lately, people have been asking "how do i write things for myself", so here's how i unlearned writing for other people!

1. step one for me was medication/therapy. without the stepping stone of having something approaching good mental health, i simply couldn't operate the way i wanted to, so please don't be down on yourself if nothing here works and you can't afford therapy and serotonin.

2. what fics are you thinking about when you lay in bed at night and try to quell your anxiety by imagining characters in love? what do you search for when you go on ao3? what do you get your hopes up for finding? that's what you love. write that.

3. cringe culture is dead. write the ships you want to write. if you want to write your favorite character railing your original character, fucking do it. write it for you: to get the words out, to see it in your head, to enjoy it, to reread it and grow from it.

4. never think, "i should alter this fic to be more acceptable/palatable". write what you want to write. if you love a fic, it shows, and other people will love it. if you're afraid to publish it for whatever reason, make a side ao3! anonymize it! whatever!

5. just because someone else "i hopes you do/don't do x in this fic" doesn't mean you have to do it. would it make them happy? yeah, and they'd forget about it in a day. would it make you happy? probably not, but you'll struggle with it for ages if you don't want to write it.

6. IF IT DOESN'T BRING YOU JOY, STOP WRITING IT. there's a difference between writer's block and hating something. learn the difference. swap fics to see if something else helps. talk about it with someone to see if you love it. you can force words; you can't force ideas.

7. remove kudos/comments/etc from the equation. do they feel nice? absolutely! but when i publish a fic, i do it for me -- i wrote a fic that i like, so i am allowing other people to enjoy it. it isn't for them, so i don't care if they like it.

8. if you love something you've written, it'll show. some of the fics i've thought would flop became some of my most well-received fics, and fics i thought would do really well because i tried to cater to people have absolutely flopped.

9. write for you. write for your own happiness. you have to love writing -- not posting, not getting feedback, not the serotonin boost of nice comments. you have to love writing, the actual words on paper. (this is much easier with good brain chemistry.)

10. write at YOUR PACE. if you want to take 4 months off until an idea hits you, that's FINE. no one is paying you, you're not disappointing anyone. take 4 months off, play video games, watch anime, until that perfect idea grabs you and makes you write 4 chapters in a week.

note that all of these steps work for me personally and may not work for you! they don't apply if you're writing for profit, obviously, and are only for fan works or passion projects. tldr sheer love is what allows me to write 13k fics in four days. love and giving 0 fucks

also PLEASE don't compare yourself to other people's speed, my writing speed has been carefully honed by writing for literally 20 years and i've ruined my wrists doing it, writing slower is JUST as valid!