Monday, April 23, 2018

Fanfic & Sims: The Importance of Playing Around

It's a common experience for a lot of writers, myself included, to go through frustrating periods of low motivation, low creativity, and general apathy toward writing. It happens. It's not a bad thing, and it doesn't make anyone a poor writer, but it can feel like a total soul-suck.

I could feel myself starting to go through one of those periods awhile back, when all I wanted to do was play video games and not think about anything--much less my own stories. So I did, and fell further into a pit of frustration because now I felt guilty for not writing when I clearly had the time.

But working on my original content still felt like pulling teeth.

I think it was my boyfriend who first suggested I start writing fanfic. I've been playing Skyrim since it came out, and in that time I've developed a lot of headcanons, and after awhile those headcanons began to develop into a coherent narrative surrounding mine, my wife's, and my boyfriend's OCs.

So in the downtime at work one day, I started scribbling down the beginnings of what is now Triumvirate--which I'm still enjoying and updating over a year later. I've also written two other Skyrim fanfics, Prophecy's End and Speak to Me Now and the World Will Crumble. I'm immensely proud of them, and they keep me feeling excited about writing even when it's hard to figure out what to do in my own original universes.


Fanfic writers have always told me that fanfic keeps them feeling creative even when OC is hard, but I never really thought it would work for me. I was definitely wrong. I don't feel like I'm neglecting my writing with fanfic, I still feel like I'm producing something worthwhile--because I absolutely am. Sometimes it's hard to feel passionate about my original worlds, but I am never--ever--not going to be passionate about Tamriel.

Another thing in a similar vein that's helped me keep creative even through slumps is the Sims fandom on tumblr, known as Simblr. Since The Sims is essentially a massive dollhouse for people to plop original characters, it's become common practice for Simmers to post screenshots of their games along with captions telling stories. Sometimes they're just simple one-off scenes, sometimes the stories go on for months or longer.

The stories I've been telling on my Simblr, while simple, have been a lot of fun, and keep Sims from becoming a mindless time-eater that leaves me feeling guilty over not doing anything creative. But at the same time, it's still endless fun and doesn't feel like a chore, the way writing can sometimes feel.


At the end of the day, for me, the fanfiction and Sims stories are worthwhile on their own, but they also leave me feeling inspired and pumped up to work on original content. So when it comes time to sit down and bang out my daily goal of 500 words, it's not as much of a struggle.

"Just writing anyway" has never helped me break through creative slumps. "If you don't write, you'll never publish anything" just makes me anxious. But the "frivolous," "silly" projects? They keep me going. It doesn't matter if it's not wholly original, it doesn't matter if I can't sell it, it doesn't matter if it's not "groundbreaking." It's fun free writing, born out of something I genuinely care about.

And if the comments I keep getting on both are anything to go by, having fun has made my writing stronger.

Until next time,
Jenn.

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