What I learned in 2022
And what I want to learn in 2023
It’s the end of the year. A time when we all lean into contemplation and inward study. When we ask ourselves, How did 2022 go? What did I learn? And what can I do better in 2023?
Well, read on to see my answers.
1. What I Learned
I told all of you that I discovered Becca Syme’s work at the end of last year—I started with her books, then listened to her QuitCast, then took two of her courses. I can safely say that, while I haven’t necessarily changed much in my process, I have learned to fully embrace my process. The messiness, the intuition, the layering, the fact that sequels will always take me longer to write and that is just how it is.
I’m also trying a few new things, which I talked about my new plan to cycle through projects as the muse “strikes” over here.
This sounds like an advertisement for her resources because I do highly, highly recommend her work.1 I think understanding your brain’s unique wiring and applying it to your life can be pretty transformative. I am certainly in a much healthier place this December than I was a year ago.2
Yet the most important thing I have learned in 2022 is that there is no magic bullet.
Before you all say, Wait, Sooz. Haven’t you been preaching that for years? I will just jump the gun and say: Yep, I have been preaching that for years. And yet, there is still this part of me that believes if I just find the right method, the right time management technique, the right keyboard with the right ergonomic mouse, suddenly everything will become…
Easier.
But it’s not true. If I go back to how I wrote my earliest books in the Something Strange and Deadly series, my method hasn’t actually changed much.
Sure, I have a much broader knowledge base to build from thanks to years of study, practice, and work with editors & fellow writers. And sure, I am just a stronger writer on a prose and story-construction level for all the same reasons too.
But in the end, nothing has actually changed. I felt my way clumsily through my drafts ten years ago. I still feel my way clumsily through drafts now. The only real difference is that I more scaffolding to lean against. Sometimes scaffolding can be limiting, though. Sometimes we get trapped by the knowledge in her brain. Oh, but I’m not offering enough insight into the thematic arc of this character! Oh, but this scene needs more subtext and tension! Oh, but I am telling too much instead of showing…
Basically, the moral of the story—the truth I’ve been forced to reckon with this year—is that nothing is actually going to change how I write books. There is no secret that is going to unlock a first draft for me, that is going to unlock my process and make everything easy, that is going to suddenly allow me to write six books a year.
This doesn’t mean I should stop learning.3 This doesn’t mean I should stop trying new tools4 or new methods. And this doesn’t mean I should give up trying because this is the way it is and nothing will ever change…
It just means that I have to go back to what has always worked for me and stop fighting against it. Instead, I can study why it works and try to lean into that—which is what I talked about here. Rather than try to fit the mold of what I think an author should do to be successful, I can just focus on what works for me and always has. It might not look like anyone else’s process, but that is absolutely okay.
2. What can I do better in 2023?
Like I talked about here, I want to work on listening to my gut. If it says X-project has run dry, then I want to see what happens when I shift gears to something else. Even if that means jumping around often.
It might not work. Or it might be amazingly successful. The only way to find out is to try!
Another thing I want to work on in 2023 actually ties into a question from @Adriana:
“Hi Susan! Question about gearing up to write: how do you get in the mood to write a specific story? Specially if it's a story you've started before and are coming back to after a while. I think I do my best drafting when I'm immersed in a story day after day, but work and life make constancy difficult sometimes, and every time I re-start, I feels like I lose a little bit of /something/ that I had before. Any advice?”
I love this question because it is something I have been thinking about a lot lately, as Cricket keeps getting sick and I keep having to put my work on hold…right as I feel like I’m building momentum in a story. It has happened twice in the last month, and I’ve been so frustrated both times!
But you know what? The frustration doesn’t change anything. It actually just makes everything worse because then I push myself to work when I’m not at my best—I’m sleep deprived or stressed from a toddler or anxious that if I don’t get words on the page NOW, they will fly away and be gone for good.
And it’s that last bit I really want to think about this year: if I don’t get words on the page NOW, they will fly away and be gone for good. Is that actually true? It’s like you said, Adriana, I too have always thought that I lose a little something if I don’t get the story down now while the words and the spark are fresh.
Also like you, Adriana, I have always thought I did my best drafting when I’m immersed in a story day after day. And yes, I probably do. But as you are also experiencing, life doesn’t always allow us to operate this way.
But is this true?
I enjoyed the book Big Magic. There was a lot I took away from that book that I felt was motivating. But there is one part of it that I think damaged a lot of writers out there and that I wish Liz Gilbert had never said: the idea that if you don’t write something now, the idea will move on to someone new.
That’s just bull shit.
It’s just absolute bull shit.
Sometimes ideas take years before they’re ready to be written. Sometimes ideas never grow into something we can write. Sometimes ideas are ready to go, but our life simply isn’t in a place to accommodate then…though that doesn’t mean the idea will now float away and leave us for good.
