At some point in your book, you’ll hit a wall and as you’re asking yourself, “and then what?” something else will pop into your mind. Since this scene is so hard, why not go back and work on polishing up that really cool scene a few chapters ago? It’s still working on the book, so that counts, right?
Don’t do this. Please.
With the exception of adding scenes to stuff earlier in the book–Josh is constantly finding himself about to write something that needs more build up in previous chapters, so he goes back and adds it, then keeps going–avoid at all costs the siren song of going back and “cleaning up” earlier scenes in your book.
The reasoning for this is as clear as it is unassailable. Writing is about your muse. Rewriting is about your internal editor. Your internal editor is that tiny freshman English teacher inside your brain that obsessively frets over everything from typos to character motivation. And he never, ever shuts up once you let him out of his little office.
The problem is that writing shitty first drafts is entirely dependent on locking the internal editor in his office and not letting him out unti the draft is done, no matter how much he yells, screams and stamps his tiny feet. The muse and the internal editor are polar opposites, matter and anti-matter, and as is so often the case with small-minded, detail-obsessed evil, the internal editor is more powerful than the muse. Let him out, and the muse is outta there.
In short, as soon as you start revising your book, you’re pretty much done writing it.
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