Not turned on by my own stuff?

[Sinisterinfant]

Is it weird to not get aroused by my own material? I've been editing a piece lately and realized I just don't get excited the way I do when I read what other people wrote. Could be because by the time I sit down to write i've run threw it a few times and after its finished who knows how many times I've looked at the same words. This latest piece though is almost entirely one long sex scene and I just realized I wasn't turned on at all. I showed it to someone who proof reads for me and she said I'm still up to the usual standard. Not sure why its bothering me all of a sudden.

 

[sr71plt]

You should only write if you're enjoying it unless you're trying to do for a living. Try laying off for a while. If you're meant to write, you'll be drawn back to it.

 

[Sinisterinfant]

I'm totally enjoying it. I mean the writing I'm doing on the site is the most fun I've had in years. I just don't feel frisky when I'm doing it. I guess I assumed a normal person would get aroused when they write about sex and I don't.

 

[sr71plt]

Well, OK, then. Don't know what you expect anyone here to do about it, though.

 

[oggbashan]

I'm totally enjoying it. I mean the writing I'm doing on the site is the most fun I've had in years. I just don't feel frisky when I'm doing it. I guess I assumed a normal person would get aroused when they write about sex and I don't.

Not necessarily. You might get aroused by the initial idea, but the mechanics of writing the story, while they could be enjoyable, are not likely to be arousing. By the time you get to the final edit you could be bored of the whole thing.

Wait five years after posting it. If it arouses you then, you wrote a good story.

 

[TxRad]

Not necessarily. You might get aroused by the initial idea, but the mechanics of writing the story, while they could be enjoyable, are not likely to be arousing. By the time you get to the final edit you could be bored of the whole thing.

Wait five years after posting it. If it arouses you then, you wrote a good story.

You don't even have to wait that long. Just a few months will do most of the time.

 

[Desiremakesmeweak]

Yeah I read your recent chapter and you're being too good/decent of a writer...

You work seems to be science-fantasy or fantasy-romance with the mythic erotic scenes that are meant to be part of that 'saga-telling' sort of thing. I think?

Absolutely nothing wrong with what I read but I'm not sure you were really heading for the 'porn' elements as the major part of the story. If that's what you meant by 'turned on...' If you 'only' meant was the storytelling good enough it was very good enough so far.

Did you mean the hot sex turn-on stuff, or the general writing?

 

[PennLady]

Not necessarily. You might get aroused by the initial idea, but the mechanics of writing the story, while they could be enjoyable, are not likely to be arousing. By the time you get to the final edit you could be bored of the whole thing.

Wait five years after posting it. If it arouses you then, you wrote a good story.

I was discussing this with my beta reader not long ago. When you're focused on writing the sex, finding the right words, putting them together in the right order, etc., then it's not so exciting. Which doesn't mean it's not exciting, just that putting it together can often take the arousing factor out, or at least dampen it.

 

[StrangeLife]

Most authors write better stories when they're not aroused anyway.

At least that's my assumption. Of course I have no way of actually knowing whether or not some of our top writers are rolling around in a raging orgastic ecstasy while penning their greatest works, but I doubt it. There are certain technical aspects to composing a good story and that doesn't go well with high levels of arousal.

 

[Desiremakesmeweak]

Hmn...

Not being aroused in order to write an arousing story...? Not sure that's exactly right...

Couldn't really say for absolute certain, myself, because I can never remember having written the thing once I read it again!!

In any case I'm always taking off based on some aspect or element of some real event or person I know that definitely WAS or still IS arousing, so you can count me out of the cold dispassionate objective technical narrator team!

 

[Sinisterinfant]

Yeah I read your recent chapter and you're being too good/decent of a writer...

You work seems to be science-fantasy or fantasy-romance with the mythic erotic scenes that are meant to be part of that 'saga-telling' sort of thing. I think?

Absolutely nothing wrong with what I read but I'm not sure you were really heading for the 'porn' elements as the major part of the story. If that's what you meant by 'turned on...' If you 'only' meant was the storytelling good enough it was very good enough so far.

Did you mean the hot sex turn-on stuff, or the general writing?

