Have you ever felt worse about yourself after you’ve written?  Even if it’s terrible?  My guess is your answer is no.  When you’ve felt worse is when you know you should be writing…and you don’t – there’s the pain.

It’s the same as the gym, you suck it up and go, after that you feel better.  Or, you make up a reason not to go and live with the short term pain of regret.

To finish the headline above:

“Writing is fun, it’s the not writing, the staring at the screen, procrastinating and trying to make yourself start that’s miserable.”

Now, just go write a few sentences and see where that takes you.

J

You all know this but sometimes it needs to be reinforced.  Your first draft will be lacking, if not terrible.  Easy to get discouraged, move on to another task, or throw in the towel all together after reading it.

However…this is the nature of the game.  All the greats (Hemingway to Stephen King) have admitted this.  If the titans of this biz have terrible first drafts so will you.  Accept it, embrace it, use it to your advantage.  Get the first draft written, out of your soul and on to the paper…then you can craft your masterpiece from the foundation you’ve built underneath.

So the answer to the headline question is obvious: just write.  Writing is rewriting, this is a basic rule of the trade you’ve chosen, now go fire it up.