You’ve set your word count goals. You’ve mapped out an outline. You’ve even created some character profiles. You’re all set to crush your first draft in a matter of months, nay, weeks! You’re five, maybe even ten chapters in.

And . . . you’re stuck. Stuck like Buttercup in the Fire Swamp’s quicksand, with no Westley to save you. That plot that looked so shiny in your nicely organized outline is growing holes faster than you can fill them. Your main character, so perfectly realized in your head, is now doing things you never agreed to, and it’s changing her whole arc. You’re about five minutes away from just pressing delete and starting over.

Don’t press that button just yet!

Part of the fun (and aggravation) of writing a first draft is that it’s not supposed to be perfect. The first draft is when you explore your world for the first time, discovering new things along the way. Sure, you may have a map that tells you the general direction you should be heading in, but don’t let that stop you from taking a few detours. If you ask most published writers, they’ll tell you their first drafts often look nothing like their final book. It’s a time of discovery and wonder. But, if you’re trying hard to meet a goal, it can also be a time of great frustration when that plot hole opens up right in front of you.

That’s why we’ve come up with three surefire tricks to keep the momentum of your first draft going.

While there are a chosen few among us who can write a first draft in perfect, sequential order, many of us will need to jump around. For instance, I usually write my final chapters immediately after writing my beginning chapters. It helps to keep me focused and gives me a light at the end of the tunnel to write toward.

I know another writer who writes the scene she is most inspired to write that day. That scene may be the next in her outline, it may be in the middle, or it may not even be in her plan right now. She still writes it, and often she’ll end up using the scene, even if it wasn’t in her original plan. Even if she doesn’t use it for that draft, she has a nice collection of scenes to use in other works.

The point is, don’t force yourself to push through to the next chapter if the inspiration isn’t there. It’s not worth it. Often, if you’re not feeling the words, your reader won’t either. So, if you’re stuck in a plot hole or you don’t know where you should take your character next, skip ahead! You may find the answer as you’re writing those later chapters.

And, if inspiration strikes you for a scene you’ve never planned for, go with it! You might use the scene or you might not, but it’s always good to capture that inspiration right as it strikes.

Sometimes, you get so stuck in the plot weeds, you can’t even see the later chapters ahead. You don’t know what your characters should be doing, and you’re lost. That’s the time to turn to freewriting…with a twist. Find a prompt, but instead of just creating a new character and scenario, use your existing characters.

By putting your characters in an unfamiliar situation (and, sometimes, even an unfamiliar world), you start to understand how they react. Perhaps your awesome mercenary warrior isn’t really kicking butt in your fight scenes. The words are there, and the actions are there, but it’s reading flat. You use her to write to a prompt about her dream job in the modern world, and the idea just pops out. Her dream job is to be a corporate strategist, managing million-dollar takeovers. You realize the reason she’s not kicking butt is because she’s not a front-lines type of fighter. She’s a strategist, a general. You pull her back and have her make battle plans, and the scene suddenly sings.

Don’t get stuck thinking that you have to write directly from your outline. Exercises like prompt-writing, even if they never make it to your book, can be powerful tools of character discovery and inspiration.

I know, I know, this is the hardest one. If I was hooked up to some sort of torture device that shocked me every time I edited as I wrote my last first draft, I’d look like this:

Especially if you’re a perfectionist, writing a first draft can be painful. There’s usually passive voice everywhere, inconsistencies, and enough typos to make your head spin. Don’t. Fix it. You’ll get trapped in the endless cycle of wordsmithing sentences that you may very well cut in your next revision, instead of pushing forward.

If you’re like me and re-read your previous chapter before writing a new one, seeing those errors can make your fingers twitch. Just remind yourself that the first draft is for getting words on the page. That’s it. It’s not for crafting a perfect sentence. It’s not for writing a metaphor so beautiful it makes you cry. It’s for getting the basics on the page, so you have the material to work with for your revisions. A perfect first draft is like a unicorn. It’s a beautiful idea, but if you spend your time chasing it, you’re going to lose your way (and possibly get stabbed by a pointy horn). So, put the red pen down, nice and slow.

First drafts are often the hardest to write, because there are so many unknowns. But, if you use these three tricks, you’ll be well on your way to a not-perfect, not-beautiful, but finished first draft. Happy writing!