When I was younger, my teacher taught me that replacing the word 'said' with something more interesting would take my writing further. In a lot of my work so far, you'd be hard-pressed to find someone who simply said something. They're always exclaiming, inquiring, asking, noting, grunting, smirking, mumbling, murmuring, laughing, shouting, groaning, moaning, scoffing... but never simply saying.
Granted, I do what not many writers do; that is, predominantly write in the present tense. So rather than a character who 'said' something, I'll have characters who 'say' things. But even then, they don't just say. They say slowly, or quietly, or hesitantly, or mysteriously, or furiously, or suddenly — the list of adjectives is inexhaustible, and perhaps it is therein that the problem lies.
I believe that you can over-describe. And I know that right now, it is one of my greatest weaknesses when it comes to writing. It always has been, as well. Even as a kid, I'd get pulled up for going into far too much detail describing how creepy a forest was and not proceeding with the plot of whatever Halloween story we were supposed to be writing. And the thing is, you don't even know you're over-describing when you're doing it. It's so hard to pick yourself up for it, because it comes naturally, and it feels like if you make a concious effort not to do that, everything sounds over-simplified or stilted, as if someone five years younger than you is sitting in front of the paper.
But when I was re-reading something I wrote quite recently (so, within the last year), I find myself getting frustrated because — as nice as it is to have lots of description and get a real sense of how everything looks and the actions everyone makes and the feelings behind those actions, etc. etc. — the plot suffers, and more importantly, the pace suffers. That's not to say that plot is more important that than pace, but there are other ways to keep a good story. But if too many words are spent describing what's going on, the deliverance of the story —how the reader learns it — is compromised. And that's a very big sacrifice to make, even more so when it's not necessary at all.
The other main problem with this phobia of 'said' is that you lose impact. When everything is said in a certain way, when you really want to stress that aspect of a scene, it becomes near impossible to do so. More is less in this case, and if you keep describing everything so fully, I think the reader becomes a bit desensitized to it all. Or (worse case scenario), they just stop caring because it takes so damn long just to read on.
Avoiding 'said' doesn't just slow down the reader. It slows the writer down as well. I already have so much trouble with my inner editor; being slowed down even more is catastrophic when I'm trying to keep up a certain pace, or working on a longer piece, or — and this is what I always find myself dealing with — trying to write chapters in continuity. Because each chapter takes so long, and I'm trying to create this level of writing that, at the time, feels good, it's easy to lose motivation and... I wouldn't say interest, but more... drive? It's hard to keep doing that. And it makes trying to edit things a nightmare (even though I don't really edit stuff to begin with) because I spend so long just writing it and trying to make the first draft the final draft.
Anyway, after considering all this, it just makes sense for me to try face my fears and re-accept the word 'said' back into my life. You can't build a castle without strong foundations, right?
