If you’re like me, you may sometimes have trouble sitting down and working on your story. Here are a few things to help you push through the story pain:

1. Music. I find that soundtracks help. Why? They help get your brain into the mood through the kinds of sounds you hear when watching a movie. Which helps with…

Are you ready for it? I know this is going to blow your mind because nobody has ever thought of it!

2. Visualize. Imagine you are in the theater, sitting down to watch a movie of your story. You’re onto the scene you’re writing at this very moment. What do you see? What does it look like? If you’re drawing blanks think about some of your favorite movies of a similar theme or genre.

   If you’re writing a sci-fi detective story, what would your scene look like from the style of Bladerunner? Is that on track, or totally off? What’s off about it? What works, what doesn’t?

Like me you may find that once you start visualizing, you’ve tricked yourself into the right working mindset for your story.

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Because my study of media franchises in movies, television, and games I began to think in terms of the series in everything that I do. Once this became force of habit, I started to create differently.

An idea for a second story in a series had useful influence on editing and reshaping the first story so that is better focused respect to the series.

Being a Serial Thinker

Story one defines the central character of the series. For example, in Raiders of the Lost Ark we get a great introduction to the primary hooks of the series: Indy hunting down sacred artifacts, a race of wits and time to secure the artifact before someone else exploits it, and of course, gratuitous use of the whip.

Indiana Jones is episodic more than serial, however. There is no overarching story from one movie to the next. A TV show like 24 is the opposite however.

In my opinion, serial is much harder to pull off because you have to treat it like you’re telling one big story and each episode is merely a chapter in that story.

My stories are a hybrid. Each story is part of an overall larger story, but I intend for them to be enjoyed on their own as well. How am I doing this?

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In Personality Styles & Writing Habits I talked about how important it is to fire the inner nazi. If you listen to the inner nazi, you will approach everything you do with dread. This is no way to be productive. If you’re not enjoying yourself, you’re not going to put as much effort into it, and you won’t be happy with either the process or the end result. The inner nazi can suffocate even the most enjoyable things in your life. It’s up to you to not let that happen.

At the lowest point, the inner nazi has taken over and stripped the fun out of everything. In the past when I felt like this, I’d sometimes also reach a point of great clarity and insight. I would think of the times I’ve had both the most fun and been the most productive. In those moments I was able to achieve what Mihály Csíkszentmihályi calls Flow.

Even though the study of flow is mostly anecdotal and not very scientific, whatever the root causes in the brain, the kind of fun focus known as flow truly does exist. What isn’t clear, is how people achieve flow or initiate it, especially if they are stumbling out of a fight with the inner nazi.

I’m not sure how other people do it, but here is how I like to tackle the issue of motivating myself.

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