Yeah I think you got me. The sex is secondary to my story for sure. In that latest chapter especially it was difficult to even find a place for something sex related. Although the one I just submitted is like all sex. It's weird. I'm not sure if I want people to get off on my story, cause that's the focus of the site and I assume the audience, or just enjoy the story, which is what I enjoy. Any way thanks for the responses.

 

[49greg]

Not necessarily. You might get aroused by the initial idea, but the mechanics of writing the story, while they could be enjoyable, are not likely to be arousing. By the time you get to the final edit you could be bored of the whole thing.

Wait five years after posting it. If it arouses you then, you wrote a good story.

I agree with this, it seems to be how it works for me. I get turned on by the idea, love it, jot down a few basics. I usually still get turned on thinking about it at this stage. But normally by the time I've gone through the mechanics of putting words together, proofing, writing some more, proofing it, correcting etc., it just doesn't seem so sexy to me.

Especially if I take several weeks or months to write it, reading over the story each time I open up the file to work on it does wear down the eroticism for me at some point.

However, a week or five after it's been posted, if I read it again it usually does turn me on.

One problem I do have that is similar, is that I get more ideas than I have time to write, and so I have a file with dozens of ideas that sounded oh so very good and erotic at the time. But there are some that when I go back and look at, just don't sound so good anymore. Those probably won't ever get turned into stories. I wonder how good they would have been if I had started on them right away.

 

[mikoli5763]

I wouldn't worry about it.

I don't get aroused when I write a story, or edit it after letting it sit for awhile, or even after its been posted and I go back and read it weeks or even months later contrary to what one commenter posted in one of my stories comment section. The original idea has sometimes gotten me aroused, but the writing and finished story have not.
I wouldn't worry about not getting aroused by your own stories. If you're still getting enjoyment from writing continue; to write. When the enjoyment is gone, then you have something to worry about.

 

[sr71plt]

It's almost always arousal at a story idea that sends me to the keyboard to begin with and I maintain a low level of arousal while I'm writing into it and a higher level of arousal while writing the sex scenes of it. If I'm not aroused in writing a story, it's usually because I haven't been able to get around to writing up a story for some time after conceptualizing it (although my brain has kept working with it). Then I may not be as aroused while writing it.

I'm also counter to most, I think, in that I add to a story in review rather than trim stuff from it. And often where I'm adding is to the sex scenes--so I get a second round of arousal from the story.

If I wasn't floating along on the buzz of arousal I wouldn't be writing an erotic story at all--I'd be writing something for the mainstream or editing something in the mainstream or reading or working in the yard or taking a drive in the mountains.

 

[SecondCircle]

I think at some point in your process, you should be turned on by what you've written. Doesn't matter if it's while you're actively writing the story. It could be the idea crafting process or reading back over the completed story. But at some point, it should do something for you.

I wouldn't write a drama that I myself didn't find dramatic at any time. I certainly wouldn't write a horror story if it didn't give me the chills. Doesn't matter when it does, but it needs to. If your emotions aren't touched by what you've written, why would the reader's?

 

[Stella_Omega]

Yeah I think you got me. The sex is secondary to my story for sure. In that latest chapter especially it was difficult to even find a place for something sex related. Although the one I just submitted is like all sex. It's weird. I'm not sure if I want people to get off on my story, cause that's the focus of the site and I assume the audience, or just enjoy the story, which is what I enjoy. Any way thanks for the responses.

That's someting I've battled with a lot. In novels at least, if the sex scene doesn't move the story forward in some way, it becomes bothersome. Same with any repeated action element, IMO-- after the tenth blow-by-blow description of boxing matches, who cares? You just want to know who fought, who won, and who threw the fight. The plot elements.
And then maybe, we want to read about how the fighters went home and fucked.

It's almost always arousal at a story idea that sends me to the keyboard to begin with and I maintain a low level of arousal while I'm writing into it and a higher level of arousal while writing the sex scenes of it. If I'm not aroused in writing a story, it's usually because I haven't been able to get around to writing up a story for some time after conceptualizing it (although my brain has kept working with it). Then I may not be as aroused while writing it.

