“There is no such thing as great writing, only great rewriting.”

Robert Graves

It has been said that Ernest Hemingway rewrote the final chapter of “Farewell to Arms” 39 times before he found it acceptable. 39 times! If it is that hard for a Nobel prize winning author, it is going to hard for the rest of us. That is good news because it means that when you find it hard to write, you are in great company.

The truth is writing is hard. Hard for everyone. So when you are struggling to get the words down or get them right take great consolation that you are in great company. The most important thing is to just keep doing the work. Put the words down. Understand that they will not be perfect when you write them for the first time. This is perfectly normal. This is part of the process. 

You need to find the method that works for you. Maybe you write a page in a stream of consciousness and then new page gets better and the third page is even better. May be you write a page one day and rewrite it the next day. Maybe you write three pages and then go back and do some editing. It will take trial and error to get your method right. But understand that writing is not an easy process and even the greatest writers of all time have to edit and rewrite their own work.