Should I just sit down and write or should I plan out what I will write so that it builds towards something?

I’ve wrestled with this question and found that it’s mostly a thought exercise that serves the essential purpose of sparing me from actually having to write.

While largely a method of procrastination, the question has some merit and I’m not the only one that’s ever posed it, so here’s how I’ve answered it. (Irony is not lost on me that I’ve tricked myself into turning my hiding spot into a post.)

Two thoughts:

1. Starting small is fine. Writing disparate pieces is fine. 

Here’s what Mary Karr says:

“If you let yourself tell those smaller anecdotes or stories, the overarching capital-S Story will rise into view.”

Write the small thing. See what happens.

1. You can only write the thing that you can write. 

Does the question of “does this need to be something bigger?” let you off the hook and allow you to write nothing at all because you simply cannot write something bigger right now? Then don’t write something bigger. Write something small. Write the thing you can write right now.

And here is wisdom from Cheryl Strayed at the time she was trying to wrestle her first novel into being:

“Perhaps I could get back on track by setting aside my ambitions about being a Great American Writer and instead surrender to the possibility of my own mediocrity. Perhaps the way forward wasn’t to write the best thing that had ever been written, but to write simply the best thing I could.”

PS: But also, write the book you can’t write is also good advice.