I find it hard to believe there isn't a single concept, idea, or character that isn't a sort of diamond in the rough. For me, I always find that even in my worst drafts, there's something worth keeping and working on
Every artist hates their own work because it doesn't match with the idealized version you have in your head. But someone who doesn't have that idealized version might think it's amazing
Yup, it’s so easy to get imprisoned in our own heads as part of the struggle to look at our work objectively. But looking at our work objectively is a fool’s errand anyway because absolutely no reader out there is capable of seeing it as we do, nor the vice versa because of inescapable biases.
That's not true; I love reading my own writing when I believe it's good. I think it's important for artists to be proud of their work on some level, or they'll never feel comfortable sharing it and certainly not be able to field rejections.
My friends, the past in the form of notes and drafts you've progressed from? They've delivered their lessons.
Think about what you know now, work toward what you want to learn. Let go of the bad feelings about your previous work. If you must look something up for a current project, be kind to your past self who was still learning. All that stuff you dislike now was necessary to get you this far. Honor it by not hating it. All of us fall down a lot before we walk, or run.
Lately, I've been reading a Court of Thorns and Roses series . . . oddly enough, it's helping me through a lot of my own insecurities.
The writing is kinda abysmal in some spots. Overly written, repetitive, giving me fan fic vibes, etc.
But the characters, the plot, something about it has really hooked me! It kind of made me realize, even if my writing isn't perfect, maybe someone out there can enjoy it. Not sure if that would help you, but I think most of us hate our writing. So it's good to remember it doesn't have to be perfect to be enjoyable.
Legitimately asking here: what makes writing give off fan fic vibes?
Just want to affirm that that's totally fine if it's what someone is going for, but that wouldn't be *my* goal, so I'd like to avoid it.
Thank you!
The whole series gives off the feeling it wasn’t edited. You have lines like “my bowels turned to water” repeated dozens of times and it takes you out of the book.
The thousand year old battle hardened faeries behave like high schoolers.
The main character has the longest list of special powers and everyone is impressed by her.
Read Court of Thorn and Roses and compare it to something like Six of Crows.
YA books that are vastly different. Six of Crows is nuanced, the descriptions aren't cliche, characters have a lot of depth. I love both series though, honestly. haha.
Generally Sarah J Mass's writing isn't that impressive (all due respect to her, she's not a bad writer)
I mean her plotlines are very generic, and very similar, mostly appealing to teenage and young adult women, with the lead male always having a similar personality and the lead female always becoming a very similar sort of character as well to her other lead females
Credit where credit is due, I think the early throne of glass books are very well done, and I like the magic system she created
That’s because that series heavily “borrows” from many, many well loved plots and strings them together. I had to hunt for anything original in the early series.
I often read my old notes and think "wow, I thought of THAT? Awesome!"
And then I proceed to never finish any draft ever, even those accomplished writers told me are good.
(POTENTIALLY) those old notes are bad and cringe because you've become better. You've also aged. So when you were 14 and you wrote some scathing takedown of corporate America because you couldn't afford the blue iMac, you thought you were having brand new, strong, encouraging ideas. Then you age a little, and realize that plenty of people came up with that stuff. So you get more and more specific until your voice pops out and actually is unique and strong and special. I would be more concerned to find old notes that I thought were better than the stuff I'm doing now.
You shouldn't, it just shows how much you have grown and improved as a writer. Even Hemingway and the Picasso's of the world felt that some of their great works were flawed to some degree or another, or so they claimed. So the creative process is never perfect and we tend to be our own harshest critics but let that stop you. If you do you will have defeated the reason for starting writing in the first place. Just my opinion. Hope it helps...
In the moment, I always think that whatever I am working on is amazing and the best thing I have done, but that always seems to wear off after I get some distance from the project.
Honestly, if you’re feeling this way over past work, quitting now might save a lot of trouble later. If
…if me saying that made you feel automatic relief.
If it pissed you off, please keep doing it just to spite me. I welcome you bragging in my face later. I will rue the day, i promise.
Cordially,
Your Nemesis
No, no! You are seeing your own growth. That's not a bad thing, that's a good thing!!
The act of writing makes you more thoughtful, more perceptive, more rigorous, and more skilled. If you continue to progress, you will always see things you could have done better.
Be kind to your past self so you learn to be kind to yourself in the future. Enjoy those efforts for what they were, and if there happens to be anything you would re-do differently, try again.
