When I'm writing it doesn't read the way I see it in my head. Then I get upset at how disorganized the page looks. Then I usually end up deleting my work. The thing is I'm usually more accepting of my writing if I don't look at it for awhile. Does this ever happen to you?
All the time! In my head I always have these great scenes but I can NEVER get it on the page the same way as I see it in my head. Personally I prefer writing in notebooks so this helps me alot. I write this disorganized scene on the page and then I'll read over it, think about it and play around with it when I type it on a word document and then it usually turns out how I want. Try it !
Don't delete it. Modify it until it gets better. A good exercise might be to find some published material you would like your style to emulate, and type several pages of it. Running it through your head word by word at typing speed will give you a different perspective than just reading it. It may give you clues to what you aren't doing the way you want.
I once read in a book that "everyone's first draft is horrible." I think it's true. The key, is to keep it, even if you don't like it. I've had chapters three quarters written and dumped it before, but I kept the material. After starting fresh, I found areas that fit the original chapter material, and it really rounded out the chapter. So never delete or throw away what you write. It's a good start that just needs editing.
I am 100% in agreement with this. I am actually right pissed with my writing right now. I know what I want to write but the words just don't want to come out. I tend to read a book for a bit, then try to write it out. Or I just try to write out the scene. I can always fix it during one of my edit sessions. So yes, writing can anger me at times. No one ever said writing was easy or fun. It can be one big pain in the butt.
That's one of my main flaws... I have this tendency to delete my work after writing it because I think my writing is boring, now I keep them in a document and look over my work again after some hours or days, depending of the situation.
Trung, if you're getting confused about your structure, then go to The Writer's Diet, a free website where you can drop anything from 100-1000 words. It'll give you a good or bad rating overall and show you want you overuse. It's works to help make a tight sentence, and of course a paragraph. Don't get down or upset if something shows bad, just look at each sentence and toy with them, seeing how it changes your writing. Secondly, take a deep breath and take your time writing. I'm cranking out 2-4k a day because I have a lot of time, and have gotten the hang of tight writing, but when starting, take it slow. If you only write 500 words in a day and they're a great 500, then be happy with yourself. It takes time to master this profession; I've been working for 5 years to get to this point. So you can too, just take a deep breath, relax, and take advantage of all tools at your disposal.
What issue are you having in particular? "Seeing" the scene to describe or the description itself? Might be able to help you with it.
Another free site with analysis a little like Writer's Diet is ProWritingAid. It breaks down several measures of your writing including repeated words and phrases, sentence length statistics, and others, plus it counts/highlights dialog tags. Some of its tools, like homonym finding, are fairly useless but I like some of the others. It can really help tighten up your wording.
this happens a lot. what i do is to continue writing whatever that comes to mind so that i do not loose the initial idea. then,with the passage of time, i will find the exact words/vocabulary to use,which may come at odd times or odd places (like an advert, interview,anywhwere).
I would also recommend spending some time in our own writer's workshop. Getting critiqued will only address your immediate concern, but I see a problem that goes beyond a writing flaw - you need to learn how to critique yourself properly, and working in the writer's workshop will allow you to do that. Best of luck.
Oh, I can see what major scene I want to write, I just am writing about the pre-action. I don't want to rush the scene, instead I have to write quicker to get to it. I know my qualms with my writing methods. Always good scenes long before they can happen. Silly mind I have.
I don't get angry at my writing so much as bored by it. I can tell when things are going bad because each sentence I write seems more tedious than the one before. When that happens I usually stop, sometimes abruptly, and put the material aside in a special folder for that purpose. I rarely delete material outright even if it obviously stinks. I have at times salvaged some of that nasty stuff and, after extensive reworking, found a use for it.
Sometimes you can get leverage on your anger and become motivated to improve your writing. I do believe that as long as you keep your expectations realistic, you can get smooth progress instead of getting upset about your writing. If not looking at your work for a while brings clarity to your work-in-progress then schedule some breaks between your writing, however long those breaks need to be (just make sure you come back to it eventually).
I honestly believe that when your trying to be creative, be it writing or any other art form, its easy to become angry with yourself. For me, sometimes its frustration at my own limitations or my intelligence level. Not that Im stupid, but I short change myself and feel insecure. But everyone here is spot on, take a deep breath or break and go back to it with a fresh outlook. Try to figure out what is that you dont like and try to work on that part. Practice makes perfect..a cliche yes, but very true.
Don't delete!! I guarantee that when you look at it again you will see where you've gone wrong, and as you've said yourself you don't think it's that bad when you go back to it. I doubt there's a writer on earth who likes what he first puts down, revision is the key and you can't do that if you delete!
What I find helpful is to leave it, and think about it before bed. Sometimes, if I fall asleep while thinking about a story, I'll have new ideas for it in a dream. Even if that doesn't happen, it's still good to go back to it the next days.
Honestly, this is what I like about NaNoWriMo. It forces you to keep blazing onward and ignore that self-critic who screams about every short-falling. Well, for me at least...
It's all about the re-writing. Every bodies writing (including professional authors) is complete crap in the first few drafts. It must be perfected and tweaked until just right. Didn't one of those classic authors re-write his scenes up to 35 times before he got it right? I forget his name. Maybe it was Hemingway, but I can't remember.
Yes, Hemingway. A new edition is coming out that includes alternate scenes not used in the final version, and 39 endings for Farewell to Arms.
Just goes to show that good writers are the ones who re-write and ten re-write again, and then after that they do it a few more dozen times
