3 Mindset Shifts Every Writer Needs to Finish Their Novel

You've got a story idea you're excited about. Maybe you've already started writing—a few chapters here, an outline there. Or maybe you've started the same novel three, five, or ten times, and each attempt stalls out somewhere around chapter three.

Either way, you're stuck. And you're starting to wonder if the problem is you.

Here's the thing: it's not.

After coaching hundreds of writers inside my Notes to Novel course, I've seen the same patterns over and over. The writers who finish their novels aren't more talented or more disciplined than the ones who don't. They just think about the drafting process differently.

Today I'm sharing three mindset shifts that will help you write forward instead of in circles—whether you're just getting started or you've got a folder full of abandoned drafts.

Shift #1: Embrace Progress Over Perfection

Your first draft has one job: to exist. Not to be beautiful. Not to be publishable. Just to exist on the page.

But most writers don't treat it that way. Instead, they write chapter one, decide it's not good enough, and revise it. Then revise it again. Maybe they tweak the dialogue, adjust the opening paragraph, do another pass on the prose. And then eventually—maybe—they feel okay enough to move on to chapter two.

As soon as they move forward, though, the same pattern pops up. That critical voice kicks in, saying this isn't good enough yet, and suddenly they're back at the beginning, polishing instead of progressing.

If that's you, take a breath. This instinct comes from a good place—you care deeply about your story, and you want to get it right. There's nothing wrong with that.

The problem isn't that you care. It's where you're putting that care in the process.

When you keep looping over your opening chapters trying to get them perfect, you're essentially trying to perfect a puzzle piece before you know what the final picture looks like. You don't yet have enough information to know what "good" actually means for this story.

You need a complete draft—beginning, middle, and end—before you can really see what's working, what's missing, and what needs to change.

One of my Notes to Novel students, Jenny, spent twelve years caught in this cycle. She'd write a few chapters, decide they weren't good enough, and start over. Again and again. She cared so much about getting it right that she couldn't move forward until her opening felt strong.

What finally changed? She gave herself permission to write a messy draft all the way through. And she finished her first draft in six months.

Was it perfect? No—first drafts never are. But it was real. And once it existed, she could finally see what was actually on the page instead of what she imagined might be there. The clarity she'd been chasing for over a decade came from finishing, not from perfecting those first few chapters.

So here's your mantra for this stage: progress before perfection. Forward movement before beautiful prose. Get the story down first. You can make it good later.

Shift #2: Choose Action Over Analysis

Let me ask you something slightly uncomfortable. How many writing craft books are on your shelf right now? How many podcasts about writing are in your queue? How many workshops or courses have you taken?

Now, how many words did you write last week?

If there's a big gap there, you're not alone. When you care about your story and want to get it right, it feels productive to keep learning. One more craft book. One more plotting method. One more bit of preparation before you're really ready to start.

But here's the truth: at a certain point, all that studying becomes fear in disguise—a way to stay safe from the messy, vulnerable act of putting words on the page.

Liz, another Notes to Novel student, spent almost ten years in this cycle. She'd get excited about an idea, write a few chapters, start to doubt herself, and retreat into learning mode—thinking, Maybe I'm missing something about structure. Maybe I just need to find the right outlining system.

She genuinely wanted to understand story structure before she began—she thought that was her biggest problem. So she absorbed everything she could find: podcasts, craft books, workshops. But every time she sat down to write, she still felt stuck.

Of course she did—because reading about writing and actually writing aren't the same skill. It's like trying to learn to swim by only reading about swimming. At some point, you have to get in the water—and when you do, it's going to feel awkward and splashy and imperfect, no matter how many books you've read about the perfect freestyle stroke.

When Liz finally shifted from analysis to action, she didn't stop learning completely. She just flipped the ratio. Her default became doing, not researching.

She created a simple scene-by-scene outline—nothing fancy, just a list of what happens from beginning to end. She treated it as a starting point, not a contract. And she committed to showing up to write three days a week, even when she didn't feel ready.