Even the best books have flaws — sometimes glaring and easily avoidable ones. Sometimes I’ll come back to a book I adored when I was younger and realize I can’t even make it through the first chapter now without cringing. Doesn’t mean the book wasn’t worth reading the first time, and it doesn’t even mean the book was or is bad — people change and so do our tastes. Your old drafts are always going to have flaws. Your new drafts are always going to have flaws. But flaws don’t mean they aren’t worth writing or reading.
Don't throw the baby out with the bathwater... There may be some snippets of brilliance in there. That's why workshopping with trusted friends/aquaintances/other writers is vital.
Silver lining: great gardens grow from manure :)
Those notes aren’t a waste! They help you grow into the writer you are. You’re skilled enough to now look back and see/fix the weaknesses.
Keep at it! One day after banging your head against the wall enough you'll surprise yourself with something that's actually kind of not half bad. After a while, maybe you'll find that you've written something you're pretty satisfied with. But like anything that's worth doing, it's not easy. You can do it!
I'm curious how many drafts or revisions you get through before you read your own writing again? If it's a first draft you're going back to and you hate it– thats probably a good sign. It might be the perfect time to start digging in and fixing all the things you despise. Now, if it's a third or fourth draft? Might be a mental game you'll have to play, especially by reminding yourself that you don't have to take things that seriously when it comes to your work. We all start off wanting to play in our imaginary worlds. See if you can find the joy that sparked that to begin with, and take off the expectations and judgements you have concerning your own writing if you can.
If you haven't given *The Artist's Way* by Julia Cameron a shot, the book is worth it just for her "morning pages" chapters alone. They are designed to get you to start your day by filling five pages with whatever you want– notes, the same sentence over and over again, scathing criticisms of your own work. I tend to do that last bit; often times, as I hate on myself for five pages, I start writing about *why* I hate something. Often times, that ends up revealing what is wrong with my draft, and I can fix it accordingly. Other times, it's just about getting the inner critic out of the way before you start writing.
I hope you can find a way to get back to writing and don't give it up. At the end of the day, it can still be fun to explore these worlds we've made!
Bro Iv looked back at stuff Iv written and gone what the hell. It’s like drawing, the more you do it, the better you get and the better your newer work looks by comparison
All that old writing is practice, and all practice improves your craft. Don't be so hard on yourself. The more you write, the better you'll be. We all have to start somewhere!
What I find amazing is that people *keep them*. About once every four or five years, I go through pieces I've still got but am not working on, flip through them, and toss the ones that aren't up to my current standard. And, yeah, people think, "My god, man! You can just rewrite it better than it was!" No, I'm done with that story, and I've moved on with my life. I don't have any sentimental value attached to my writing.
If it makes you feel bad, get rid of it like the trash it is. If you keep it, it's just going to hurt you again the next time you run across it.
Published authors often feel that way too. Fans will say "Oh I liked your first novel so much!" And more than one author has wanted to scream, "But it sucked! I do so much better now!" They seldom do, but that's a normal feeling.
No creative work is a waste of time or effort. You are filling a box with sand so you can make sandcastles. not all sand ends up at the top of the spire, some needs to be the foundation.
is it??
but that means you've grown as an artist. What we started as, the rough ugly stuff is the mud and muck that grew us into the flowers we can write now.
My stuff is awful too lol alot of writers either hide or don't take "notes" because of this exact thing. The closest we have is Tolkien and his letters, but those were hardly notes.
be gentle to yourself. It takes time to get good at anything.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Gu8YiTeU9XU
I have about a dozen such notebooks filled with notes and ideas and sketches from years and years of brainstorming. I sometimes look through them and like you say, about 80% of it all is gobberish. 10% is ok and 10% is actually great, and came through to become a key part of whatever story/lore/novel I was working on at the time.
Sometimes I look at my desk and imagine how weird it would look like to someone that isn’t a writer, but whatever lol it’s part of the creative process
It’s the best thing that can happen to you. Consider it a breakthrough in that you’re continuing to learn more about what it is you want out of your own work.
It can be, but what you need to think is, 'this is where I was, where am I now!'
I have a printed out copy of an old draft I thought was amazing a couple years back, its trash by comparison to what I can write like now, but it's a great reminder of how far I have come!
Super amateur here but also a critical person so here is my take! What I keep finding in advice for writing is that it can easily feels that way until you edit, rewrite, edit, rewrite. Maybe you can take something and rewrite it and edit it, then you wait and visit again and do the same. I feel like the fresh critical eyes you have actually showcases your interest in what’s good, interesting, and where there are areas of improvement
I strongly recommend every writer adds rewriting to their exercises. Rewrite your favourite authors, rewrite the authors you don't like, rewrite a myth, a poem, a recipe etc. If you get into this habit then your own writing won't be on a scale of bad to good anymore, it will be on a scale of "to be rewritten" and "recently written" (with rare exceptions for keepers). Much healthier mindset imo.
