@Fretum: I feel that hard – social media’s endless highlight reel is the perfect recipe for unrealistic expectations. Like, the “before” never makes it into the post, only the “look at me now” version. And yeah, it’s the same in writing – nobody posts the 17 discarded drafts or the week you wrote nothing because the plot just… stopped moving.
What you said about having a bank of already-written material to adapt – that’s kind of genius. It turns “blank page” panic into “okay, what fits here?” instead of starting from zero. Do you ever feel like that speed and structure from your professional writing leaks into your free writing – like you catch yourself setting imaginary guidelines even when you don’t need to?
Also, that bit about reading a lot for your job – does that make you more critical of your own sentences, or does it loosen you up because you’ve seen so many different styles work in their own way?
Exactly. That's why many people think it's so easy, that you don't have to invest a lot of time and resources, that everything happens quickly and easily... until you realise that it's not that simple after all. Then many people despair, or they stick with it and believe that they can achieve success with little effort. You can see that in their stories, or they simply have no chance of being accepted by a publisher.
Yes, writing is certainly influenced. I find it difficult to write freely and really get creative. I have clear structures and if I'm not careful, I squeeze everything into these structures. Because I write more professionally, everything tends to go in that direction. Certainly not the best structure for a novel.
At work, I don't really care, because it's about the content, and the faster and more accurately I get it, the better for me. There's no need for sentences that go across the whole page. I don't see myself as a literary critic either; all I can say is whether I like a style or not. And everyone has their favourite authors and authors they can't stand. No matter how good a story is, if you don't like the writing style, you just don't read the books. At least that's how it is for me.