The momentum she'd been chasing for a decade didn't come from the next craft book. It came from putting words on the page and being willing to learn inside the work.

Here's what I want you to remember: courage comes before confidence. You're not going to feel perfectly ready before you start. Confidence grows because you've taken action—it's not something you wait for before you begin.

Shift #3: Trust the Layered Nature of Storytelling

This might be the most important shift of all, because it changes how you think about the entire writing process.

One of the biggest sources of overwhelm I see is when writers try to do everything at once. They're thinking about plot and prose and character development and worldbuilding and theme and pacing—all at the same time, on the sentence level.

If that's you, of course you feel overwhelmed! That's way too much for any brain to hold at once.

Here's what I want you to understand: stories aren't written in one perfect pass. They're built in layers—kind of like building a house.

You wouldn't pick out paint colors while you're still digging the foundation. You wouldn't stress about crown molding before the walls are up. There's a natural order—foundation first, then framing, then walls and roof, then finishes.

Writing a novel works the same way.

• Layer one is your foundation. This is where you figure out the core elements: your genre, your protagonist, what they want, the central conflict, and the big turning points. You're not writing polished prose yet—you're discovering the story you actually want to tell.
• Layer two is your structure. Once you have that foundation, you map out how the story unfolds from beginning to end. You're making decisions about order and cause-and-effect: this happens, which leads to that, which forces this choice.
• Layer three is your draft. Now you write. And because you've done the foundation and structure work, you're not just wandering around on the page hoping it all comes together. You have a roadmap. You know what each scene is building toward.

Julia, a Notes to Novel student, came in after years of trying to juggle all these elements at once. She'd draft a scene, then immediately revise the prose, then try to fix the character arc, then tweak the worldbuilding—all in the same pass. She felt like she was constantly rewriting the first half of her book and never reaching the end.

The turning point came when she decided to trust the layered nature of storytelling. She went back to the foundation first—clarified her character's want and need, nailed down the central conflict, got clear on the big plot points. Then she built a simple structure. Only then did she draft.

And when she did, she stopped trying to make the sentences beautiful and the theme profound and the world perfectly detailed all at the same time. She let herself focus on one job per layer.

The result? She finished in four months, after years of being stuck. Not because she became more talented, but because she stopped asking one pass to do the job of five.

Your Path Forward

All three of these shifts address the same core problem from different angles: most writers are trying to write their final book on their first pass.

This shows up in different ways.

• When you loop endlessly on chapter one, you're trying to make it final-book-quality before you know what the final book needs.
• When you stay in learning mode instead of writing mode, you're trying to understand everything perfectly before you allow yourself to make mistakes.
• When you juggle plot and prose and theme all at once, you're trying to write a finished, polished novel in a single draft.

But writing a novel isn't a linear process—it's an iterative one. You make decisions, test them, see what works, adjust. You can only do that if you have something to work with. And that something is a complete draft.

You don't need to master all three shifts this week. Just pick one—whichever hit you hardest—and focus there.

• If perfectionism is slowing you down, commit to writing forward without editing for one week. Set a goal (five scenes, a certain word count) and don't go back until you hit it.
• If you're stuck in learning mode, set a boundary around craft consumption. For every podcast episode you listen to, write for at least twenty minutes.
• If you're trying to juggle everything at once, give yourself permission to step back into the foundation layer. Spend a few days getting clear on your protagonist, their goal, and the core shape of your story before you draft another word.

The point isn't to become a perfect writer overnight—perfect writers don't exist. The point is to start relating to the drafting process in a way that actually gets you to the end.

Ready to finally finish that novel you've been thinking about for years? My Notes to Novel course shows you exactly how to brainstorm, outline, and write your complete first draft using the same layered approach I talked about today. No more false starts, no more getting stuck in the messy middle, just a clear, proven process that actually works. Enrollment opens very soon, so click here to get on the waitlist now and be first in line when doors open!