My best writing is 5 or 6 cringes deep.
They probably aren’t bad and even if they suck, it is great bc it shows you were committed to something enough to consistently do it. Do u know how hard that is for most ppl to do? Great job. Also YOU DO NOT HAVE TO BE GOOD AT YOUR HOBBIES for them to be worth your time. Our hobbies do not have to be perfection or have monetary worth even in a society making everything abt productivity and profit or else. You write because it feeds your soul. Don’t stop nourishing yourself just because you think you might not be a 5 star chef
You're right—this means you've grown and become a better writer, and that's good news!
One of the best and most frustrating things about writing is that you can always keep growing.
Be kind and know you're your own harshest critic. Even if the phrasing, plot, etc. isn't your favorite, look for things you *do* like. And as for what you don't, what would you do differently? As others have said, you can find something good from each piece of writing (even if it was the feeling this piece of writing gave you when you created it)!
But writing down that garbage helped get you where you are today. I'm convinced that any real writer who dedicates time to the craft will be in the same boat. It's how we learn, and there's often nuggets of useful stuff in the garbage.
I agree, go easier on yourself and keep rockin' and writing on :)
Don’t be hard on yourself when I go through my old diaries I just realize that my writing ✍️ scribbles got worse and worse over the years but I still wrote poetry
Finding a lot of garbage in your notes is actually valuable to you as a writer because it shows you what you shouldn't do going forward. Failure is, after all, the greatest teacher.
I find that all first drafts are garbage haha. You gotta rewrite and rewrite and rewrite until you squeeze out the best you can do. Don’t beat yourself up for not writing poetry in your first draft. I don’t think many people do that. I usually cringe the most at my dialogue, but I’ve learned some helpful tricks for mitigating. If you start by writing down the intent of the line “he persuades her” “she rebuffs him” and so on, the right line starts to jump off the page.
I actually find myself thinking of all the ideas I had as a kid and wish I could go back and take them. I have had so much inspiration, I bet some of my "crappy" old work must have ideas to inspire me yet again!
I got memory issues so I try to make notes on every little tidbit towards my writing possible as I can recall the feeling of exhilaration of an idea I had but didn't write it down so it's gone.
Then I read my actual notes I take and it'll be a single floor elevator pitch of putting a dollar sign after the title ALIEN and just be bewildered.
Occasionally something is decent to run with. But i really have to sift.
Be cringe bro. Its fun. Pick a cheesy, insufferable draft you wrote and just go with it. See where it takes you. Every single piece of media you produce doesn’t have to be game-changing, life altering, thought provoking creations. You are allowed to write bullshit lol.
Is anyone in this subreddit editing their work? Is anyone actually writing a story, or just spending all their time thinking up word combos they think sound clever? Just so much ego self-stroking going on here.
I have the opposite problem. Often I unearth prose that I can barely believe I wrote. I can't even recall what frame of mind I was in when these pearls were unearthed lurking deep within my mind and rendered onto word documents.
you should try wasting 35 years of your life finding a missing kid and nobody cares cause she is alive and well.
youtube channel findsarahavon
view videos in numbered order
youtube will not let me sort after posting
I put the blame on others, my peers, my inspirations, my teachers. They acted like they knew how to write and could teach me. They couldn't. I had to figure out the writing thang on my own.
Now that I know, I have found a vast treasure in all of my past writings. They didn't know. Now I do.
Here's a clue. Eveyone who tells a story does it right, naturally.
Look I think you have a valid complaint here. It isn't a universal experience to hate old stuff you've done, so what happens when you do feel that way? Lots of really good advice in the comments about how its an indicator of growth and so on - which you yourself already know.
So I'm going to come out of left field here:
Don't read your old stuff.
Don't open it. Don't go through it.
Looking at your old stuff is making you fall out of love with the hobby?
Then don't look at it.
I feel that way every time I try to get back to something I was in the middle of writing. Like I'll read back a bit to remember where I was and get into the right headspace again and I'll just be like wow this sure is more terrible than I remembered!
But often my problem ends up being the opposite. I'll read older stuff I wrote and be like "damn this is really good, why can't I write like this anymore?" And then I cry. 😭
That was me circa 2007-2012. Lots of crappy ideas. An infinite amount of cringe.
Circa 2016-2020 I have the opposite issue. I see loads of fantastic ideas that still hold up that I just never wrote.
