A few words about writing.
September 1, 2008I've been thinking a lot lately about the creative process. Partly because Scott has started this amazing project, after years of talking about it but not doing much of anything. The one thing harder than starting is starting after years of talking about starting. Talking can kill the urge to create. So I'm sort of dying of pride, over here, while my husband works and works and keeps working, like he's a professional. I am a little in awe.
I've also been thinking about it because a reader (hi Sharon!) recently expressed surprise that I struggle with writing. I'm a little embarrassed to even share that with you, because it's kind of ridiculously flattering. It's also woefully inaccurate. So I wanted to reiterate to her, and you guys, that writing is a struggle for me, and always will be. It's the nature of the game. It's always hard, especially if you're doing it right. You're always aspiring to be better than you are, so no matter how much experience you get, it's always an uphill battle. Always, always, always.
Not to mention that whole "inner critic" hooha that anyone creative has to deal with. I am amazingly accomplished at beating myself up. I tell myself I'm too old, that all really talented writers were published much earlier than I ever was, that I don't have enough publications under my belt, that I should have written my novel when I got out of graduate school, that there are X number of writers who left my writing program when I did who are all on their second or third or seventh novel while I'm still not even a third of the way finished with a short story collection. I tell myself blogs are useless, that this site is a waste of time that's taking away from my Precious Writerly Resources. Or I tell myself that I'm just a blogger, as if blogging is somehow less relevant, so I shouldn't bother writing anything else. I tell myself that because I don't have large expanses of time to work I'm never going to reach my full potential. Or just decide that I suck and everyone who hates me is right and I'm never going to blah blah blah blah BLAH. It's a miracle that I get anything done, I'm so busy giving myself a hard time.
But everyone does this. This is how the mind works to stop you from writing. Creating is scary, and your brain wants you to run from scary things. For some reason it forgets about the rewards that come from risk. The brain will also do this for painting, or dancing, whatever creative work you do. I also draw and paint (in an extremely amateurish fashion, mind you) and I've been finding all sorts of reasons not to do either these days. The light in my dining room isn't quite right. I need better materials. My sketchbook is either too large or too small. There's nothing good to draw in my house, and I don't want to leave the house to draw because then people will look at what I'm doing. I can't remember how paints work. Watercolor paper is expensive and don't I need to stretch it, or something? Also my brushes aren't right. I have numerous excellent reasons for never attempting to create any artwork ever again.
Then yesterday I sat down and, while my brain screamed NO! DON'T! STOP!, I sketched for an hour. I sketched my cat, and my foot. Exciting, no? It was crappy and I did some terrible work. When I was done that voice in my head had been reduced, temporarily, to a mouselike squeak. And I felt like a superhero.
The only way to win over that voice is to work despite it. Doing stuff is always better than not doing stuff. Period.
Here's an inspiring talk on creativity by Ira Glass that another lovely reader (hi Erin!) sent me.
In a similar vein comes this anecdote from Art and Fear—which is a brilliant piece of work, by the way, chock full of quotables. A ceramics class is divided into two groups. The first group is graded on quantity: it doesn't matter how good their stuff is, just how many pounds of work they end up with. The second group is graded on quality: it didn't matter how few pots they create, just how perfect the final product is. Can you guess who ends up doing the best work? It's the quantity group: the students who churned out work day after day and learned from their mistakes. Meanwhile, the quality group had wasted time mulling over how they could achieve perfection, so by the end of the class they had "little more to show for their efforts than grandiose theories and a pile of dead clay."
It's all about working and working and working some more, no matter how crappy you think it is. You are never the best judge of your work, so shut up and work and don't stop to wonder why it's not a masterpiece. Remember what Voltaire said: "The perfect is the enemy of the good." He probably wrote that after spending an hour whining about how he'd never be as important an Enlightenment figure as that fathead Rousseau .
Don't sit and agonize over how you're not good enough. Don't leave yourself with a pile of dead clay. Start and keep going; if you stop, start again, and keep going.
Reader Comments (102)
So, to everything you've said, I say YES! You keep on truckin', and so will the rest of us who have been inspired by your post.
Poo to the Naysayer!
I was recently asked to write a memoir based on my blog. How wonderful! Every blogger's dream! Turns out, it is not the amazingly fun and glamorous project I thought it would be. So many time I almost cry when I sit down to write, beyond frustrated that this is just not shaping up to be the magnum opus I wanted it to be.
Anyway, as I was sitting here reading my favorite blogs during the time I was supposed to be working on my book, my jaw dropped when I saw this post. It's like you were speaking directly to me.
THANK YOU!
But it is writing - blogging, I mean. It's putting words together in a way that engages people... wait - I'm preaching to the choir here, aren't I? Carry on...
WOW! I am sitting here in tears. I have been floundering for weeks, fighting the things I KNOW I have to change, working hard at not taking the leap of faith to start really living. I had set up Labor Day as the end. Tomorrow my life changes, my world gets moving. I plan to start blogging again, accepting my Type II Diabetes, and getting my life in order.
Please keep doing what you are doing. You have been an inspiration.
PS: Have you seen "Meet the Robinson's" yet? What an amazing move with the over all message KEEP MOVING FOREWORD.
"The only way to win over that voice is to work despite it. Doing stuff is always better than not doing stuff. Period."
thanks so much for writing that. I'm going to write that down.
HOLY TAP-DANCING CHRIST ON A CRACKER YES. This could have been cut straight from my inner monologue today, only with all of the references to singing replaced with writing.
Thank you so much for this post; it was damned good timing today. I needed someone to say these things to me, and remind me not to get so caught up in navel-gazing and self-criticism that I just stop working on my art. You are amazing!
Do you have any advice on writing really stupid essays for uni?
And this post? Brilliant. I'm an aspiring photographer and have started taking steps towards making something more of this hobby, but one of my biggest obstacles is that voice that says, "Why do you think you're as good as or better than others out there?" Your words have helped silence it.
And I love the story about the pottery class. I'll have to pass that one on to my sister-- she's very into NaNoWriMo and that story certainly helps justify and show the benefit of that sort of an exercise.