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Pick one recipe and start; if it doesn’t work, switch and keep moving.

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Ask yourself:

• What recipes have moved me to write in the past? Might one be helpful here?
• How can I make this writing task more interesting?
• How can I make it more challenging?
• How can I introduce more novelty into my writing tasks?
• How can I make this feel more urgent?

So, when you feel stuck and can’t start your writing, you can refer to your simple ingredients list of Interest, Challenge, Novelty, and Urgency. Then, ask yourself what recipe or individual ingredient you might use to move forward.

When a recipe doesn’t work, we try something else, maybe returning to the original recipe at a different time. Of course, I’m fond of returning to test the buttered pecan ice cream reward, but I hope you’ll make better choices.

And because our brains seek novelty and challenge, we can expect our opened ingredients to have an expiration date. But, like with any writing task, we’re looking for recipes that will work for now.

It’s important to note that these suggestions are far from an exhaustive list. And these writing initiation recipes won’t always work. No strategy will eliminate the need to revise your work. Recipes sometimes fail.

We'll wrap things up in the next post.

• Find a writing competition with a rigid application timeline and pre-pay the application fee.
• Schedule to pitch your project to an agent at an upcoming writers’ conference, knowing that if they ask to see your manuscript, you’ll need to produce it immediately or lose a publishing opportunity.

Ask yourself, how can I create revision deadlines that feel imminent? You could:

• Hire and prepay an editor with specific submission dates and times.
• Join a critique group with regularly scheduled meetings and eagerly waiting readers.

* Commit to texting a willing friend every time you revise for a full fifteen minutes

The next post will look at the final component — urgency.

You could:

* Set a timer and try to complete the revision of a scene in under twenty minutes.
* Race a fellow writer online or at a local meet-up to see who could complete a chapter revision the fastest.
* Read your manuscript backward to look for line edits, punctuation, and word choice.

* Try doing a full editing pass through the manuscript, evaluating and correcting one character’s arc and dialog at a time.
* Edit only for essential story elements scene by scene.
* Work through the revisions process with an editor or fellow writer.

Next up: challenge!

* Try a systematic editing process, such as eliminating all the chapters, scenes, and sentences you know you won’t use in your final manuscript. Then, and only then, might you fill in the missing content.

Some ideas might be:

* Try working in a new setting or location. If you can afford it, book yourself a writing retreat. If not, try writing in a coffee shop, a rented workspace, a picnic table at a park, or even moving your desk or writing spot to a new location in the room.

If your interest in the project isn’t enough to initiate action, ask yourself if there are ways to make revisions more novel. Our brains, especially ADHD ones, are always looking for novelty. Some ideas you come up with might seem silly at first, but they may be just what you need to get started.

In the next post, we'll look at novelty.

And if so…

* Do you have the kind of time and energy it takes to force yourself through completion of a project that doesn’t align with your interests?
* Why would you? What’s the payoff?
* Is it worth the blood, sweat, and anxiety?
* Which project would really get you excited about writing?