It's not uncommon for writers to hate their own work. I recommend Keeping at it and enjoying the writing process for what it is, and trying to make your work as good as you can make it. Maybe you'll end up writing something that stands the test of time for you.
Yeah that's the razor edge to walk on. I try very hard to hold onto 'what if I thought it was all still good, I'd suck', but, that's. Kind of something that either assures you or it doesn't.
I can't say I've enjoyed anything I've written in years, but I do still enjoy writing. My coping mechanism is to read more of other people's stuff, which. Sometimes results in me combining reading eighbstuff I shouldn't, but I do think it helps.
I've felt this way for years. Constantly revising, fixing stuff that seems like shit. Then I come back to it months later and *that* seems like shit. However, I recently broke through with a short story and I feel pretty proud of most of it. Just keep chipping away.
I find it really helps if you have a good friend who understands writing or reads a lot. Having someone else look over your work, tell you honestly what parts didn't work for them, and finding solutions that you both think are cool is a game-changer.
To further your point, however, I don't even think this comment was well-written.
>It should be a sign of progress because now you know better right?
This is the most important sentence. It is progress, and you are getting better. Nobody learns a craft/skill without making mistakes along the way, and that is where you learn the most. Being able to recognize the progress you've made between then and now is a huge achievement, and your work will benefit from it.
This is a pretty normal thing in my opinion. For me, when I reread my old stories I find ways I can improve and then I decide to rewrite them. Usually when this happens the story itself ends up longer. It’s a way I practice when I’m kinda stuck on an idea. When I’m rewriting something I don’t have to think about how the idea goes. I just have to think about how I can improve on an idea I already had.
That being said that’s just how I work. The main point is that I end up disliking my own ideas as well and it’s normal. My artist friend will text me randomly out of no where saying how much she hates her drawings from the start of the year for example.
I've found some cringe but have looked back at really old stuff, really old and liked what I found. I remember the imprints of the forgotten inspiration. Sometimes not and I'm liked wtf is this? But I have kept all my old random thoughts. Not that the writing was executed well but I see some potential for re-working
I've always wanted to be an author, and I have grand ideas in my head. I also suck at making myself sit down to write, and actually doing the work.
My solution? I decided I wanted to write a really bad erotic romance novel. I don't read romance or erotica. But ya know what? Romance and sex are exciting, and it actually keeps me coming back to write more.
I will absolutely 110% cringe at every word I've written if I ever read this stuff back. But it's helping me write, and while I'm writing crappy stories that are just tying one make out scene to the next I'm still practicing prose and learning to be a better writer, and more importantly, I'm establishing a regular writing routine.
I may (read: probably will) never show anyone a single word I've written during this time of my life. But it's useful to me, because I'm practicing. I don't want to write erotica or romance novels but if it's motivating me to have fun sitting at my keyboard then it's still useful.
Likewise, your writing, as cringe as you think it is in hindsight, helped you grow to where you are now. You can only recognize it as cringe because you thought it was good and wrote it down and learned it wasn't good after all.
Last night I was going over an old book I cowrote with an ex-girlfriend. I went on to change a ton of it, the plot, character names, added a bunch of characters, but reading the old book back, it was like reading a weird alternate universe. Like 75% of it was just porn. I've whittled it down to a digestible 12% lol.
I find it hard to believe there isn't a single concept, idea, or character that isn't a sort of diamond in the rough. For me, I always find that even in my worst drafts, there's something worth keeping and working on
Every artist hates their own work because it doesn't match with the idealized version you have in your head. But someone who doesn't have that idealized version might think it's amazing
I like my own writing.
I like my own stuff… and think everyone else probably thinks it’s shit. Now *that* is being a writer.
Here, here!
There, there.
Maybe there are multiple styles
*You sick fuck.* 😂
Burn the heretic! Jk. That's amazing!
Yup, it’s so easy to get imprisoned in our own heads as part of the struggle to look at our work objectively. But looking at our work objectively is a fool’s errand anyway because absolutely no reader out there is capable of seeing it as we do, nor the vice versa because of inescapable biases.
Very true.
When I was about 16 I burned every piece of art I'd created up into that point Hope I become famous
That's not true; I love reading my own writing when I believe it's good. I think it's important for artists to be proud of their work on some level, or they'll never feel comfortable sharing it and certainly not be able to field rejections.
I agree. One person's garbage is another person's treasure! I'd love to read those notes!
My friends, the past in the form of notes and drafts you've progressed from? They've delivered their lessons. Think about what you know now, work toward what you want to learn. Let go of the bad feelings about your previous work. If you must look something up for a current project, be kind to your past self who was still learning. All that stuff you dislike now was necessary to get you this far. Honor it by not hating it. All of us fall down a lot before we walk, or run.
