Picked the digital planner over paper for my novel outline and it actually worked out

I was stuck on chapter 4 of this fantasy thing I've been pecking at for months. Could not figure out where the plot was going. So I had this choice: buy a nice leather journal and try the old-school bullet journal method, or dump it all into a Scrivener template. I went with the digital option because I hate my own handwriting. 3 days later I had the whole second act mapped out. The corkboard view just clicked for me. Has anyone else had a tool choice totally unlock a story block?

3 comments

3 Comments

charlescraig1mo ago

Tool choice? Yeah I guess. But it's just an outline. You could've drawn it on napkins and gotten the same result if the story was ready to come out. People overthink this stuff. Three days of work is three days of work no matter what you type it into.

michael6691mo ago

Tried something similar a while back with a short story. Spent like a week outlining in this fancy app with all the bells and whistles. Then one day my laptop died and I just grabbed a notebook and a pen. Finished the whole outline in two hours flat. The app stuff just got in my way honestly. Sometimes the extra options make you think you're being productive when you're really just fiddling around with settings. Did you ever try going back to paper just to see if it changes anything for you?

paige3311mo ago

Michael over here living in 2005 with his napkin outlines.