creative process

Miscellaneous

Anyone Quoting Black-and-White “Rules” About Writing Is Full of Crap

If someone is handing you absolute, black-and-white “rules” about writing, they’re full of crap.
Most of those commandments started life as reasonable cautions… before nuance died somewhere between a conference panel and a poorly edited podcast rant.

Real editors don’t enforce rules.
Real editors ask one question: Is this working for this story, this audience, this moment?

Follow every so-called rule perfectly and you won’t write a great book — you’ll just write a technically correct, emotionally flat one.
Rules can stop you from making mistakes.
They cannot help you make choices.
And writing is nothing but choices.

The Writing Life

The Annual Ritual of the Writing Resolution

Writing resolutions fail for remarkably predictable reasons.
Not because writers are lazy or unserious—but because they aim too high, too vaguely, and too emotionally.

The writers who finish books aren’t the ones who promise themselves a perfect year.
They’re the ones who build systems that survive imperfect weeks.

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