picture my book there. That always gives me a jolt.
So in order to stimulate this one, just go online, and observe people gaining what you want to gain.
Watch author interviews, and picture yourself answering those questions. How would you get a laugh from the audience? Watch author rankings, and picture your book in the top selling series.
You can go to reviews, and watch how people gush over the authors, and imagine your book being spoke on like that.
Desire to do something.
The second desire that drives the authors is the desire to see something done.
The first thing I ever wrote was after watching Naruto, and hearing of frog summoning. I wondered what it would be like if Naruto got a wolf summoning instead. So, I wrote an entirely new book with a wolf summoning character.
It was extreme copyright infringement, but it made my mind wonder. Basically, just watch shows, and ask yourself what would happen if something else happened. Ever since I’ve been reading, I’ve gotten book centric ideas.
For example, I noticed that most poems have a subject matter, and then they have metaphors to describe what is happening. I wondered what would happen if you wrote a complete poem with a single continuous metaphor, and the subject meta becomes the metaphors.
So, I tried it out.
So, go read books, and watch how conventions of writing are used by the author. Then, look at tutorials on videos on how to write characters, and stuff. Then, you may have the fire to try it out yourself.
Fear of losing something.
For some authors, they have families to feed, and they write from fear of failing them.
Other authors are known by family, and friends as writers, so they write from fear of having to face the question “How’s the next book coming along”? I personally am horrified of having to live with my parents in my 20s, or being unable to pay them back for the life they’ve given me.
I do not want to be a failure. As a result, I wake up everyday at 3, and go for a run at 4, then from 5 to 7, i write this blog. Meta, I know. But later in the day, I work on my books, usually from 9 to 12.
Find something you are scared of. It can be physical like financial destitution, or loss of face to friends. Or it can be deeper, like failure to live up to your own standards.
That will give you a passion to write anything.
How To Get Motivated To Write A Book?
1. Tie Positive Activities With Your Writing For Motivation
You could do fun activities every time you write.
When you write, listen to music, eat snacks, have a cold beer, and write away.
However, make sure it is something that you will never do at any other time, so do not pick a habit you enjoy a lot. Also, it needs to be something you can do absent mindedly.
This practice will make you start to crave your writing sessions. Eventually, every time you see the snacks you eat, your mind will wonder to writing, and you will wish to write.
Of course, you actually just want to eat the snack, but because your mind has come to associate that snack with writing, you will only ever think about writing.
2. Listen to Music that Stores Your Inspiration And You Listen To It Again When You Wish To For Motivation
You need to expose yourself to what you exposed yourself to when you got inspiration to write the book.
Try to listen to the same song you were listening to when you came up with the idea for the song.
This is another reason why a writing space is so awesome. When you have a writing space, most of your inspirations, and your ideas come when you are at the space. This means that when you want inspiration, you just expose yourself to the writing space music you listened to.
I do not know if it is scientific, but i call this process ‘storing inspiration’.
So you story your inspiration anywhere you wish, and whenever you want to access it, you just access it. in this case, it is in music. Though there are other means of storing inspiration.
3. Read Works That You’d Like To Emulate For Motivation
Read the books you want to write, then the statics you’d like to achieve, and finally, the hard work you’d like to put in.
My favorite stories are those where the author gives up on his woke, but a family member publishes it anyway, and the author is successful.
Basically, the stories that for focus on the process. The process interests me itself. Such as reading books, and being floored by unexpected turns, then wondering how I could have written it and realizing I would have made it pretty bad.
That’s how I felt reading Joe Abercrombie’s work.
The point is exposing your self to stories about your favorite authors will go a long way in giving you a sudden bust to write.
4. Outline Your Books, And Go Over It, Then Try To Use The Kickstart Method
You could sue the kickstart method to get motivation.
So, this is just a technique that I use to write.
In fact, I am using it to write this very article. What I do is, I look at the time, and I split it into spans of 10 minutes, with 5 minutes breaks in between. I then take my work, and I split it into chunks of arguments that I will have to write. so basically paragraphs, or subheadings.
I will spend 10 minutes writing, then 5 minutes thinking about the next subheading, and begin writing that.
The point here is breaks. You need to be able to take breaks so that you can think. Also, take days of when you will not write anything, and you will instead focus on your works.
5 Do A Writing Sprint
Finally, stop trying to make your book perfect.
There are multiple drafts to writing a book.
The best thing you could do for yourself is trying to make sure that your book is completed. Only when the book is complete will you have something to do improvements on. But without this, you will not be able to improve the work.
Once you have mastered how to make writing tempting, then you will be starting your journey of mastering mastery.