TheExperimentalist
Inventive
- Joined
- Dec 1, 2024
- Posts
- 12
Anyone else have this problem? I've only got two posted stories, but I'm sitting here with 18 drafts, about a dozen of which are legitimate stories or outlines in various stages of completion. (The other 6 are checklists, reminders, notes, or rambling essays to try to explore my own thoughts that probably no one will ever read.)
I've been itching get at least ONE more of them done and posted sometime soon, and I just haven't been able to. There are a number of reasons for this:
1. Sequel Syndrome. I'm having trouble avoiding that thing where, halfway through a story that I had originally intended as a one-off, I start getting a bunch of ideas for sequels. So I take notes on them, and then don't want to finalize certain scenes in the first installment until I know where the sequel is going to be headed so that I make sure to avoid inconsistencies.
2. Fear of Commitment. Similar problem with the stories that I HAVE planned as multiple parts. I have plans for an ongoing I/T saga with a VERY slow buildup where the siblings don't even broach the topic of their relationship anywhere outside of their own minds until the fourth or fifth installment. I've more or less finished at least two or three installments (still with plenty of, what I hope are, steamy masturbation scenes), but I don't want to edit and post them yet, because in incest stories, I find the hardest part to make believable to be the part where they actually cross the line from thought to action. Until I have at least that much done and I'm sure I'm satisfied with how the narrative flows in that moment, I'm afraid to commit to setting any of the prior story points in stone, in case some subtle change to some earlier detail would make the mood or motivations when they finally get there more believable. Once they cross that line, continuing to explore will be easier, and depend less on what came before or how they got there. Which brings me to my next point:
3. Variety, but having to get there first. Not all of my stories are incest stories, but a large percentage are, and those definitely need to start the relationship from scratch. I tend to prefer incest stories where at least one, if not both, of the siblings start off much more innocent and inexperienced, and then they learn, grow, and explore their sexualities together. On the other hand, one of my top priorities in a story is believability. You can't take characters who have rarely, if ever, had sex before and suddenly throw them into fetishey, kinky, wild crazy monkey sex without developing that comfort and confidence with both themselves and with each other.
Yes, I want to go in a different direction with each of those stories and have a LOT of ideas for sex acts, positions, contexts, and even fetishes to explore, but they have to build up to it naturally. I find that the 'first time' stories, even good first time stories, are all generally pretty similar in mood and tone. At least, the first time stories that I find myself able to write believably are. And one can only write phrases such as "tentatively placed her hand directly on the rigid flesh of his bare cock" or "cautiously let his tongue slide out from between his lips to explore between her folds" or "never imagined it could feel this good, especially not with her own brother" so many times before it starts feeling repetitive and samey.
4. Balancing similar-but-different with variety. Okay, so I like a LOT of different kinds of sex. Different moods, different speeds, different contexts. The first story I posted is a slow build up, third-person, I/T piece set in the 70s with a loving brother emotionally supporting a distraught sister. A bit of a twist reveal about why she's struggled so much leads to some pretty gentle and extremely romantic sex. It got 40k views and 20 comments in the first week (up to 50k and 35 now) and never had its rating drop below I think a 4.56 at the lowest.
The other story I posted was more of a quick intro to the character's sexual history and then get right into it, first-person, piece, with much less specific chronological anchoring, and a fight with make-up sex that veers just slightly toward the aggressive and vindictive side. It's in the BDSM category, though only because that's where it fit best. It isn't really the typical fare that you would find under that heading. That one got only a couple thousand views in the first week, STILL has zero comments, and only managed to finally scrape itself up above a 4.5 rating this past week, when it's seen a small uptick in viewership.
While it's true that I made the conscious decision, when I started writing, that I would be writing the stories that I myself would want to read and wouldn't make narrative decisions based on what might be more popular, it's still a bit disheartening to not even get a few comments from people telling me that they really liked the sensuality of it, or that the concept was really interesting, or that they liked the humorous pop culture reference that I'd thrown in there, or SOMETHING.
I get it, the second story wouldn't really have fit the expectations of either the people finding it through that category or the small following that accumulated from my first story, being that it was a very different style, tone, setting, mood, relationship, presentation, everything. I didn't really expect it to do nearly as well as the first, but I would really have liked at least SOME feedback or interaction on it. Since then, I've found myself thinking 'which of these stories would be the least unexpected for people to see me post next?' And I know it's stupid. I should just post whatever I like and eventually the people who like my eclectic style will find and follow me, some people will only read a subset of what I post, and still others will avoid my unpredictable chaos entirely, and that's all okay. The self-doubt is also really less about 'what would people like' and more about 'what would I MYSELF like to see next if I were just a following myself as a writer and not actually me?' It leads to me jumping around between the different works in progress, doing little bits on each, but never really making solid progress, because all of them feel like the 'wrong' one to be working on next.
5. Difficulty Channeling Alternate Personalities. In truth, this one is less being trapped by the breadth of my own imagination and more one of the few areas where I wish I could expand it further. I'm not so easily able to write characters with differing personalities, so it kind of all comes back to how I would respond were I that character in that situation with those experiences and that backstory. I find believable dialogue challenging. I once managed to get into a mode where I really got into a groove channeling an extremely flirtatious, outgoing, and (in my opinion) witty and charming woman and actually found myself kind of falling in love with her before I realized that the mood didn't really work for the story I had been trying to tell and had to dial her back. And maybe I'll bring her back in some other story, but the point is that I don't really know how to intentionally get into a different personality mode, or how to do a variety of them. It seems like writers really do need to learn how to be several different people all at the same time. Perhaps I should sign up for a beginner's acting class or something...
