Planners vs. Pantsers

I’ve gotta admit, the Planners almost had me convinced. Their arguments for having a basic outline figured out and done before you start writing seem to make logical sense – have a road map, know where you’re going. Save yourself the heartbreak of ending up with 100,000 words that just don’t work due to some fundamental flaw in the story structure.

The Pantsers (‘seat-of-the-pants’ writers) will tell you that they can’t work that way. That they didn’t know what they knew about the subject before they started working on it, before their characters took over and led them to places they never imagined they would go.

But you’ll get stuck, the Planners say. You’ll write a better beginning if you know how it’s all going to end. You’ll breeze through NaNo; your outline will give you the straightforward reassurance of a steady pace. You’ll never have to worry about what comes next.

And when I do get stuck, the Planning way seems to make so much sense. And I start scribbling outlines and considering mechanics and then I get so darn frustrated because all of a sudden, nothing in this story is working.

Then I read this:

In writing, we often talk about the lesson of trust – described as trusting yourself or trusting the story.  It’s the moment in which cerebral control is set aside for discovery.  The energy that originally compelled the writer to write is allowed the helm, and the writer goes along for the ride.  To the extent that we trust that intelligent energy, we experience its ability to open doors of new ideas and experiences.

- Jennifer Paros on trust at Authormagazine.org

And I realize… I just have to find my way back into the story, and it will all be okay. Not perfect. But that story will hopefully start connecting with the inner muse that creates things. And at this point, that’s all you need.

This blog entry is part of Foxtail’s Post A Day efforts during November, undertaken in the “get-out-there-and-write-something” spirit of NaNoWriMo.