Every writing teacher will tell you: show, don't tell. Almost none of them tell you why it's so hard to do. Here's why: you can't show what you haven't inhabited. If you're standing outside the scene — watching it happen, reporting on it — the only tool you have is telling. These tell me what's happening: - "She was sad." - "The room was tense." - "He felt afraid." These show me what's happening: - "Her shoulders sagged, and she sighed heavily." - "Mr. Baker clenched his jaw and fists when Mrs. Fletcher walked in." - "His body froze when he saw the figure emerge through the closed door." Do you feel the difference? In Sanskrit, there's a concept called parakaya pravesha — entering another's body. It describes a yogi who leaves their own form and inhabits another, not to control, but to understand from the inside. To know what can only be known by being there. That's what writing a scene actually requires. The philosopher Adi Shankaracharya — a celibate monk who had never known love or marriage — entered the body of a dead king so he could learn what he could not learn as a renunciate. He lived inside another life in order to know it truly. When he came back, he could speak of things he had never experienced. Not because he imagined them. Because he had been there. That's the job. Before you write the scene, enter it. Feel the floor under your feet. Smell what's in the air. Know what your character wants so badly they can taste it. Then write. You won't have to think about showing versus telling. You'll have no choice but to render what you lived. The report comes from outside. The scene comes from inside. Where in your current project have you been standing outside a scene you should have inhabited?

One of the hardest lessons I've learned as a writer is that not all inactivity is procrastination. There are three distinct states in the creative process: - Working: You're actively writing, editing, outlining, recording, or otherwise moving the project forward. - Fermenting: You've reached a point where more effort won't improve the work. The manuscript needs distance. It needs time to settle. Your subconscious is still processing it even though you're not touching it. - Avoiding: The project is ready for your attention, but you're finding reasons not to engage with it. Suddenly, every other project seems more interesting. New ideas appear. Side quests multiply. The challenge is that fermenting and avoiding can look identical from the outside. In both cases, you're not working on the project. The difference is how the project feels. When a manuscript is still fermenting, returning to it feels muddy. You can't quite see what needs to change. When fermentation is complete, something shifts. The project starts quietly asking for your attention. You begin to sense what needs to be done, but the work itself may feel difficult, tedious, or uncomfortable. That's often the moment writers mistake avoidance for inspiration and run off to a shiny new project. I've also learned that productive procrastination has value. While one project is fermenting, I might write an essay, critique another author's work, record an audiobook chapter, or work on a lesson for the Guild. Those activities keep me engaged with the craft without forcing a manuscript before it's ready. The key is making sure productive procrastination remains productive and doesn't become a permanent refuge from finishing. Sometimes the most important question isn't: "What do I feel like working on?" It's: "Which project is actually asking for me right now?"

There’s an old practice among some Japanese monks where they would write a poem and then release it into a river, letting the current carry it away. Not because the poem had no value, but because attachment can become a cage. The act of writing was the living thing. The page was only ever a leaf floating downstream. Over the years, I’ve lost stories to crashed computers, floods, divorce, hard drives, moves, and the strange erosion of time. Entire worlds vanished. Characters gone. Thousands upon thousands of words disappeared into the fog. But I’m still a writer. A tree does not stop being a tree because a storm tears off a branch. The story is not always the point. Sometimes the writing itself is the point. The practice. The attention. The shaping of thought into language. The quiet act of returning to the desk again and again, even after loss. If you lost a project recently, grieve it. Seriously. But don’t mistake a lost manuscript for a lost voice. Those are not the same thing.

Check in and let us know how you did this week. Did you: - Spend any time writing this week? - Clarify your vision for your book? - Make any progress - even a smidge? Rome wasn't built in a day - but it also wasn't built by procrastinating. 📕 Each book can feel like building Rome. 📚 👉 What are your goals for next week? Drop it in the comments!

Inside a recent thread, I was asked about the pros & cons of both NovelCrafter and AutoCrit, two platforms I spend a lot of time using. Here are my current thoughts. NovelCrafter is a powerful, highly customizable AI-assisted (though this is optional, it's best to have it) novel writing platform tailored for fiction authors. It stands out for its deep world-building capabilities and model flexibility, though it has a steep learning curve and requires some initial technical setup. As a former database geek, my brain works in the style of NovelCrafter. The Codex is a powerful relational database which can supply context at need, with lots of the decisions about what to include in a prompt taken care of by the NC software; you don't have to think about most of this side of prompting, once you've populated your Codex. There are other platforms that can assist the writing side, and some are likely better than NC in this area; but I stay for the Codex. Pros - The Codex: It features a highly advanced, dynamic story bible. You can store character profiles, locations, and lore. The AI uses this to maintain near-perfect continuity and detail consistency across massive, multi-book series. - Model Flexibility (BYOK): Unlike all-in-one tools that lock you into one AI, Novelcrafter uses a "Bring Your Own Key" (BYOK) system. This allows you to connect to platforms like OpenRouter and choose exactly which AI models (such as Claude, ChatGPT, or Gemini) you want to use for outlining versus drafting. - Deep Control: You can completely customize prompts, system instructions, and workflows to match your specific voice and genre. - Cost-Effectiveness: Because you pay separately for the AI models you use, it can be significantly cheaper than fixed-price, credit-based AI platforms—especially if you utilize lighter, cheaper models. Cons - Steep Learning Curve: The interface and the setup process are not for the faint of heart. Learning how to connect API keys, navigate model settings, and organize the Codex can be overwhelming for non-technical beginners. - Setup Friction: You have to do a lot of configuration work and data entry (like populating the Codex) before the AI becomes genuinely useful. If you are importing an existing draft, this setup can feel tedious. One area that must be addressed regularly is customization of prompts and controls in the (back-end) Prompt System. - Requires Separate AI Accounts: You must set up and manage an account on a third-party AI bridge/provider, such as OpenRouter, to connect the AI models. Or, you must bring API keys from specific LLM suppliers, one at a time, and connect them in. (This is true of many other writing platforms, though.) - Output Quality Depends on the Model: Because NC provides the interface rather than the AI itself, the quality of the prose or brainstorming is only as good as the underlying model you choose. Additionally, output quality is sensitive to how sophisticated you populate the Prompt System’s controls and prompts. - Formatting for Publication is Weak: While NC is a powerful writing platform, it is very weak (even bad) as a formatting application for print. You will have to use Word (or equivalent), Atticus, or Vellum (Mac only!) to get a print-ready upload for paper books. It also can’t generate eBook formats, such as the KPF file required for Kindle.