It’s your brain. It’s your idea. Only you can write it the way you see it, and while it’s one thing to lose the spark…
A project is only dead when you say it’s dead.
So this year, I want to reevaluate the idea of momentum. The idea of immersion. The belief I have inside of me that says, If you don’t get this done now, it won’t happen. It won’t be as good.
Is that actually true?
I don’t think it is. I wrote The Luminaries in a joyous burst of speed during baby nap times. But the second Luminaries was an absolute beast of false starts and lost threads and writing sessions that were never long enough to get into a groove…
Yet I still wrote the book, didn’t I? I still finished the book, didn’t I? And I actually think it’s effing fantastic, if I do say so myself. Even better than book 1, even if it was such a challenge to create.
Sure, it takes longer to get back into an idea if we are forced to constantly step away. Sure, that can be frustrating. But I also want us all to give ourselves a little grace. Just because you don’t get the idea down now doesn’t mean it won’t be as good later. The idea won’t decay. It won’t decompose into nothing. It won’t float off to a new brain who is ready to properly handle it…
Maybe the idea actually gets better with some time. Maybe the interruptions actually allow an idea to bake longer. Maybe if I relieve the pressure of frustration and of fearing I’ll lose the idea for good, then I’ll actually end up with something that’s good.
I do have ways to get back into a project, of course: I have playlists for my books, I have little rituals before I start working (make a cup of coffee, pull on my fingerless gloves!), and I almost always stop a scene in the middle of it so I can more easily dive in the next time with just a quick reread of what came before…
It sucks that I had to lose last week when I had so much momentum going for the last Witchlands book. I was truly excited to hammer out another 15,000 words or so by the end of Friday. But that didn’t happen. Cricket was sick, I was sick, my husband was sick, and even our dog was sick. What could I do? When I did have time to draft, I didn’t have the brain capacity.
And that is okay. I left Aeduan right in the middle of a scene, and I feel pretty certain when I do get back to him, he and his story will still be there. And maybe all that forced time away will make the ideas even better. My subconscious has had a lot of time to work, after all!
So that is my main goal for 2023—at least as a writer: how can I stop feeling frustrated at “lost time” and “lost ideas?” How can I reframe interruptions as positive and learn to dive back into a project more seamlessly once I have time?
I will let you all know what I find as the year progresses! And while I know there won’t be an easy magic bullet 😉, you can also bet your bottom dollar that I’ll study new methods, read up on craft, and take more workshops in my endless pursuit to expand my knowledge base.
What about you all? What did you learn in 2022? What do you want to learn in 2023?
Let me know in the comments! Or hit reply and send me an email. And whatever your goals are of the new year, I hope you can find a way to achieve them!
3. One Final Note
Thank you again to everyone who has supported me this year as I transitioned to Substack. I’m sure you have noticed that I have been creating far more content—most of which remains free!
But I can only do this because some of you pay to support me. You are the reason I can focus more on writing advice, and I’m truly so, so grateful for that.
Writing about story craft, about the creative life, about publishing, about healing from trauma—it allows me to understand myself better. It helps me grow as a writer and a human. And I couldn’t do that if not for the support of so many of you.
Thank you, and I hope your holiday season is a fantastic one.
I’ll see you in the new year, my friends!
🐙 - Sooz
I promise I’m not getting paid! This is not an ad!
Having childcare also helps, ha. I cannot express to you how draining it was to handle it all alone for so long. Especially with the chaotic neutral mess that is my daughter. (All my fellow parents know what I’m talking about.)
I have been reading The Anatomy of Genres by John Truby the past few weeks, and phew. It’s dense, but so much food for thought in my own stories!
So glad I tried 4theWords again! It has been so helpful for me as I draft the final Witchlands! This doesn’t mean it will always be useful, but I will use it for as long as it is!
I couldn't agree more about ideas *not* going away until you say they're dead. I wrote my first book INCARNATE in late 2009 -- but my notes for the idea are dated three years before, in 2006. In fact, the original seeds of what later became NIGHTRENDER (which released *this* year) are also dated in 2006. (Other seeds have later dates, but wow was it weird to find that one and realize how long that story had been growing.) And I have another idea I want to work on next that has been growing and changing wildly since 2008!
Sometimes those ideas get put aside because I know they're too much for me right then. Sometimes I'm not in the right space. And sometimes I just don't have enough to get started -- but the ideas don't go away to someone else. They're mine. I'm not in a race with anyone else to write them first. Pretending like I am will only do a disservice to the story, and ultimately, my readers.
/preaching to the choir
Thank you for generously sharing your experience and experiences all these years — it’s a pleasure to be able to support you in a tiny way between book purchases. Happy new year to you and the fam, Sooz!