My Writing: Stuck on Endings and Beginnings

Well, it appears that I am stuck. Chapter 3 is 45 pages long, but the ending just doesn’t feel right. Nor can I manage to figure out how to start Chapter 4. The two chapters need to connect to each other, but I just can’t find the right way to do it.

Three goes through a series of pedagogical beliefs, one-by-one, and discusses how each one relates to the topic/goal of the overall text. Four is supposed to work through an example in complete detail.

Part of me thinks that Three could just end after the last belief is dealt with. They’re numbered, and that’s all that the chapter does. Does it really need a conclusion? Can I just start the next chapter? I looked at the ends of chapters in Both Art and Craft, and a good number of the chapters just end after the last teaching idea is dealt with. Can I do that? It feels like cheating, but anything else feels redundant.

Gah . . . Maybe this is the point in my life when writing a dissertation would have been helpful. I’d know whether and how to transition in such things. That part of me that thinks maybe it would be okay to just end after the twelfth belief is being seduced by another part of me that says, “This will go out for review. Just move on and wait till someone tells you it’s wrong.” Okay, yes, I know that’s very lame. But it would help me move on to the next chapter (which was due Sept 6, so it’s seriously late).

Poopies. I’m supposed to have this chapter seriously underway and have a new schedule written by tomorrow afternoon. :( And I have to get the all of the book written by the end of October. Maybe I should hire a ghost writer.