12 Writing Hacks to Ignite Love for your Story Again

“A professional writer is an amateur who didn’t quit.”

Richard Bach

What keeps love for your story alive?

I sometimes need fun ideas to change my pattern and reenergize my want to write. Please tell me it’s not just me who gets burnt out. Even worse, I reach a brick wall at about 20k words.

What do you do when this happens?

Here are my fun hacks to rekindle story love:

1. Draw and color character cards. For some reason, coloring is therapeutic for me. Drawing my own characters, helps me see my own characters better.
2. Plan a book box for your manuscript. What fun items would you include in a box with your book? What trinkets make your story original? What merch would someone reading your book want?
3. Write a journal entry for a main character. Set a timer for ten minutes and just write like if you’re the character. Don’t worry about grammar, the perfect word or anything besides getting into your character’s head and dumping it on the page. After you’re done, your character’s voice should pop. It’s something you can checkout to get into the right voice.
4. Try a new activity that your character might enjoy. You get a fabulous excuse to be adventurous and you get to fully immerse yourself into your story world.
5. Design a house or building from your story. You can do it the old fashion way or you can look up an online design program. I don’t know about you, but I love designing living spaces with an unlimited budget. At the end of your time, you now have a concrete visual of a place from your writing.
6. Write a prayer to God about your story. This gets me in the write state of mind.
7. Knit by yourself. I don’t know if it’s only me, but I love knitting or showering with my story in mind. Somehow loose ends from the story snap into place with these mechanical activities.
8. Take a scheduled break each week. I’ve thought about going full force seven days a week but end up with a daybreak each week. Why? Personal conviction and seeing the benefit. I don’t burn out so easily when I take a break.
9. Set a deadline based off external factors. A lot of times I fail at my goals if there is no hard deadline. I make my deadlines according to contests, vacations, and submission windows.
10. Make a list of your success. Have you won a contest, gotten great feedback, learned a new technique, attended a new class or done anything to show writing progress. Make a list of those things. If you have nothing to add, make a list of the things you can do and check off each thing you do. I love feeling the swish of my hand when I finish something.
11. Read author publishing stories. Most of the time, you will find stories about hard work, rejections and the strange way things suddenly lined up.
12. Flip to the acknowledgment section in your favorite books and read them. I don’t know why I always loved reading these even as a nonwriter. They always remind me of how many people it takes to encourage a writer and contribute to my favorite stories.

This year has been a fabulous writing year for me. I had less time with a new baby and homeschooling. I’ve been more exhausted than ever in mind and body. Even with all the 2020 craziness, I signed with my fabulous literary agent, went on submission, signed a book contract and stayed consistent with writing. Believe me when I say, I’ve used each of these to rekindle my love for my stories.

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How do you keep yourself motivated to write your story?