Turn Your Papercut into a Novel

Sometimes life is frustrating. If you’re a writer, this can be a good thing and a bad thing. Obviously, frustrations are…well, frustrating. On the positive side, they are a great thing to write about. Your main character has to have something standing in his way, and you may as well get some use out of your own frustrations to deepen the struggles of your hero or heroine.

“But my main character has to go fight a dragon, and I can’t even find time to write?” you may be shouting.

In that case, save up your frustration about not having time and pour it into your mental character development for your character. Let’s say he’s a knight and has to kill a dragon, as in the above example. From now on, your frustration about lack of time IS the dragon to be slain.

Frustration = dragon.

If you find 5 minutes to write, it equals your hero finding something little to help him on his quest, such as a tip about the dragon or maybe a little confidence to go on. Use symbolism with your own struggles to make his seem more real. Yeah, I know it seems cheesy, but it works. The weird part about it is that you’re using all that English class symbolism you learned in high school literature; each piece of your story becomes a symbol for something in your life.

Here are a few more examples.

Time to write = dragon

evil sorcerer guy = job you don’t like

stitch in side = annoying person at work/school

paper cut = scar from dragon battle

Literally everything in your life can be used to write an epic novel or story. It’s all in the symbolism.