Write because it's right
This has been a strange week. It's been a strange month, really, and it's not even over yet, which is giving me a certain sense of foreboding because damn...I hope the rest of 2012 is not like how it started.
Anyhow, it's been months since I have had enough of a muse to write anything substantial, and I have fics growing and kicking about in my head like children waiting to be born. They tug at my insides and wake me up in the middle of the night just to remind me that they are there and it drives me crazy because I so very much WANT to birth them into the world, but I won't do it if I can't do it right. I owe it to myself and the characters I love. And there's that other thing too...
Posting for others to read. We'd all be liars if we tried to say that we don't want people to read what we write and hopefully see what we saw in the stories. It's the curse of the creative mind. Hell, I even get a huge rise when someone "likes" something I post in a public facebook group. Seriously. But low self-esteem...well, that's a curse too. And even though I tell myself that I am writing these stories for myself and no one else, it's not true. I WANT other people to feel something for what I write, and thus I have become my own worst critic. I judge myself against the works of other writes who have had more education and experience and every time I read something that blows my mind, I look at my words and feel so inadequate. To top it all off, sometimes I will be in the middle of writing something and someone else will post something with the same concept, only better! *kick to the gut*. Yes-I understand that in pop culture fandom, there are NO original ideas and we are all writing about the same things happening to the same people, so I really shouldn't care, but I do.
So this is what I'm going to do. I'm just going to write. I'm going give myself a literary c-section (lol--must be ovulating...so many childbirth reference! ) and drag those stories kicking and screaming into the world for ME. I will stop comparing myself to other writers (because for the few brilliant writes I am so insanely jealous of out there, there are at least 10 that I KNOW I am better than!) and I am going to stop caring if my plot has already been covered by someone else. Maybe it has...but it hasn't been done MY WAY. We all put our own spin and interpretation on things. It's almost like reading the bible...everyone can read the same thing and come away with something different. So yeah. I need to be my own biggest fan. Because nothing is sadder than denying yourself the right to do something you love and nurture your talents so that it does become something other people want to read. And even if it never does, you know what? That's okay too.
Anyhow, it's been months since I have had enough of a muse to write anything substantial, and I have fics growing and kicking about in my head like children waiting to be born. They tug at my insides and wake me up in the middle of the night just to remind me that they are there and it drives me crazy because I so very much WANT to birth them into the world, but I won't do it if I can't do it right. I owe it to myself and the characters I love. And there's that other thing too...
Posting for others to read. We'd all be liars if we tried to say that we don't want people to read what we write and hopefully see what we saw in the stories. It's the curse of the creative mind. Hell, I even get a huge rise when someone "likes" something I post in a public facebook group. Seriously. But low self-esteem...well, that's a curse too. And even though I tell myself that I am writing these stories for myself and no one else, it's not true. I WANT other people to feel something for what I write, and thus I have become my own worst critic. I judge myself against the works of other writes who have had more education and experience and every time I read something that blows my mind, I look at my words and feel so inadequate. To top it all off, sometimes I will be in the middle of writing something and someone else will post something with the same concept, only better! *kick to the gut*. Yes-I understand that in pop culture fandom, there are NO original ideas and we are all writing about the same things happening to the same people, so I really shouldn't care, but I do.
So this is what I'm going to do. I'm just going to write. I'm going give myself a literary c-section (lol--must be ovulating...so many childbirth reference! ) and drag those stories kicking and screaming into the world for ME. I will stop comparing myself to other writers (because for the few brilliant writes I am so insanely jealous of out there, there are at least 10 that I KNOW I am better than!) and I am going to stop caring if my plot has already been covered by someone else. Maybe it has...but it hasn't been done MY WAY. We all put our own spin and interpretation on things. It's almost like reading the bible...everyone can read the same thing and come away with something different. So yeah. I need to be my own biggest fan. Because nothing is sadder than denying yourself the right to do something you love and nurture your talents so that it does become something other people want to read. And even if it never does, you know what? That's okay too.