I'm also counter to most, I think, in that I add to a story in review rather than trim stuff from it. And often where I'm adding is to the sex scenes--so I get a second round of arousal from the story.

If I wasn't floating along on the buzz of arousal I wouldn't be writing an erotic story at all--I'd be writing something for the mainstream or editing something in the mainstream or reading or working in the yard or taking a drive in the mountains.

You speak for me as well.

 

[JAMESBJOHNSON]

I just finished a new story where I have a good blend of sex and treachery involving sex. The sex doesn't turn me on tho the female character turned me on in real life, she was a hottie in many ways. What excites me is how solid the story is. Where to put it is the question. LW? Prolly.

 

[soflabbwlvr]

I get much more turned on when I'm adding ideas to my concept file. By the time I sit down to write a story it has gestated for months or years. Also, I only spend an hour or two a day writing, so by the time I get to the sex I have gone over it so many times in my head that it is no longer fresh. I find that having a porn video playing on another screen while I'm writing the sex scene helps to keep me in the moment.

 

[CPBaudelaire]

When I was writing my first story, for the sex scenes I would focus on what idea I thought was hot. I'd eventually get through the mechanics of the scene and by the time I was finished all the editing and proof-reading, I'd be pretty disengaged. I found this very disturbing at first and for a while, I thought that i just didn't have it in me to write that way.

It was only after I revisited the first couple of sex scenes I ever wrote after a couple of weeks layoff, that I realized that the "sizzle" was still there. So now, I put the juicy bits together and immediately move on. When I feel like it, I'll revisit. If it gets me revved up on re-reading, then I leave it alone. If my re-read reaction is "meh," then I cut it and try again.

 

[driphoney]

Not necessarily. You might get aroused by the initial idea, but the mechanics of writing the story, while they could be enjoyable, are not likely to be arousing. By the time you get to the final edit you could be bored of the whole thing.

Wait five years after posting it. If it arouses you then, you wrote a good story.

I’m no expert, but I think he’s right. For me, the fantasy is hot enough for me to want to recreate it, but the mechanics use a different part of the brain.

 

[robertreams]

The next time you are going to have sex with your significant other, stop and write ten pages about it first, then close read it, then edit it, thernproofread it, then write it agin, tehn copy and paste it, the. . .see what I mean? However, if you are writing porn or erotica, it should turn you on in first draft, it would seem. If not, maybe it is time to drift a little deeper into fantasy. works for me.

 

[HeyAll]

Nothing wrong with that.

Think of it as a movie director editing his movie. He already knows everything that happens because he's the one who filmed it. If he's making a suspense movie, he's not going to be surprised because he already knows what happens.

 

[49greg]

The next time you are going to have sex with your significant other, stop and write ten pages about it first, then close read it, then edit it, thernproofread it, then write it agin, tehn copy and paste it, the. . .see what I mean? However, if you are writing porn or erotica, it should turn you on in first draft, it would seem. If not, maybe it is time to drift a little deeper into fantasy. works for me.

Sort of on a tangent from the quoted post: I find that I can usually write better, get ideas quicker, write faster and generally do a better job when I haven't had sex for several days. Writing gets easier, and I think better, the longer I go without sex, either with myself or with my wife.

I've been kind of having a hard time writing the last few months.

 

[StrangeLife]

Sort of on a tangent from the quoted post: I find that I can usually write better, get ideas quicker, write faster and generally do a better job when I haven't had sex for several days. Writing gets easier, and I think better, the longer I go without sex, either with myself or with my wife.

I've been kind of having a hard time writing the last few months.

When you put it that way I suppose suffering a writers block ain't so bad after all...

 

[49greg]

I know I already posted that I don't usually get turned on by my stories after working on them for a while, but I did the other day. I'd been working on it for a while, and then went back and read it from the beginning "just one more time", and ... WOW! I had at least one scene that was pretty good. Go figure.

Didn't do anything for me when I did final re-reads looking for errors etc, or when I went over it the last time after pasting it into the submission form. But still. I hope someone else likes it when it gets posted.