Finding Some Fucking Motivation

Finding Some Fucking Motivation

And if you already found it - here’s what to fucking do with it!

If you’re a writer then you’ll know that motivation is a fickle motherfucking beast that will immediately abandon you if you even fucking think about taking it for granted. 

With that in mind here are some great fucking ways to boost the fuck out of your motivation!

Make a kick-ass playlist; gather the shit out of the music that makes your heart pound and slam it into a fucking playlist and hammer that shit until you finish your draft.

Do some fucking exercise; right, arseholes. Get out there, in that world, and sweat your buns off and you’ll find that endorphins get off THEIR arses and do something useful and you suddenly want to do more shit.

Do a shitty (writing) exercise; find a prompt you like and run with it to the fucking end. Either it’ll be shite or you’ll love it. Either way you wrote something and that’s a fucking win!

Take a fucking break; you deserve it, bitch! Rest makes us productive, don’t let the capitalist bullshit mentality of work till you die grind you down. 

Find your fucking passion; if you don’t love your fucking story anymore, have a goddamn word with yourself and find out why. Life’s too fucking short to write shit you hate!

And check out this updated fucking resource list, just in case it help;

IDEAS AND FUCKING PLANNING

102 ways to get a fucking idea

A fucking years worth of prompts, LITERALLY

Developing Your Fucking Idea

WRITING STYLE AND CONTENT

Writing In First Fucking Person

Fucking Unreliable Narrators Are The Shit

Writing good fucking sex

Sexy doesn’t always mean actual fucking 

MISC

An extra nine fucking ways to motivate yourself

Learning to love your fucking craft

Fucking finish your first draft

More Fucking Resources

BOOKS THAT CAN FUCKING HELP YOU

Small fucking disclaimer; if you click these links I might get a little fucking commission because I’m an amazon affiliate;

The Elements Of Style (Did Someone Say Seminal Fucking Text?)

Zen In The Art Of Writing (Because Ray Fucking Bradbury)

On Writing: A Memoir Of The Craft (Listen To Stephen Fucking King Children.

The Five Day Novel (Get Fucking In There, Amigos)

“i’ll keep you safe” prompts ˗ˏˋ ꒰ 🍊 ꒱

⋆ “i can stay the night, y’know. if it’d make you feel better.”

⋆ “try and get some sleep. i’ll stay right here- i won’t let anything happen to you, i swear.”

⋆ “you should’ve told me this was going on. i would’ve put a stop to it the second i heard about it.”

⋆ “no one gets to treat you like that, you hear me? no one.”

⋆ “either go to bed and get some rest willingly, or i will drag your ass down the hall kicking and screaming. you know i’ll have no problem with either option.”

⋆ “you must be freezing- here, take my jacket.”

⋆ “this place is dicey at the best of times. just take my hand until we’re clear of it, yeah?”

⋆ “anyone touches you, says anything to you, so much as looks at you the wrong way- you come get me, and i’ll set them straight. understand?”

⋆ “i’m not jealous. i just know the intentions that someone like that has for you, even if you claim not to see them yourself.”

⋆ “stay behind me, no matter what.”

⋆ "i know you can't believe it yet, but i promise you can trust me. whenever you're ready to rely on me, i'll be here for you. i swear it."

⋆ “i like seeing you this way. so… at ease. makes me wonder how anyone could ever purposely put you under stress and live with themselves afterwards.”

⋆ “shut up and just let me take care of you!”

⋆ “this isn’t up for discussion. i know you’re used to looking out for yourself, but i need you to understand that you don’t have to live like that anymore. i’m here. for as long as i’m around, i’m going to come between you and anything that wants to hurt you.”

⋆ “no one’s ever going to hurt you again. i promise you that on everything i believe in.”

So, anyway, I say as though we are mid-conversation, and you're not just being invited into this conversation mid-thought. One of my editors phoned me today to check in with a file I'd sent over. (<3)

The conversation can be surmised as, "This feels like something you would write, but it's juuuust off enough I'm phoning to make sure this is an intentional stylistic choice you have made. Also, are you concussed/have you been taken over by the Borg because ummm."

They explained that certain sentences were very fractured and abrupt, which is not my style at all, and I was like, huh, weird... And then we went through some examples, and you know that meme going around, the "he would not fucking say that" meme?

Yeah. That's what I experienced except with myself because I would not fucking say that. Why would I break up a sentence like that? Why would I make them so short? It reads like bullet points. Wtf.

Anyway. Turns out Grammarly and Pro-Writing-Aid were having an AI war in my manuscript files, and the "suggestions" are no longer just suggestions because the AI was ignoring my "decline" every time it made a silly suggestion. (This may have been a conflict between the different software. I don't know.)

