I am a long-time lurker through the various iterations of this website. Zero regrets either - thoroughly enjoyed doing this. I have my own kinks: mind control/hypnosis, muscle, big sub, etc, as we all probably do.
I’ll never truly consider myself a writer because I didn’t go to school for it. I’ve always been more science- and health-based in my field of study and practice. Nor had I ever planned to write anything until I got inspired by a story here that hit a lot of my kinks, but left a fantasy open to my own interpretation. So after talking to the author in October, I started writing something two to three months ago. It’s been done for a couple of weeks now, but each night I reread parts of it, make subtle changes or minor word changes, and jack off to it. Or I run it through Grammarly, etc. Or I read the long AI discussion and realize that I can’t use the word “said,” so I go back with a thesaurus to change out all the “saids” - jokes, but I really did that because of that post. I do plan to publish it at some point, perhaps. Still, I am a perfectionist, and in my career, you have to be nearly perfect, so I think I’m carrying that mindset into my writing, with the subtle changes I keep making and the publishing delay I keep putting off.
My reason for writing this post, though, is this realization. I have attempted to write a story which obviously hits all my buttons… holy crap, this is all I jack off to? How do writers actually get to read everything else on this site and enjoy it? As a lurker or reader since I was one, I could choose a different story/selection whenever I want to jack off to something at my leisure. Over the past two months, I’ve almost had to pause writing just to read my favorite authors’ work so I can fully enjoy them and jack off. So I guess I am curious because I’ve never thought of it from the writer’s perspective before.
That’s exactly how it works. You don’t need to go to school “for writing”. I didn’t either - I’m a software guy - but I love to write. And even if you’re not good with words, you can write amazingly creative stories, even if your usage of words and phrases might be limited. There are endless examples on the site.
It’s not about how eloquently you can write, it’s all about what you inspire in the reader’s mind.
That you wank to your own stories is exactly how it should be, that’s definitely quite common. At least you should be wetting your pants with pre while writing
So please put your perfectionism aside at some point and just go ahead and publish your story. Anything else would be unfair, you have to share your lewd fantasy with us all, so we can all enjoy and jack off to it!
I’ve had a similar experience when it comes to writing. I’m a visual/multimedia designer, so writing is a part of the job, but not something I’ve studied intensively other than basic college English classes.
I’ve read too many stories that I love that inspire new fantasies and scenarios, so I started writing to fill in gaps where I felt like a certain type of story hadn’t been told on the site yet. It always takes me months to come up with a version I’m proud of stylistically and I’m always not sure if people will enjoy them, but it’s been great seeing people’s reactions and comments on what I’ve spent forever working on. I’m looking forward to when you finally publish your work! I’m interested to hear other “hobby” writers’ perspectives on this as well.
I’ll just react to something secondary, but please don’t try to follow rules about writing. There aren’t any actually. The stuff they teach in high school English classes is not that much useful. First of all, the talk about “said” in the thread for AI had nothing to do with AI, there’s no special AI style about “said”. There are three schools of thought I encountered as advice:
Use said all the time because it’s invisible and it makes you focus on the dialogue. Any other word becomes a form of telling instead of showing, it should be clear exactly how things are said by the dialogue itself and the situation.
Use said but add an adverb to give hints as to the voice and tone.
Never use said, use specific words that enrich the scene instead of flattening it with a boring said.
Any of those work, and the best thing is probably to mix and match them.
For people coming from sciences, and I am one of them (studied math and computer science than went back to college in literature and creative writing twenty years later), these “rules” makes us feel safe, they look like the rules of physics or math, and we feel we must master them. But that’s the worse way to approach the arts, even if it’s only to write smut. Any writing decision has an effect, and you must just be aware of those effects as much as possible, none are right and wrong by themselves. You must focus on what your words convey, not on which rules you followed.
I like to make the text I’m writing “flow”, I want to like to read it.
And that means that I try not to repeat words, not because of some rules, but because it feels clunky and repetitive. A text is more fun to read if it varies in words. Not just about “said”, also about how you name the persons involved, IF you name them at all in first-person speech (sometimes it’s clear from the context, you don’t need to add who said something every time).
Also, I’ll never understand rules like “don’t tell, show” or “don’t use adverbs” and then creating an incredibly boring text. A story is all about emotion, and that means using a rich language that allows the reader to feel the emotion, the temper, the atmosphere. And to achieve that, you need to add flavored words and adverbs, that’s what they exist for.
