Writer, I’m about to give you some of the best news ever. If you paid attention to the title, I already have: It hasn’t been written.
“What hasn’t been written?” you ask.
Just pause for a second and feel for that glow of hope.
That. That story which is on your heart. The one you’ve been searching for in every book you’ve ever read and haven’t quite managed to find. The one that feels so familiar that you could swear you’ve read it somewhere or maybe had it read to you as a child, if you could just remember where.
That one perfect story, or the one that’s perfect to you, which includes all your favorite elements and makes you feel like you’re soaring. It has got to be out there somewhere. Hasn’t it?
It is out there, but not on the shelves of a bookstore. It’s here. Within you. You just haven’t written it yet.
Isn’t that a wonderful privilege? To be the channel through which that one story you’ve loved all your life comes into the world? If that seems intimidating, take those thoughts about how hard and daunting it might be and crush them. Crush them without mercy. You don’t need that kind of negativity in your life. All you have is story, and that’s what you’re about to bring to life.
Because you have to, don’t you? Yes, you’ve felt it clamoring to be heard, but you always thought it was calling to you from inside one of the millions of volumes already written. Little did you know, that knocking you heard was coming not from inside the cover of some already beloved hardback, but from the inner door of your heart.
“But how do I write it?” you ask.
That’s what I’ve been trying to figure out for myself this year, and I’ve had some success. The first thing you need to do is sit down and write what you already know. Don’t bother trying to write the story itself if it’s not ready yet; simply record everything you know about it. You may find you know more than you had admitted to yourself as details which had been only on the periphery come to light.
Then think about where you have heard it calling from. What stories did you think would be it? No, don’t be afraid that there’s already another story too much like it out there; from my experience, the more I go to the source of the call, the more I find books very different from the one I’ve imagined and leave with thoughts about how I would have done it differently.
Therefore, no matter who has written their own spin on this idea that’s calling to you, no one has written your story. So read those books. Watch those movies. Go to those plays. Listen to the songs on repeat. And write down whatever clicks in your mind, for those are the puzzle pieces of your work. No one has assembled them in the exact same way you will.
Next, just take your inspiration notebook and go out into the world. Whenever something strikes you, be it as weird or seemingly insignificant as you please, write. That. Down. There is a place for your inner editor, but your inspiration notebook is not it. So don’t leave anything out or tell yourself it would be too cliché. Perhaps it might, but that’s not for you to decide right now. Just believe. Record the faces or manners of strangers you believe would live in your book. Make a note of whatever aesthetic plunges you right into your story. Take photos of scenes that inspire you. Eventually, it will all come together. It will take some time, but you’re creating a beautiful thing.
That masterwork you feel the world has been missing? The world was holding its breath, waiting for you to arrive with this story planted inside.
So it hasn’t been written…yet.
