You are unique–just like everybody else

I have been working on the snowflake outline for my screenplay. It’s helping. A lot. I have found holes, which I have filled. I have found out things about my characters I didn’t know that I needed to know. I still have a ways to go in this outlining process, but I feel much better about things. I think that, when I sit down to write it, I will be writing the story I’ve wanted to tell all along, as opposed to going off on dead-end side tangents.

I realized on Saturday one of the best benefits of this outlining thing. In the past, I’ve come up with great ideas and written them out and only then realized they don’t fit in with the story I’m trying to tell. With working in a structured way, I am still coming up with great ideas, but they are ideas that fit within the story I’m already crafting. One of the greatest fears authors have, or at least that I’ve had, about outlining is that it will stunt the creative juices. If you do it right (or right for you, whichever way that is), it just helps to channel those juices.

And who doesn’t love juice?