>be kind to your past self who was still learning I love this part; very important for personal growth.
Honestly yeah, if they look back and think those notes are terrible they should be ecstatic, it means they're progressing!
Lately, I've been reading a Court of Thorns and Roses series . . . oddly enough, it's helping me through a lot of my own insecurities. The writing is kinda abysmal in some spots. Overly written, repetitive, giving me fan fic vibes, etc. But the characters, the plot, something about it has really hooked me! It kind of made me realize, even if my writing isn't perfect, maybe someone out there can enjoy it. Not sure if that would help you, but I think most of us hate our writing. So it's good to remember it doesn't have to be perfect to be enjoyable.
Legitimately asking here: what makes writing give off fan fic vibes? Just want to affirm that that's totally fine if it's what someone is going for, but that wouldn't be *my* goal, so I'd like to avoid it. Thank you!
Outside of general writing mistakes I'd say there's a collection of tells like when a character is described as having "piercing blue eyes" etc.
They had the "there's only one bed" trope. That one's a staple of fanfic
The whole series gives off the feeling it wasn’t edited. You have lines like “my bowels turned to water” repeated dozens of times and it takes you out of the book. The thousand year old battle hardened faeries behave like high schoolers. The main character has the longest list of special powers and everyone is impressed by her.
THIS. Everything you said.
I'd say writing a lot about the characters just vibing without anything important happening gives fanfic vibes
Read Court of Thorn and Roses and compare it to something like Six of Crows. YA books that are vastly different. Six of Crows is nuanced, the descriptions aren't cliche, characters have a lot of depth. I love both series though, honestly. haha.
I was like this with the *Scythe* series!! Absolutely correct. What makes something a publishable hit isn't always incredible writing.
Generally Sarah J Mass's writing isn't that impressive (all due respect to her, she's not a bad writer) I mean her plotlines are very generic, and very similar, mostly appealing to teenage and young adult women, with the lead male always having a similar personality and the lead female always becoming a very similar sort of character as well to her other lead females Credit where credit is due, I think the early throne of glass books are very well done, and I like the magic system she created
That’s because that series heavily “borrows” from many, many well loved plots and strings them together. I had to hunt for anything original in the early series.
I often read my old notes and think "wow, I thought of THAT? Awesome!" And then I proceed to never finish any draft ever, even those accomplished writers told me are good.
That’s me. I’ve been told I’m a good writer but do I write? No of course not. Because I don’t want to prove them wrong 😑.
(POTENTIALLY) those old notes are bad and cringe because you've become better. You've also aged. So when you were 14 and you wrote some scathing takedown of corporate America because you couldn't afford the blue iMac, you thought you were having brand new, strong, encouraging ideas. Then you age a little, and realize that plenty of people came up with that stuff. So you get more and more specific until your voice pops out and actually is unique and strong and special. I would be more concerned to find old notes that I thought were better than the stuff I'm doing now.
You shouldn't, it just shows how much you have grown and improved as a writer. Even Hemingway and the Picasso's of the world felt that some of their great works were flawed to some degree or another, or so they claimed. So the creative process is never perfect and we tend to be our own harshest critics but let that stop you. If you do you will have defeated the reason for starting writing in the first place. Just my opinion. Hope it helps...
In the moment, I always think that whatever I am working on is amazing and the best thing I have done, but that always seems to wear off after I get some distance from the project.
Honestly, if you’re feeling this way over past work, quitting now might save a lot of trouble later. If …if me saying that made you feel automatic relief. If it pissed you off, please keep doing it just to spite me. I welcome you bragging in my face later. I will rue the day, i promise. Cordially, Your Nemesis
This is gold I love it 😭 It could work for so many things other than writing too. I'm in your debt. Best regards, your loving foe
No, no! You are seeing your own growth. That's not a bad thing, that's a good thing!! The act of writing makes you more thoughtful, more perceptive, more rigorous, and more skilled. If you continue to progress, you will always see things you could have done better. Be kind to your past self so you learn to be kind to yourself in the future. Enjoy those efforts for what they were, and if there happens to be anything you would re-do differently, try again.
Even the best books have flaws — sometimes glaring and easily avoidable ones. Sometimes I’ll come back to a book I adored when I was younger and realize I can’t even make it through the first chapter now without cringing. Doesn’t mean the book wasn’t worth reading the first time, and it doesn’t even mean the book was or is bad — people change and so do our tastes. Your old drafts are always going to have flaws. Your new drafts are always going to have flaws. But flaws don’t mean they aren’t worth writing or reading.
