The world will end if you write the wrong scene

I am busy practicing the discipline that not every scene I write needs to end up in the book.

You write to find the story.

And that is how there is a story. Because you looked for it and found it.

But the looking can be scary. What if this isn't the right way? 

I'll tell you. If this scene you write turns out not to be the right scene, THE WORLD WILL END in a plague of hissing cockroaches. They will hiss scorn upon you as they swallow you up in a writhing oblivion, leaving only your shoelaces and eyelashes as evidence you even existed.

Except not really. Nothing will happen. You will write another scene. And another. And one of them will be right. 

That's all. Angst makes it feel very complicated, but it's not. 

ONWARD! WRITE! You will find stuff you weren't looking for. It's like sofa cushions. Yeah, there's money there, and the occasional diamond ring, but there's also a lot of lint, and probably a half-sucked Life Saver or a used Q-tip you'd rather not deal with. But would you let a used Q-tip stand between you and a diamond ring?! Plus which, who knows? You may well find a tiny, mystical medallion in ancient bronze, and have no idea how it came to be there, or what its powers are ... and it will light your brain on fire.

(Also: have a nice day :-)

P.S. This discipline is the thing that gives me courage and freedom to write the scenes instead of just fretting about them, and more often than not, they are right, or at least right-ish. YAY!