switchbladeeyes

Challenge #8:
Talk about your creative process.

This has been a bit of an off-putting challenge because there is a great deal about my creative process that I feel desperately out of touch with. The past two years my creative output has felt insurmountably stalled. (and part of me still hasn't interrogated one of the inciting personal/fandom incidents that made me even more self conscious as a writer) but I have recently been recommitting to writing fanfiction again, which has felt in a lot of ways like relearning an entire aspect of my personality.


Step One! The seed.
The initial part of the creative process generally starts with a seed idea. The seed is normally no bigger than a specific scenario/scene or bit of dialogue. The seed always needs to be jotted down immediately. If it doesn't happen, the idea is gone forever. But once in a document, if the seed is truly taking root then I will work forward and backwards to achieve this scene. And by achieve, I mean, make it make sense. for example: the best fic I ever wrote was Ouroboros, a 20k joe/nicky fic for The Old Guard. The seed scene for that fic was just one bit of dialogue where joe is asked by another character "why does nicky do anything?." and i wrote the entire story backwards and forwards like a pendulum to get to a place where it made sense for joe to respond with the emotional clincher of "because he loves me."

This is why I have a great deal of trouble talking about my in progress stories with people. Its hard to explain that I want to write my way up to a scene where Shane Hollander is breaking up with his shitty abusive boyfriend because his husband is coming home. But that's an image I definitely have been ruminating on for weeks XD.

Step Two! The document shuffle.
This part of the process is easy! Open several documents, title them poorly, and write the story in six different places at varying velocities and uncertain directions. Nothing will get lost this way. Nothing at all...

Step Three! Vibes.
Very much depends on the length and goals of the story. Longer stories get more cushion. A dedicated playlist or a pinterest board. For example, my 911 fic Retrograde has its own pinterest board i spent way too much time on. And another example, my ASOIAF fic A Song of Earth & Sky has a playlist. Never story is anywhere close to finished, but hey. No one said the process was efficient.

Step Four! Self Hatred.
What it says on the tin. This is where I tell myself over and over that my stories are meaningless and I'm a hack. I will earnestly debate deleting everything I've ever written. (However, I am still learning and unlearning this process with the new added benefit of being fucking medicated. Maybe this will lead to hating myself less? who knows. a girl can dream.)

Step Five! Set story to a low simmer and walk the fuck away.
This is the only counterbalance to step four. Generally a break of a few days or weeks (or even months to years) will make me enjoy what I've written again. It will inspire me to write more and perhaps add enough seasoning and polish to get to the posting stage.


And I was going to say that was all, but I was talking to queenslayerbee & just remembered that back in like 2019 during the lost days of quarantine, I came up with a short list of what i considered "rules" for my personal fic writing process. 
So, I present to you CypressSunn's Thirteen Rotating Rules of Writing*

1. All stories are promises.
2. You don’t have to know where to begin but you must know how it ends. 
3. Reel in the exposition. Subtlety gets you everywhere.
4. Immersion is sacred. From respecting the atmosphere to every last sensuous detail, setting is always a character in its own right.
5. No well-written character should ever have to say “I love you” or “I hate this” to be understood. The unsaid is powerful, but the unconveyed is meaningless.
6. Motivation matters. Even the most spontaneous act must spring from somewhere.
7. Change is essential. 
8. Failure is never optional.
9. Stories need consequences, but never authorial punishment.
10. All stories must endorse a truth about character or humanity (but that truth does not need to be good, pure, or even kind).
11. Trust in the intelligence of the audience.
12. Let the story breathe. Come back to it in time.
13. No writing is ever wasted.

* rules subject to change because i have free will and all that.