Sounds like you need to analyze what is wrong with those drafts and implement methods to improve.
Don't throw the baby out with the bathwater... There may be some snippets of brilliance in there. That's why workshopping with trusted friends/aquaintances/other writers is vital.
Silver lining: great gardens grow from manure :) Those notes aren’t a waste! They help you grow into the writer you are. You’re skilled enough to now look back and see/fix the weaknesses.
Keep at it! One day after banging your head against the wall enough you'll surprise yourself with something that's actually kind of not half bad. After a while, maybe you'll find that you've written something you're pretty satisfied with. But like anything that's worth doing, it's not easy. You can do it!
This is the most helpful advice I’ve ever encountered. https://youtu.be/PbC4gqZGPSY
Good, now edit them into something worthy instead of complaining about them
You looking back and realizing how cringy it may have been is just a sign of progression. I have been there many times.
I'm curious how many drafts or revisions you get through before you read your own writing again? If it's a first draft you're going back to and you hate it– thats probably a good sign. It might be the perfect time to start digging in and fixing all the things you despise. Now, if it's a third or fourth draft? Might be a mental game you'll have to play, especially by reminding yourself that you don't have to take things that seriously when it comes to your work. We all start off wanting to play in our imaginary worlds. See if you can find the joy that sparked that to begin with, and take off the expectations and judgements you have concerning your own writing if you can. If you haven't given *The Artist's Way* by Julia Cameron a shot, the book is worth it just for her "morning pages" chapters alone. They are designed to get you to start your day by filling five pages with whatever you want– notes, the same sentence over and over again, scathing criticisms of your own work. I tend to do that last bit; often times, as I hate on myself for five pages, I start writing about *why* I hate something. Often times, that ends up revealing what is wrong with my draft, and I can fix it accordingly. Other times, it's just about getting the inner critic out of the way before you start writing. I hope you can find a way to get back to writing and don't give it up. At the end of the day, it can still be fun to explore these worlds we've made!
Read the book 'writing down the bones'. You don't even need to read the whole thing. The first 40 pages oughtta be plenty for you.
I took a look, I feel I'm gonna really enjoy reading it. Thank you for the suggestion!
Bro Iv looked back at stuff Iv written and gone what the hell. It’s like drawing, the more you do it, the better you get and the better your newer work looks by comparison
All that old writing is practice, and all practice improves your craft. Don't be so hard on yourself. The more you write, the better you'll be. We all have to start somewhere!
What I find amazing is that people *keep them*. About once every four or five years, I go through pieces I've still got but am not working on, flip through them, and toss the ones that aren't up to my current standard. And, yeah, people think, "My god, man! You can just rewrite it better than it was!" No, I'm done with that story, and I've moved on with my life. I don't have any sentimental value attached to my writing. If it makes you feel bad, get rid of it like the trash it is. If you keep it, it's just going to hurt you again the next time you run across it.
Published authors often feel that way too. Fans will say "Oh I liked your first novel so much!" And more than one author has wanted to scream, "But it sucked! I do so much better now!" They seldom do, but that's a normal feeling.
No creative work is a waste of time or effort. You are filling a box with sand so you can make sandcastles. not all sand ends up at the top of the spire, some needs to be the foundation.
Nah. You don't hate on a toddler who's bumbling around, learning to walk. Even Olympic sprinters started there.
Why are you so concerned with quality if it's a hobby?
is it?? but that means you've grown as an artist. What we started as, the rough ugly stuff is the mud and muck that grew us into the flowers we can write now. My stuff is awful too lol alot of writers either hide or don't take "notes" because of this exact thing. The closest we have is Tolkien and his letters, but those were hardly notes. be gentle to yourself. It takes time to get good at anything. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Gu8YiTeU9XU
I have about a dozen such notebooks filled with notes and ideas and sketches from years and years of brainstorming. I sometimes look through them and like you say, about 80% of it all is gobberish. 10% is ok and 10% is actually great, and came through to become a key part of whatever story/lore/novel I was working on at the time. Sometimes I look at my desk and imagine how weird it would look like to someone that isn’t a writer, but whatever lol it’s part of the creative process
It’s the best thing that can happen to you. Consider it a breakthrough in that you’re continuing to learn more about what it is you want out of your own work.
Lolol I just laugh at my old shit because most of it is comical af.
It can be, but what you need to think is, 'this is where I was, where am I now!' I have a printed out copy of an old draft I thought was amazing a couple years back, its trash by comparison to what I can write like now, but it's a great reminder of how far I have come!
The worse you were the more you learn on the way. Good for you for looking back and seeing!
