Tuesday's Writer's Tip based on quote by Sidney Sheldon #amwriting

This quote in an essay by Sidney Sheldon struck me as very true and takes me back to when I began writing. "If you write only when the muse sits on your shoulder, it is unlikely your project will ever get completed."

That is how I began many years ago. How about you? Do you wait for that moment of inspiration and then sit down to write, then hang up the project until the next inspiration hits? Maybe you will finish the story in a year or two and maybe never. Sometimes putting a story aside for a time is a good thing. I have a lot of starts in a file cabinet. They're ones I've hit a roadblock. So I put them aside and start a new project. I may or may not go back to the project or I may change the project's focus.

But I write nearly every day. There's no muse sitting on my shoulder or even in the room. What primes the pump is putting those words on the paper, knowing when I reach the end I can go back and rewrite passages and revise what's down.

Words matter, the muse is a game or a myth. Finishing the story even when it's not going well or putting it aside until you find a way over the roadblock and starting something new. The main thing I give to new writers is "Finish the book." The writer is in control and has the words needed and they will emerge with a bit of persistence,