Thread by @BowTieWriter

So I talk a LOT about iteration. @jennlyonsauthor and I have geeked out before out how agile development has influenced our process.

I want to talk about something else important too that's not just iteration...

Just tryin shit.

I'm not being a smartass either. Let me explain.

A lot of people use the language "fail often."
I don't really like that framing, especially because half the time what they really mean is "iterate your process rapidly." That's not failing, that's systematic experimentation.

Here when I say "just try shit" I don't mean on the process level, I mean on the "wtf do I want to produce level?"

I realized this with my video work, actually.

Part of making daily videos is I am forced to just TRY SHIT every. Single. Day. I try different things. I try new things. Some of them work really great, and some end up being a cluster that crashes my computer.

That's not process. That's what I tried to make.

So as creatives, don't just lock yourself in to going "I'm a SFF fantasy writer."

Feel free to try MG, or mystery, or screenwriting, or whatever else you want to try.

I'll be straight it's also a LOT easier for me - unagented, under no contracts - to say that than it is for my friends under a deadline. Completely true.

But for folks out there learning the ropes? You can try ANYTHING.

The other thing is that you don't HAVE to commit to writing a full book. TRY SHIT!

Want to try writing a romance novel? Spend two weeks pantsing a draft to see if you like the general tone of it.

Do you want to try writing some MASSIVE EPIC 400k monster?

Try shit! Spend two weeks worldbuilding and building up a giant outline to just see what it feels like.

Remember: the purpose of this experimentation IS NOT to see "if you're good at it."

The purpose is to see if you *like* it.

For videos, it's really easy for me to try shit in a day. That's a couple of hours. Not a big thing.

For novels obviously, which take hundreds of hours to write, I can't suggest you experiment by just bashing out a whole book.

But you can still experiment.

Lastly, all this talk about craft and honing your skills and how writing is important.

It's all so. So SERIOUS.
The other thing about experimentation is that it should be *fun*. It should be a chance to just, well, try shit. See if you enjoy it. Light stakes creating.

And maybe after this experimentation you end up going "Yep. Don't like that. Don't like that at all."

Not a thing. You like what you like.
But maybe you end up finding something you really enjoy that you didn't know before.

Yay!

Publishing as a career is a business, and you have to think about the business side of things.

But CREATING should be fun and should bring you joy. So if you experiment and you find some new joy? That's worth it.