I recently had a busy morning in which only had one hour to write. That’s probably more of the rule than the exception for me, so I didn’t sweat it too much, put my head down, and got to work.

Although I can usually write about 2,000 words in a typical hour session, in this one, my brain felt stuck. Each word was a struggle, each sentence a slog. I only ended up tallying about 500 words. That could have been fail number one.

Later on that same afternoon, while driving to pick up my kids from school, I had a major epiphany about the story I was working on. Unfortunately, this brain explosion let me know one major thing about the work that I completed that morning.

All of it—or nearly all of it—would need to be deleted.

That could have been fail number 2.

Winning, not failing

However, throughout the years, I’ve come to recognize such events in a completely different light than I did as a newer writer. (I say newer because, relatively speaking, I’m still new, aren’t I? Even several years into this twisted game we call being a writer).

When I first began, I would certainly have called both of these things failures in my day. A low (for me) word count? An entire day’s work that was essentially about to be dumped in the trash? I might as well go hide under a rock and never show my face in my writing groups again.

But now, with a bit more experience and the exquisite gift of hindsight, I’m able to recognize what this is—the evolution of my story.

In this particular case, the epiphany I had about where the plot needed to go may not have registered with my brain had I not written those 500 words earlier in the day. Had I not explored where I thought the plot was going, my mind might not have ever wandered down the path that ended up being the correct one.

The couple of pages I wrote that morning weren’t a waste, they were a catalyst of what was to come. Even though they ended up cut-and-pasted into a seperate word-graveyard document (never, ever completely delete!), they were a necessary means to an…