Wrote myself into a paradox and now demotivated - how to resolve?
I'm a casual writer at best and tend to write in fits and starts when motivation hits. I tend to lack resolve and this leads to writer's block.
I've been off-and-on writing a series of little vignettes in a universe my friends and I created. The current series is a (for me) fairly tight narrative where timing is very important. It's fey-based fantasy but revolving around a college, so events fall into a typical college schedule.
I have written several scenes that deeply clash timing-wise and I can't think of a way to reorder them without causing more problems. It boils down to the following:
- Character meets other character at the start of winter break
- Characters agree to do stuff that require classes to be started
- A pre-Christmas party is had and plans are made for Christmas itself
- The characters do their during-classes events
- Christmas happens
Obviously this is a conflict and I can't find a way to solve it, but that's not the main concern of this question.
Because I've written myself into this paradox, I find myself unable to move forward in the narrative with it looming over me. However, I also can't see a way to resolve it without negatively altering the flow. I am, in short, completely blocked from writing at the moment.
How can I keep writing rather than linger over this paradox? I am reasonably certain that with enough distance and objectivity I could find a way around it, but it's weighing on me too heavily and I can't find motivation to keep writing.
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1 answer
It is hard to say without reading (and we don't do that here) but the times I have fallen into this paradox, and the many times I have seen others fall into it, I believe the real problem is that the story lacks a main spring. The main spring, the thing that drive a story, can, I think, be reasonably broken down to desire, frustration, and crisis.
A character has a desire. Various forces (internal or external) frustrate that desire. The character struggles against those forces. The struggle leads them to a moment of crisis (usually a crisis of values -- a hard choice), and from their to triumph, defeat, change, or self awareness. There are certainly yarns that don't obviously fit this model, that seem to get by on descriptive force and motion alone, but this seems to be the mainspring of most stories.
Without the mainspring to keep the author's imagination in check, the story can easily wander off course and end up tying itself in knots. This is, of course, highly discouraging. And while the advice to soldier on is no doubt well intentioned, and mere soldiering on may sometimes pay off in the spontaneous discovery of your story's mainspring, it may sometimes be better to pause and consult a map and make sure you have a clear idea of where you are going before you resume your journey.
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