Outlining is no prison
Hello Neophyte, sit down and welcome back. Yeah, I moved you to one of the unused rooms upstairs. No, not because I care, but because I hope to lure the Corpo that way. Yes, I am still convinced that you have a Corpo behind you; no argument can convince me otherwise. But that isn’t either here or there at this moment.
Today, I am issuing a Public Service Announcement for you and for any rookie that is listening through this thin, so very thin wall. In that, Outlining is no prison.
If you have a sense of déjà vu, then you are on the money. I have already said something like this before, talking about prewriting, but I feel this is necessary. Why? Well, Neophyte, because sometimes repetition is paramount for learning—not always, but sometimes. Especially for those who are just starting, those who are just learning and treat rules and lessons as being ironbound. They shouldn’t; they look silly, and here is why.
The endpoint of any writing journey, at least of one leg of it, is to finish a story. It doesn’t matter if it is a novel, a novelette, a short story, or an entire 20-book-long series. How you write is irrelevant; it may influence the characters of the final product, but for this discussion, that is not relevant at this point. All that matters is that you sit down (or stand) and write the story.
Not long ago, you would have been lucky if you knew one person who was a writer or knew someone who knew a writer. Now it is the opposite; a chunk of the internet is dedicated to writing, and many of those writers lean close to the Hardcore Outliner corner. Why? Because a method is something “tangible” that can be akin to a product, which can be packaged and sold. Plus, having something concrete eases the nerves. Hence the popularity of things like the sticky note method.
How do I marry both arguments? At the end of the day, you should use what works for you. I know in my bones that there are plenty who flock to those videos, try to imitate what the author does to the T, fail miserably, or it just doesn’t work the same, and then get discouraged or worse, drop out entirely. To those people, I say keep going, keep trying.
No, I’m not saying that the method is wrong, or that beginning as a Hardcore Outliner should be discouraged, or that plenty of those authors who make videos are sell-outs. No method is inherently wrong unless proven otherwise. Also, this is not nuclear engineering; nothing will go boom if you do things differently from the rest. Hardcore Outliners are just themselves, and no, they are not sell-outs; they just need to sell their books.
The point I’m driving at is that if you imprison yourself into something just because it worked for other people, then you’re hindering your progress on one side and not understanding the point on the other. Hardcore Outliners write the story in the outline, plain and simple. It is the very same process Pure Pantsers go through, just different. The same amount of rewrites (almost uncountable), the same doubts, the same unknowns, just a different method and stage to face them.
“What about the rest of the story?” What do you mean, Neophyte? In that, the proper writing of the story? For them, it comes after the outline is done and dusted, almost as cosmetic over the actual, real, artwork of the tale.
Know that many are feeling relief, while many are still skeptical. “But person X did such a thing, so if I do it, I should be successful!” That is an endearing thought, Neophyte, but misguided. Just because you have someone sitting in front of a camera telling you that they did just this thing and had success, then let me tell you, you are being deceived, perhaps not in a malicious way, but there is deception there nonetheless.
A single testimony cannot capture the whole scope of the work someone puts in for success; a lot goes into creating one’s own luck, Neophyte. Plus, when you see or hear testimonies like those, they are usually followed by a lot of others that go, “Yeah, I did, and it worked for me!” Haven’t you ever asked yourself, where are the comments or stories of those who “failed”? Nowhere, because many just give up, or if they are angry, they leave a stupid comment or response and are deleted.
As for me? There was a time when I had that attitude, a time when I was determined to set on a path and make it work. Now I am just determined to reach my objective and modify my method as I go, for I am somewhere in the middle when it comes to writing styles. Yes, I have an outline; yes, most of it has been out the window for a while, so yes, I will have to go back to the prewriting documents that I prepared before I sat down to write. You have to also have in mind that iteration and repetitive work are some of the bases of our work.
So, Neophyte, just so we are clear, outlining is no prison but a method, and if there are a few who can write great works within its confines, it doesn’t mean that you should do the same.
No, up to the room that I gave you now, we have to dangle you up in the air fresh and noticeable for that Corpo that got to you.