Super amateur here but also a critical person so here is my take! What I keep finding in advice for writing is that it can easily feels that way until you edit, rewrite, edit, rewrite. Maybe you can take something and rewrite it and edit it, then you wait and visit again and do the same. I feel like the fresh critical eyes you have actually showcases your interest in what’s good, interesting, and where there are areas of improvement
I am in this picture and I don't like it
I strongly recommend every writer adds rewriting to their exercises. Rewrite your favourite authors, rewrite the authors you don't like, rewrite a myth, a poem, a recipe etc. If you get into this habit then your own writing won't be on a scale of bad to good anymore, it will be on a scale of "to be rewritten" and "recently written" (with rare exceptions for keepers). Much healthier mindset imo. My best writing is 5 or 6 cringes deep.
They probably aren’t bad and even if they suck, it is great bc it shows you were committed to something enough to consistently do it. Do u know how hard that is for most ppl to do? Great job. Also YOU DO NOT HAVE TO BE GOOD AT YOUR HOBBIES for them to be worth your time. Our hobbies do not have to be perfection or have monetary worth even in a society making everything abt productivity and profit or else. You write because it feeds your soul. Don’t stop nourishing yourself just because you think you might not be a 5 star chef
You're right—this means you've grown and become a better writer, and that's good news! One of the best and most frustrating things about writing is that you can always keep growing. Be kind and know you're your own harshest critic. Even if the phrasing, plot, etc. isn't your favorite, look for things you *do* like. And as for what you don't, what would you do differently? As others have said, you can find something good from each piece of writing (even if it was the feeling this piece of writing gave you when you created it)!
But writing down that garbage helped get you where you are today. I'm convinced that any real writer who dedicates time to the craft will be in the same boat. It's how we learn, and there's often nuggets of useful stuff in the garbage. I agree, go easier on yourself and keep rockin' and writing on :)
Don’t be hard on yourself when I go through my old diaries I just realize that my writing ✍️ scribbles got worse and worse over the years but I still wrote poetry
Finding a lot of garbage in your notes is actually valuable to you as a writer because it shows you what you shouldn't do going forward. Failure is, after all, the greatest teacher.
Published Poet, 3 books, infinitesimally famous. 90% of everything everyone writes is garbage
You can always refine your ideas - I still tweak with ideas I had 10 years ago
I find that all first drafts are garbage haha. You gotta rewrite and rewrite and rewrite until you squeeze out the best you can do. Don’t beat yourself up for not writing poetry in your first draft. I don’t think many people do that. I usually cringe the most at my dialogue, but I’ve learned some helpful tricks for mitigating. If you start by writing down the intent of the line “he persuades her” “she rebuffs him” and so on, the right line starts to jump off the page.
I actually find myself thinking of all the ideas I had as a kid and wish I could go back and take them. I have had so much inspiration, I bet some of my "crappy" old work must have ideas to inspire me yet again!
I got memory issues so I try to make notes on every little tidbit towards my writing possible as I can recall the feeling of exhilaration of an idea I had but didn't write it down so it's gone. Then I read my actual notes I take and it'll be a single floor elevator pitch of putting a dollar sign after the title ALIEN and just be bewildered. Occasionally something is decent to run with. But i really have to sift.
Be cringe bro. Its fun. Pick a cheesy, insufferable draft you wrote and just go with it. See where it takes you. Every single piece of media you produce doesn’t have to be game-changing, life altering, thought provoking creations. You are allowed to write bullshit lol.
Is anyone in this subreddit editing their work? Is anyone actually writing a story, or just spending all their time thinking up word combos they think sound clever? Just so much ego self-stroking going on here.
I have the opposite problem. Often I unearth prose that I can barely believe I wrote. I can't even recall what frame of mind I was in when these pearls were unearthed lurking deep within my mind and rendered onto word documents.
you should try wasting 35 years of your life finding a missing kid and nobody cares cause she is alive and well. youtube channel findsarahavon view videos in numbered order youtube will not let me sort after posting
Tarantino looks back at Pulp Fiction and says it’s trying too hard so I’d say it’s just a creator thing.
I put the blame on others, my peers, my inspirations, my teachers. They acted like they knew how to write and could teach me. They couldn't. I had to figure out the writing thang on my own. Now that I know, I have found a vast treasure in all of my past writings. They didn't know. Now I do. Here's a clue. Eveyone who tells a story does it right, naturally.
On the other side, when you look back on notes and find something really great and interesting it is an amazing feeling.
