Intro
Maybe you are one of those writers who just let the words flow, a pantser as they call it. Maybe you are a planner. I used to be a pantser, but have slowly evolved into a planner over the years. See, writing by the seat of my pants was great, until it wasn’t. All of a sudden, I couldn’t finish anything I started. My WIP folder looked like a graveyard of forgotten dreams. So I evolved. I learned to outline. I shifted gears to short stories so that I could at least finish something, anything.
But writing, much like life, isn’t about neat little packages tied up in bows. And a lot of times, what I plan out in my head (sometimes on paper, but hey, I’m not perfect) and what ends up happening isn’t even close to the same thing. I might have an idea of where I want the story to go, but then the character I am working with pipes in with, “Oh, that’s what you thought? Yeah, we’re not doing that.”
Do I fight the characters? Do I give in to their terroristic chaos? Well, when I have tried to fight it, I end up with another body for the graveyard. So I let it go and let them direct the battle plan.
The Neurodivergent Angle
I am autistic and have ADHD. I am not wired like your average bear. My inner spirit animal lands somewhere between Yogi and Grumpy Bear. Sometimes I will be happily writing along, following my own dreams, and then BAM! The bend shows up so quickly, you didn’t see it in time to hit the brakes.
My neurodivergent brain (which I often imagine is powered by squirrels running on a hamster wheel) can be completely and utterly obtuse and oblivious, but it can also be hyper-focused, hyperaware, so keyed in to details that it sees things others wouldn’t find with a magnifying glass.
Real Examples
Case in point: I once had a character who was supposed to be a sidekick. Just comic relief, there for the witty banter and occasional emotional pep talk. Instead, he staged a coup in chapter three, trauma-dumped his entire backstory on me, and refused to be anything less than the emotional core of the story. I didn’t plan for that. I didn’t want that. But damn if it didn’t work.
Then there was the time I plotted a nice, tidy redemption arc for a villain—and she just noped out of the whole idea. Midway through the story, she looked me in the eye (metaphorically, thank God) and said, “Actually, I’m going to double down and destroy everything. Thanks for the origin story, though.” What was I supposed to do—argue with her? She was terrifying. And also right. It worked out to be a much better story than what I had originally planned, and if I had tried to force the story to go the way I wanted, it wouldn’t have been worth reading.
Characters do this. They get into your head and start making decisions like they’re paying rent. And if you’re neurodivergent like me, you don’t just hear them—you feel them. They shift your focus, reroute your logic, and suddenly the story that made so much sense when you wrote it out in your notebook – painstakingly by hand, might I add – looks like a crime scene strung with yarn and bad decisions. And yes, I am the detective screaming ‘None of this makes sense!’ at 2 AM.
Embracing the Chaos
So what do you do? You roll with it. You stop trying to wrangle the story into some tidy three-act cage and let it breathe. You become the dungeon master to a bunch of unruly players who absolutely did not read the campaign notes. Or they did and didn’t give a rat’s ass.
That doesn’t mean giving up all structure—I still outline. But I treat my outline like a loose grocery list, not a sacred contract. If my character wants to eat metaphorical cake for dinner instead of the healthy arc salad I planned? Fine. Let them. They might just lead me somewhere better.
Tools that help? My bullet journal, where I give my characters space to rant and pace. Voice memos for catching their rants when I’m driving. Notebooks, so many notebooks. My wife says I have a problem, and I agree, in that the problem is I don’t have enough of them. At this point, I’m one step away from cataloguing them like ancient scrolls.
When Chaos Pays Rent
And here’s the thing no one tells you when you’re trying to do this the “right” way: sometimes the best stories come from letting go of the plan.
I’ve written things that never would’ve existed if I hadn’t let the characters hijack the wheel and drive us straight into emotional mayhem. I’ve had arcs show up I didn’t consciously plan—but later realized they were exactly what the story needed. My subconscious is out here doing God’s work while my conscious brain is arguing with the GPS and trying to remember where I put the coffee.
Being neurodivergent means you process stories differently. It means your brain connects things in weird, wonderful ways. It means you probably have to work twice as hard to do something everyone else insists is “simple.” But it also means you see angles and threads that others miss entirely. When you learn to trust that part of yourself—when you stop fighting it—you unlock some truly powerful shit.
So What’s the Point, Anyway?
So yeah, maybe my stories don’t always go where I planned. Maybe my WIP folder still looks like a patchwork quilt stitched together by caffeinated goblins. But the ones I do finish? They’re real. They’re raw. They bleed.
And more importantly—they’re mine.
If you’re like me—autistic, ADHD, a little (okay, a lot) feral in your process—stop trying to write like someone else. Stop trying to tame your brain. Let it be loud. Let it be weird. Let your characters kick down doors and drag you across the plotline screaming.
And when the dust settles and you’re sitting there, stunned, holding a finished story you didn’t see coming?
That’s the magic.
Now go write some chaos.