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Q&A Any suggestions for a new writer?

You're letting the perfect become the enemy of the good. Let's be blunt: your initial efforts will suck. That's because every writer's initial efforts suck. Stephen King? Sucked. JK Rowling? Sucke...

posted 7y ago by Lauren Ipsum‭  ·  last activity 4y ago by System‭

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#4: Attribution notice removed by user avatar System‭ · 2019-12-13T12:00:41Z (over 4 years ago)
Source: https://writers.stackexchange.com/a/25688
License name: CC BY-SA 3.0
License URL: https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/3.0/
#3: Attribution notice added by user avatar System‭ · 2019-12-08T05:50:09Z (over 4 years ago)
Source: https://writers.stackexchange.com/a/25688
License name: CC BY-SA 3.0
License URL: https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/3.0/
#2: Initial revision by (deleted user) · 2019-12-08T05:50:09Z (over 4 years ago)
You're letting the perfect become the enemy of the good.

Let's be blunt: your initial efforts will suck. That's because _every_ writer's initial efforts suck. Stephen King? Sucked. JK Rowling? Sucked. Octavia Butler? Sucked. Shakespeare? Suckethed.

Your goal is _not_ to write something perfect. Your goal is to _get it down on paper._ Once it's on paper, then you can edit it, repeatedly, until it _doesn't_ suck. But **you cannot edit a blank page.**

So go ahead and get your stories out of your head. You don't have to show them to anyone. The grammar can be terrible, you can have lots of "TK he gets from here to there," your characters can all be Mary Sues, it _doesn't matter._

Write. Just write for the sheer joy of writing.

Later, you can go back and make it better. Later, you can go ask for help from beta readers and editors and _learn_ how to make it better. You can _learn_ how to make the end result great.

But there's no end result if there's no beginning. Go forth and write without worry or shame.

#1: Imported from external source by user avatar System‭ · 2016-12-28T14:21:14Z (over 7 years ago)
Original score: 8