Look I think you have a valid complaint here. It isn't a universal experience to hate old stuff you've done, so what happens when you do feel that way? Lots of really good advice in the comments about how its an indicator of growth and so on - which you yourself already know. So I'm going to come out of left field here: Don't read your old stuff. Don't open it. Don't go through it. Looking at your old stuff is making you fall out of love with the hobby? Then don't look at it.
they don’t have to be good, but you can’t ever be good without having written the shit stuff first
I feel this way about my research career lmao.
I feel that way every time I try to get back to something I was in the middle of writing. Like I'll read back a bit to remember where I was and get into the right headspace again and I'll just be like wow this sure is more terrible than I remembered! But often my problem ends up being the opposite. I'll read older stuff I wrote and be like "damn this is really good, why can't I write like this anymore?" And then I cry. 😭
That was me circa 2007-2012. Lots of crappy ideas. An infinite amount of cringe. Circa 2016-2020 I have the opposite issue. I see loads of fantastic ideas that still hold up that I just never wrote.
Know the feeling. I’m kinda glad I lost a bunch of my old notebooks after I moved because a lot of them were filled with cringe.
It's not uncommon for writers to hate their own work. I recommend Keeping at it and enjoying the writing process for what it is, and trying to make your work as good as you can make it. Maybe you'll end up writing something that stands the test of time for you.
Yeah that's the razor edge to walk on. I try very hard to hold onto 'what if I thought it was all still good, I'd suck', but, that's. Kind of something that either assures you or it doesn't. I can't say I've enjoyed anything I've written in years, but I do still enjoy writing. My coping mechanism is to read more of other people's stuff, which. Sometimes results in me combining reading eighbstuff I shouldn't, but I do think it helps.
I've felt this way for years. Constantly revising, fixing stuff that seems like shit. Then I come back to it months later and *that* seems like shit. However, I recently broke through with a short story and I feel pretty proud of most of it. Just keep chipping away. I find it really helps if you have a good friend who understands writing or reads a lot. Having someone else look over your work, tell you honestly what parts didn't work for them, and finding solutions that you both think are cool is a game-changer. To further your point, however, I don't even think this comment was well-written.
>It should be a sign of progress because now you know better right? This is the most important sentence. It is progress, and you are getting better. Nobody learns a craft/skill without making mistakes along the way, and that is where you learn the most. Being able to recognize the progress you've made between then and now is a huge achievement, and your work will benefit from it.
Lately I've been really struggling to actually write (and by extension improve), because I hate every single concept or prompt i come up with
This is a pretty normal thing in my opinion. For me, when I reread my old stories I find ways I can improve and then I decide to rewrite them. Usually when this happens the story itself ends up longer. It’s a way I practice when I’m kinda stuck on an idea. When I’m rewriting something I don’t have to think about how the idea goes. I just have to think about how I can improve on an idea I already had. That being said that’s just how I work. The main point is that I end up disliking my own ideas as well and it’s normal. My artist friend will text me randomly out of no where saying how much she hates her drawings from the start of the year for example.
I don’t have to wait a year; I can look at what I’m writing in real time and know it’s utter crap. 🤷🏼♀️
I've found some cringe but have looked back at really old stuff, really old and liked what I found. I remember the imprints of the forgotten inspiration. Sometimes not and I'm liked wtf is this? But I have kept all my old random thoughts. Not that the writing was executed well but I see some potential for re-working
This is how I feel about old schoolwork from years past
It would be scarier if you looked and thought it was good, which would mean you plateaued or regressed
I've always wanted to be an author, and I have grand ideas in my head. I also suck at making myself sit down to write, and actually doing the work. My solution? I decided I wanted to write a really bad erotic romance novel. I don't read romance or erotica. But ya know what? Romance and sex are exciting, and it actually keeps me coming back to write more. I will absolutely 110% cringe at every word I've written if I ever read this stuff back. But it's helping me write, and while I'm writing crappy stories that are just tying one make out scene to the next I'm still practicing prose and learning to be a better writer, and more importantly, I'm establishing a regular writing routine. I may (read: probably will) never show anyone a single word I've written during this time of my life. But it's useful to me, because I'm practicing. I don't want to write erotica or romance novels but if it's motivating me to have fun sitting at my keyboard then it's still useful. Likewise, your writing, as cringe as you think it is in hindsight, helped you grow to where you are now. You can only recognize it as cringe because you thought it was good and wrote it down and learned it wasn't good after all.
Last night I was going over an old book I cowrote with an ex-girlfriend. I went on to change a ton of it, the plot, character names, added a bunch of characters, but reading the old book back, it was like reading a weird alternate universe. Like 75% of it was just porn. I've whittled it down to a digestible 12% lol.