Be honest… Have you been deep in world-building, outlining, or character development for months (or maybe longer) but still haven’t started drafting? It feels productive, like you’re laying the necessary groundwork before you can write. But what if all that planning is actually keeping you stuck? What if, without realizing it, you’ve slipped into avoidance disguised as preparation?
I know this feeling well because… weeeelllll… I’ve been there myself.
Once upon a time, I had this exciting idea for a dark fantasy novel about a battered housewife who becomes a warrior. I spent some time world-building. And by “some time” I mean the better part of a year. Maps, creatures, cultures. I even designed an entire language with regional dialects!
Overwhelmed by too much information, every time I sat down to write, I felt paralyzed by the sheer amount of information I thought I needed to include, and fought to find ways to actually include it without the dreaded infodump.
I ended up shelving the idea because I’d strayed so far from my original idea, I couldn’t even recognize it anymore.
That experience taught me an important lesson: world-building is a tool, not the goal.
And no amount of preparation can replace the magic of sitting down and writing the story you’re burning to tell.
I’ve seen this in a few of my clients, each one stuck in a different flavor of prewriting hell. One kept rewriting her outline to match every new structure she discovered, convinced the right framework would unlock her story (it didn’t).
Another spent nearly a year researching a specific time period—even though she already knew it inside and out—chasing the illusion that “just one more fact” would make her ready.
And one was trapped in a cycle of perfection, endlessly revising her opening chapter instead of moving forward. (We’ll come back to her later.)
Maybe you’re stuck now in an endless phase of planning or pre-writing. Research, world-building, character sheets, extensive outlines… All of these can keep you stuck from actually starting the drafting part of the writing process.
Don’t worry. You’re not alone, and there is certainly hope for you yet!
You weren’t born this way
This is how you were probably trained to start your novel-writing journey.
You opened a web browser (or went to the library) and searched, “How to write a novel.”
You learned you should create character sheets, outline step by step, or follow the hero’s journey. Maybe a writerly BFF swore by their favorite method, so you tried that. You went back to Google to search “how to outline” and found a million plotting approaches promising to help you write a bestseller or become a master storyteller. Each one claiming this is the secret formula, this is the method that guarantees success.
If you’re a Pantser (or discovery writer), maybe you skipped the outlining rabbit hole, but got lost in research and world-building instead, like I did. You want to get everything right and in place.
It’s possible as you did all this research and world-building fresh ideas sparked. So you go back to tweak your outline. Again. Soon, your straightforward historical fantasy turns into a tangled mess of subplot spaghetti, an ever-evolving, nebulous thing, and your idea never feels “solid” enough to start.
The truth? Until you’re actually drafting your story, all this planning—this pre-writing, touching the ball—is keeping you stuck.
The price of over-planning
All these planning and pre-writing tasks are what I call, “touching the ball.” I think I stole this term from basketball, but after a quick search I didn’t find it, but it sounds good, right? If you’re touching the ball it feels like you’re playing the game, but really you might just be on the bench waiting your turn.
But there are consequences to staying here:
Your story stays trapped inside of you.
You get so caught up in perfecting every detail—world-building, plotting, character backstories—that you never get around to writing the story itself. The book stays in your head (heart and soul) forever trapped inside of you, and the one person out there in the world who really needs the story you want to tell will never hear it. *cry* The world needs your story.
Self-doubt and impostor syndrome creep in.
The longer you delay, the more your fears grow. You start to wonder if you’ll ever be ready. If your idea is good enough. If you are good enough. This cycle reinforces itself, making it even harder to start writing. And since you aren’t writing, impostor syndrome shows up reinforcing that you aren’t a Real Writer because Real Writers actually write their novels, they don’t dick around with these planning and pre-writing details for forever like you are, ya ninny.
You lose sight of your original idea.
The more research and planning you do, the more your story evolves—sometimes to the point where it’s unrecognizable from what first excited you. You keep changing things, convinced that you need to keep tweaking before you start. The result? You’re overwhelmed and no longer sure what your story even is anymore. Remember my dark fantasy story from before? Yeah. It happens!
But there’s good news: you don’t need to stay stuck here. I will show you how to break free from these shackles and start writing today.
Shift Your Focus and reach The End
Okay, get ready friend. I’m about to hand over the keys to the writing kingdom! I know you want to write your novel. I know you want to finish it. The following tactics will help you to not only get started, but to keep going.
Reconnect With the Driving Force Behind Your Idea
Before you got lost in the research rabbit hole, before the outlines and character sheets took over, you had a reason for wanting to write this book. What was it? What excited you about this idea in the first place? Take a moment to remember that. That original spark and that glorious moment when this idea came to you is like pressing the reset button on your story. Once you’ve rebooted, really dig deep into WHY you want to write THIS story. There’s a reason there, and it’s deep under layers of onion skins inside your heart. That is what will see you into the writing phase and thrust you toward The End. Not all the plots, plans, and schemes you’ve buried yourself under.