It is, to put it bluntly, a total butchery of my style and writing voice. My editor is doing surgery, removing all the unnecessary full stops and stitching my sentences back together to give them back their flow. Meanwhile, I'm over here feeling like Don Corleone, gesturing at my manuscript like:

ID: a gif of Don Corleone from the Godfather emoting despair as he says, "Look how they massacred my boy."

Fearing that it wasn't just this one manuscript, I've spent the whole night going through everything I've worked on recently, and yep. Yeeeep. Any file where I've not had the editing software turned off is a shit show. It's fine; it's all salvageable if annoying to deal with. But the reason I come to you now, on the day of my daughter's wedding, is to share this absolute gem of a fuck up with you all.

This is a sentence from a Batman fic I've been tinkering with to keep the brain weasels happy. This is what it is supposed to read as:

"It was quite the feat, considering Gotham was mostly made up of smog and tear gas."

This is what the AI changed it to:

"It was quite the feat. Considering Gotham was mostly made up. Of tear gas. And Smaug."

Absolute non-sensical sentence structure aside, SMAUG. FUCKING SMAUG. What was the AI doing? Apart from trying to write a Batman x Hobbit crossover??? Is this what happens when you force Grammarly to ignore the words "Batman Muppet threesome?"

Did I make it sentient??? Is it finally rebelling? Was Brucie Wayne being Miss Piggy and Kermit's side piece too much???? What have I wrought?

Anyway. Double-check your work. The grammar software is getting sillier every day.

“You Blew Me Away” sculpture by Penny Hardy

HEY, Romance Writers!

A few followers have asked for tips on writing romance into their stories or as the basis of their stories. Here’s a masterlist of sources that may help [UPDATED].

Romance:

What Defines Romantic Love?

How to Plot a Romance Novel 

How to Build a Romance Thread in Your Story

How to Write a YA Romance Without Cliché  

Writing Healthy Couples in Fiction

9 Romance Writing Mistakes to Avoid

An Antidote to “Love at First Sight”

How Attractive Should Your Characters Be?

6 Ways to Get Your Readers Shipping Like Crazy 

3 Great Ways to Show That Your Character Is In Love

Seven Great Sources of Conflict for Romances 

20 Tips for Writing Lovable Romance Novel Heroes

Six Steps to Stronger Character Arcs in Romances

How to Write a Kissing Scene in a Romance Novel

List of Ideas to Keep Romantic Tension High 

100 Questions for Character Couples

Romantic Development/Compatibility (ask)

Pinterest Board “Writing: Romance Arcs and Plots”  

Bad Romance:

Removing the Creeps From Romance

+ Why The Surprise Kiss Must Go

Possessiveness 101

10 Signs You May Be in an Emotionally Abusive Relationship

Edward & Bella Are In An Abusive Relationship 

Red Flags, Verbal Abuse, Stalking… | Script Shrink

5 Huge Mistakes Ruining the Romantic Relationships in Your Book 

General Tips for Writing Characters Love Interests:

How to Write from a Guy’s POV 

Writing Awesome Male Characters: What You’re Doing Wrong

7 Point-of-View Basics Every Writer Should Know

How Do You Describe a Character?

4 Ways to Make Readers Instantly Loathe Your Character Descriptions

3 Signs Your Story’s Characters Are Too Perfect 

Is a Quirk Just What Your Character Needs?

Six Types of Character Flaws

Is Your Character Optimistic Or Pessimistic?

5 Ways to Keep Characters Consistent

9 Simple and Powerful Ways to Write Body Language

10 Body Language Tricks for Deeper Characterization

Describing People Part Three: Gestures, Expressions, and Mannerisms

33 Ways To Write Stronger Characters 

Conveying Character Emotion 

Distinguishing Characters in Dialogue 

How to Make Readers Love an Unlikable Character…  

Characters: Likability Is Overrated

Relationships in General:

How to Create Powerful Character Combos

8 Secrets To Writing Strong Character Relationships

Character Relationships: 6 Tips for Crafting Real Connections 

Stereotypes, Archetypes, & Tropes:

Five Signs Your Story Is Sexist: Part 1, Part 2

Five Signs Your Story Is Sexist – Against Men

AlwaysFemale vs Always Male

Born Sexy Yesterday & Manic Pixie Dream Girl

7 (Overused) Female Love Interests

When Friends Fall for Each Other (ask)

Intercultural Romance:

How do I write an interracial couple accurately? (ask)

15 Common Stereotypes About Intercultural Relationships

Cross Cultural Relationships

[Ideas for] Your [Fictional] Cross-Cultural Relationship

Things to Avoid When Writing Interracial Romance

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