There are some phrases that I tend to overuse when I write. Normally I fix them up later but it took a while for me to realise just how much I use them … in the one piece!

The phrases are:

• “for a while” or “for a moment”
• “a little” or “a little bit”

I think this happens because I haven’t developed many creative ways to describe a brief pause whilst a character is either taken aback, shocked, thinking of a lie or just processing. Usually the phrases are also preceded by other phrases/actions I sort of also overuse: “they blinked”, “they paused” or “they just stared”. It’s such a small action that I don’t know how to capture otherwise. It might also be due to my brain functioning that way, I do pause a lot before a response or just after someone’s said something and it’s not usually because I want to. I tend to use “for a while” when I want to time something longer than “a moment” but shorted than ten minutes and don’t want to make it janky by saying something like “for seven minutes” (¬_¬”)

So it’s got me thinking: how do I convey “a moment” without using the words “a moment”.

I don’t have a hard time describing a snapshot of a scene, but when it’s active dialogue that has a moment of pause—and it might be a little more dramatic than reality—I seem to fumble with keeping the pace without using the frequent phrases (๑﹏๑//)

My “a little” is so bad that I can’t stand finding it in my writing anymore. I’ve literally used it already in this post. I think this one is mostly just a vocabulary issue. I have an idea of a variation of an emotion I’m writing and can’t put my find on the variation and so just water down the emotion I’m thinking of, like “a little sad” instead of something like “dispirited”. I start thinking ‘well they’re not really discouraged or demotivated, they’re hurt but not so much that it’s what people might think if I use “sad” or “upset”‘. And I think that line of thought is me taking words too literally and trying too hard to control what is being conveyed to readers. I seem to have a “0 to 100” idea about emotions when it comes to writing and I’m not currently sure why? (°~°)

While editing Rini & Butler right now, I’m now using these as immediate flag points for improvement and an opportunity to build on my vocabulary and writing skill. 

As I’m writing this and reflecting on it, it seems so bizarre as a problem to have. 

Disheartened. That’s the word I was thinking of for “a little sad”. I was also thinking of “down”, but there’s something always so weird about the phrase “feeling down” being used when not in an early readers book. So many words in the spectrum of sadness that start with D … disheartened, down, dispirited, depressed, discouraged …

I think I need to print off one of those emotion wheels and use it whenever I come across “a little”. I think it will help me to expand my vocabulary and add more flavour to my writing whilst also tacking the repetitive issue ദ്ദി ˉ͈̀꒳ˉ͈́ )✧

Speaking of repetition, I also use “I think” A LOT. Go back and count how many times I’ve already used this. I think … I am wondering if it has a lot to do with my unsure nature. I’m working on my self-confidence and the assertiveness of my writing as a way to tackle the “I think”. It seems to be a way to water down what I’m writing. Rather than saying “this is how it is” with confidence, I remove what feels like “cockiness” by saying “I think this is how it is”. This probably also has a lot to do with children making fun of me for being a “know-it-all” in school. It got to the point where I would pretend—I unfortunately still do this today sometimes—that I didn’t know the answer to something or conveyed doubt in my answer with it (when I was sure of it).

How wild is it that as I unravel odd things that I want to change it seems to always tie back to some kind of trauma. This is sarcasm by the way. I mean, it catches me off guard when I haven’t already delved into the reasoning behind my behaviour but I’m old enough, and have grown enough, to know that a lot of the little things about me that I don’t like but don’t quite know how it got there can be traced back to not very nice things happening to me as a child. If you had asked me a few years ago if I thought I would find therapy in writing beyond being able to escape reality, I wouldn’t even know what to think. It amusing how noticing that I overuse phrases can lead to a thread that affects me in many other aspects of life.

We truly are fascinating creatures ( •͈૦•͈ )