Use Placeholders for Missing Details
Still feeling like you must have every detail in place before you begin? Instead of pausing to research or plan, use placeholders. When you come across a spot where you need more information, mark it with brackets, like [ ] or II II, and keep writing. You can fill in those details later—after you have a draft to work with.
The first step in my revision process is to search through my manuscript for my placeholders and knock them out. Sometimes it’s as simple as filling in a single word I couldn’t think of at the time (it looks like this, IIword that means xyzII). Sometimes it could be writing an entire paragraph. Other times it’s looking something up to make sure how I portrayed a situation is how it would really go down (in the instance of my Origin Codex trilogy, I did some research about police stuff and sheriff’s departments). The key is to keep moving forward.
At the very least, get your writing session done first, then spend some time afterward filling in the parts from that session where you want to know more.
BUT, set a timer and limit how long you spend, otherwise you might find yourself in the research trap all over again. I recommend less than 30 minutes.
Take a break and make writing fun
If writing feels overwhelming, find ways to make it enjoyable. Start your writing session with a silly prompt. Free write for five minutes to clear your mind. Skip ahead and write the scenes you’re most excited about. The more fun you have, the easier it will be to keep going.
You might even set your overplanned book aside for a bit and work on something with less pressure, less stakes, and less overwhelm. Nothing beats a good reset on, not only your idea, but your writerly mindset, too. Remove the stress and planning fatigue and write something super fun. Maybe a pet project idea that’s far outside your wheelhouse. If you write historical fiction and have wanted to dabble in romance, do it! Write something fun and when you come back to your idea with a fresh brain, you’ll not only be ready to dive in (because you just spent some time actually writing), you’ll be relieved to be back in your comfort zone!
Use prompts and write some quick flash fiction pieces. These are super fun and low stakes. Give yourself a ridiculously low word count goal, like 500-1,000 or less words.
Build Confidence Through Action
The only way to gain confidence in your writing is to write. No one has to see your first draft except you. Give yourself permission to suck. Give yourself permission to write a messy first draft. Your opening scenes don’t need to be perfect. In fact, they won’t be perfect—and that’s okay. You can fix them later. The most important thing is to keep moving forward.
Creativity fosters creativity. The more you show up for it, the more it shows up for you, and the more your story will visit you throughout the day. I’ve seen this first hand with my Brains & Glory Accountability & Mindset Mentorship clients.
You’ll never know if you have what it takes until you TRY
Writing is like any other professional endeavor. How do you think Michael Jordan became one of the greatest basketball players of all time? He picked up a basketball and gave it a bounce (keeping the basketball theme going here, aren’t I?). The only way to know if you’re cut out is to try. The only way to try is to DO. I’m not going to steal Nike’s slogan here, but you won’t know if you’re good enough, creative enough, or cut out to be a Real Writer until you start actually writing.
To become great, you have to keep doing it. Start by setting a timer for 20 minutes and just write. Don’t worry about it being bad, or if your punctuation is correct. The point right now is to get that story out of your soul and into the world where SOMEDAY someone might see it. But right now? You’re the only one looking at it. You’re the only one experiencing the joy and magic it is to write a novel. Will there by bad days? Hell yes there will be! But by then you’ll be so into your story you’ll keep going anyway, determined to reach The End, because Real Writers reach The End.
The key is to just write. Write an imperfect first sentence. The first thing that comes to mind. Add another one. And another. Get a whole paragraph. You’re doing it my friend!
Set a timer for 20 minutes and just write!
Moving beyond planning and prewriting: Inspirational stories for you
Remember the writer I mentioned earlier who thought her first chapter needed to be perfect before she could move on? Let’s call her Ms. M. After one of our first coaching sessions, Ms. M committed to pushing forward instead of revising, and within a few weeks, she had written beyond step one of her outline (where she was stuck in a cycle of perfection) all the way through step five. Her creativity exploded, and she felt more inspired than ever. Her daughter even told me they were chatting one morning over coffee and Ms. M had an idea for the scene she was working on. Instead of staying at the coffee table, she jumped up and dashed to her computer to write it all down. According to Ms. M’s daughter, she’d never done that before! The excitement she had for her story since stepping through her sticking point and writing forward has inspired her creativity to show up for her and the ideas to keep coming.
Another client, after I urged her to stop researching and start writing, found the most joyful, inspiring writing practice I’ve ever seen. Every session, the way she talks about her story and how her writing is going gives me chills. She’s inspired almost every day. She is inspiring!
You can experience this, too!
But first, you need to make the choice: keep touching the ball or start playing the game.
Ready to Get Unstuck?
If you’re ready to stop planning and actually start writing, the Story Compass is the perfect next step. This isn’t about adding more planning to your plate. It’s about giving you the clarity and confidence to move forward with your story, without getting lost in the weeds of over-preparation.
By the end of this intensive, you’ll have everything you need to start writing with excitement and purpose. No more procrastination. No more avoidance. Just forward momentum toward The End.
Click here to learn more and take the first step toward writing your novel.
Your story is worth it.
And so are you.