So - what I’m saying: Find your own style. Don’t let anyone tell you what’s right or wrong! It’s your text and you don’t have to comply ot any rules (only ours, if you want to publish it here on these sites )
I had a creative writing teacher fail me because I know shit about grammar rules. But he pulled me aside and said this, “This grade is not a reflection of your talent. This grade is not an indication of your worth as a writer. It is a number I have to give as determined by a school board.” I then asked him how do I get better and he said this, and it has carried me from every writer’s block and dry spell I came across. he said, “Write. Just write. Write something horrible. Write something short, Just write. Get used to sitting down and making words appear in front of another. Sooner or later it will get easier and then it will be second nature…only then do you have to worry about your craft and rules. But until then…write and never stop.” It’s the same advice I give to you…just write and never stop.
Although I was an education major in college (40 years ago this year!) – I was a writing minor, which I loved. I loved roundtables, writing seminars, the whole bit, but in those days I was more interested in writing theatre, specifically lyrics.
Most of my early work in in theatre. I’ve been lucky enough to have been produced a number of times in “real” life, including a national tour, and a show in the Edinburgh Fringe Festival. This might explain why my stories tend to be dialogue heavy.
For me, a guy I was dating wanted me to write a fantasy story for him, which was my first time trying erotica. I was surprised how challenging it was – especially timing – and how sexually stimulating it was for me. My first story is “MILK MAN” and I’ve come back to that source well quite a number of times.
As Tom of Finland observed “If my cock isn’t standing up while I’m drawing, I stop and start over until it is.” My job is to put MY fantasy down and hopefully the reader can come along for the ride, but I’m serving me first.
I’d like to change the term lurker to reader. You weren’t lurking, you were reading stories, then you engaged with the author, and then you started writing. That’s how I got started as a writer on this site: I read stories, then I started posting comments, and then I started writing. So your path to authorship is a standard path then: reading to engaging to writing.
Writing doesn’t mean you stop reading, you should be reading for enjoyment as well as for inspiration. Right now I’m reading a couple of collections of fiction. One is Invisible Planets, a collection of Chinese science fiction; the other is The Mad Scientist’s Guide to World Domination. In the second collection, the second story, “Father of the Groom,” was a chance to see humor in action and see the use of short sentences to move the story along. That’s what the reading is about having the experiences the stories provide and taking notice of how the author writes to achieve those experiences.
I can empathize with you on the perfectionist tendency; I too am a perfectionist. My advice to you is to try to be okay with some imperfections. One thing I do is use the Read Aloud function on Microsoft Word. Once I hear the story read out for the final time and I’m comfortable with the story I post the work, I let it go out and hope the readers get some enjoyment. So you gotta get your story to the place where you can let go up on the site; it’ll take so with to do so, but it’s always good to see the comments and once you post. Those things really help you to start writing the next work.
Writer AND reader here. There’s no one ‘right’ way to engage on this site.
Some gents love to read and don’t feel the inclination or have the skill-set to create content themselves. Others do both (read and write). Other write (and some write A LOT!) and stay focused on their own craft.
I will say:
This site is nothing without it’s readers. The idea of writing something and having no one see it, comment on it, etc… that feels so dull and unappealing to me. I want to be READ! So thank you, readers, for reading!
Writing is time consuming. A short story, for me, take several weeks. Brainstorming, outlining, drafts, editing, and a final read through (all while working full time and having other responsibilities). I’m jealous of writers who create so much more content than me.
I was on a roll this past year and wrote three(!!) novel-length stories (Mountain Peaks Pack 1, 2, 3). But haven’t posted since June last year. I have a lot of material now in outline form; hoping to be able to post more in 2026.
It began as a dare I gave myself; “just put the weird thing in your brain out there,” and at the time that ended up being tumblr, fake email, fake google account.
I didn’t even know there was written porn (until I found some on CYOC). I didn’t know if what I put up was technically porn. I only knew that video-porn did nothing for me. I didn’t know there was weird thoughts out there similar to the weird thoughts I had.
So I posted the story first without knowing there was a community for it; the community found me. I still remember waking up the day after and suddenly (and overwhelmingly, panicked almost) seeing my weird story on tumblr, with the fake email I set up having 40, 50, 60, shares in 12 hours and then 80,90,100 in the following days and weeks.
And what followed was a more significant chapter of sexual development / sexual maturity / sexual education than my entire puberty and 20’s were. Suddenly this whole “thing” opened up.
I never even liked to read (in general) tbh. Language and I are a bad mix usually. I would just cherry pick tiny bits and pieces that resonated with me.
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once you post. Those things really help you to start writing the next work.