Overall, I'm finding writing to be a lot more complicated than I had initially expected. Definitely enjoyable, and definitely providing the additional outlet for self-exploration that I so desperately needed in my life, but complicated all the same. So I've been wondering if anyone else has encountered any of these challenges, and if they have any strategies for overcoming them? Thanks.
I've been itching get at least ONE more of them done and posted sometime soon, and I just haven't been able to. There are a number of reasons for this:
1. Sequel Syndrome. I'm having trouble avoiding that thing where, halfway through a story that I had originally intended as a one-off, I start getting a bunch of ideas for sequels. So I take notes on them, and then don't want to finalize certain scenes in the first installment until I know where the sequel is going to be headed so that I make sure to avoid inconsistencies.
2. Fear of Commitment. Similar problem with the stories that I HAVE planned as multiple parts. I have plans for an ongoing I/T saga with a VERY slow buildup where the siblings don't even broach the topic of their relationship anywhere outside of their own minds until the fourth or fifth installment. I've more or less finished at least two or three installments (still with plenty of, what I hope are, steamy masturbation scenes), but I don't want to edit and post them yet, because in incest stories, I find the hardest part to make believable to be the part where they actually cross the line from thought to action. Until I have at least that much done and I'm sure I'm satisfied with how the narrative flows in that moment, I'm afraid to commit to setting any of the prior story points in stone, in case some subtle change to some earlier detail would make the mood or motivations when they finally get there more believable. Once they cross that line, continuing to explore will be easier, and depend less on what came before or how they got there. Which brings me to my next point:
3. Variety, but having to get there first. Not all of my stories are incest stories, but a large percentage are, and those definitely need to start the relationship from scratch. I tend to prefer incest stories where at least one, if not both, of the siblings start off much more innocent and inexperienced, and then they learn, grow, and explore their sexualities together. On the other hand, one of my top priorities in a story is believability. You can't take characters who have rarely, if ever, had sex before and suddenly throw them into fetishey, kinky, wild crazy monkey sex without developing that comfort and confidence with both themselves and with each other.
Yes, I want to go in a different direction with each of those stories and have a LOT of ideas for sex acts, positions, contexts, and even fetishes to explore, but they have to build up to it naturally. I find that the 'first time' stories, even good first time stories, are all generally pretty similar in mood and tone. At least, the first time stories that I find myself able to write believably are. And one can only write phrases such as "tentatively placed her hand directly on the rigid flesh of his bare cock" or "cautiously let his tongue slide out from between his lips to explore between her folds" or "never imagined it could feel this good, especially not with her own brother" so many times before it starts feeling repetitive and samey.
4. Balancing similar-but-different with variety. Okay, so I like a LOT of different kinds of sex. Different moods, different speeds, different contexts. The first story I posted is a slow build up, third-person, I/T piece set in the 70s with a loving brother emotionally supporting a distraught sister. A bit of a twist reveal about why she's struggled so much leads to some pretty gentle and extremely romantic sex. It got 40k views and 20 comments in the first week (up to 50k and 35 now) and never had its rating drop below I think a 4.56 at the lowest.
The other story I posted was more of a quick intro to the character's sexual history and then get right into it, first-person, piece, with much less specific chronological anchoring, and a fight with make-up sex that veers just slightly toward the aggressive and vindictive side. It's in the BDSM category, though only because that's where it fit best. It isn't really the typical fare that you would find under that heading. That one got only a couple thousand views in the first week, STILL has zero comments, and only managed to finally scrape itself up above a 4.5 rating this past week, when it's seen a small uptick in viewership.
While it's true that I made the conscious decision, when I started writing, that I would be writing the stories that I myself would want to read and wouldn't make narrative decisions based on what might be more popular, it's still a bit disheartening to not even get a few comments from people telling me that they really liked the sensuality of it, or that the concept was really interesting, or that they liked the humorous pop culture reference that I'd thrown in there, or SOMETHING.
I get it, the second story wouldn't really have fit the expectations of either the people finding it through that category or the small following that accumulated from my first story, being that it was a very different style, tone, setting, mood, relationship, presentation, everything. I didn't really expect it to do nearly as well as the first, but I would really have liked at least SOME feedback or interaction on it. Since then, I've found myself thinking 'which of these stories would be the least unexpected for people to see me post next?' And I know it's stupid. I should just post whatever I like and eventually the people who like my eclectic style will find and follow me, some people will only read a subset of what I post, and still others will avoid my unpredictable chaos entirely, and that's all okay. The self-doubt is also really less about 'what would people like' and more about 'what would I MYSELF like to see next if I were just a following myself as a writer and not actually me?' It leads to me jumping around between the different works in progress, doing little bits on each, but never really making solid progress, because all of them feel like the 'wrong' one to be working on next.
5. Difficulty Channeling Alternate Personalities. In truth, this one is less being trapped by the breadth of my own imagination and more one of the few areas where I wish I could expand it further. I'm not so easily able to write characters with differing personalities, so it kind of all comes back to how I would respond were I that character in that situation with those experiences and that backstory. I find believable dialogue challenging. I once managed to get into a mode where I really got into a groove channeling an extremely flirtatious, outgoing, and (in my opinion) witty and charming woman and actually found myself kind of falling in love with her before I realized that the mood didn't really work for the story I had been trying to tell and had to dial her back. And maybe I'll bring her back in some other story, but the point is that I don't really know how to intentionally get into a different personality mode, or how to do a variety of them. It seems like writers really do need to learn how to be several different people all at the same time. Perhaps I should sign up for a beginner's acting class or something...
Overall, I'm finding writing to be a lot more complicated than I had initially expected. Definitely enjoyable, and definitely providing the additional outlet for self-exploration that I so desperately needed in my life, but complicated all the same. So I've been wondering if anyone else has encountered any of these challenges, and if they have any strategies for overcoming them? Thanks.
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