Be good and write
I needed to give myself a creative pep talk this morning, or a pep email, as it were, and I thought maybe some of you might also need to hear this, so:
Let go of the idea that you're not good enough. Let go of the poisonous past, the pervasive cutthroat subtext of the classroom, the competition of workshops, the fight for attention. Let go of the judgment, all the times someone told you that you didn't have it and you'd never have it. Burn up all the memories of sitting silent and alone, sick and worried, insecure and cowed. You are a good writer. Writing is a skill and you have picked up that skill; you work at that skill every day. But writing is also magic and YOU HAVE THAT MAGIC. It is in your blood, in your head. It is instinctive. Writing is not about perfection - it is about the story, crafting the story, and giving that story to the reader. There is not some ideal that you must achieve. You do not have to be good enough in order to move people - you just have to write. You can have what you want. You can make it happen. You don't need a lucky break. You just need to write.
Do not talk yourself out of it in anticipation of someone else talking you out of it. Do not say you are being cautious when you are actually being frightened. Stop looking for a reason that it won't work. It will work. This will be your life - this already is your life. You are living in this moment and you are a writer. Stop discounting what you already write as less than what you have not yet written. Stories are stories. You would rip the heart out of anyone else's argument that their fic writing, their incomplete drafts, their random seeds of ideas don't count. Give yourself the same credit, and the same respect. Stop anticipating disappointment.
I know it's easy to get sidetracked, but there is no reason you can't do the untested things. No reason you can't publish, collaborate, sustain yourself, build your life around your writing. There is no reason. All of this is possible, all of it within your grasp.
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Let go of the idea that you're not good enough. Let go of the poisonous past, the pervasive cutthroat subtext of the classroom, the competition of workshops, the fight for attention. Let go of the judgment, all the times someone told you that you didn't have it and you'd never have it. Burn up all the memories of sitting silent and alone, sick and worried, insecure and cowed. You are a good writer. Writing is a skill and you have picked up that skill; you work at that skill every day. But writing is also magic and YOU HAVE THAT MAGIC. It is in your blood, in your head. It is instinctive. Writing is not about perfection - it is about the story, crafting the story, and giving that story to the reader. There is not some ideal that you must achieve. You do not have to be good enough in order to move people - you just have to write. You can have what you want. You can make it happen. You don't need a lucky break. You just need to write.
Do not talk yourself out of it in anticipation of someone else talking you out of it. Do not say you are being cautious when you are actually being frightened. Stop looking for a reason that it won't work. It will work. This will be your life - this already is your life. You are living in this moment and you are a writer. Stop discounting what you already write as less than what you have not yet written. Stories are stories. You would rip the heart out of anyone else's argument that their fic writing, their incomplete drafts, their random seeds of ideas don't count. Give yourself the same credit, and the same respect. Stop anticipating disappointment.
I know it's easy to get sidetracked, but there is no reason you can't do the untested things. No reason you can't publish, collaborate, sustain yourself, build your life around your writing. There is no reason. All of this is possible, all of it within your grasp.
You can also read this entry on Dreamwidth (
comments)