Ever meet one of those writers who truly believes that writing is their destiny? That they have always just known that they ‘have to write.’ The ones who claim to wake up in the middle of the night and simply must get out of bed and write until the crack of dawn because the words just simply pour out of them?
Perhaps I sound a little bitter. However, I do think that while it is wonderful for those writers who feel as though they have found their true calling through writing, for most of us it’s a struggle. Yes I admit it, I think writing is frustrating and it's tiring and it's difficult.
Writers are notoriously hard on themselves, and this is something that we should learn to change. We need to be our biggest supporters, our biggest fans. However, sometimes it is simply not as easy as that.
Many writers struggle to write, and just because you do doesn’t mean you are not a true writer, nor does it mean you’re not as talented and hard-working as other writers, or that you deserve a publishing deal any less.
It’s OK if writing isn’t your entire universe. If you love writing your book but you only do it on weekends and sometimes not even then because frankly you just want to have a lie in or have drinks with friends or watch tv all day and not care about anything else.
Writers seem to think that unless you write full time, that you have a ‘proper’ book publishing deal and that you spend every living breathing minute of your life tap, tap tapping away on your computer that you shouldn’t call yourself a writer - and that people will mock you and laugh in your face, or patronise and belittle you, or think that you are supremely arrogant and pompous if you do.
Many writers feel as though they are imposters, even when they are successful they find it tough to believe that they have any authority on the subject and bestowing upon themselves the title of ‘writer’ seems big-headed and foolish.
Writing doesn’t have to be effortless, and being a writer certainly isn’t. Even the most famous and successful of writers have talked about their struggles, and their frustration and pain when writing hasn’t gone their way, or when they’ve tried to write but been unable to, or have thought their writing was dreadful, torn it all up and started again.
If we believe that to be a writer you have to consistently produce work without having to think about it, that the words simply fall, perfectly formed and beautiful from your head to the page, then really how many people could actually call themselves one?
We should never let our writing fears hold us back, and accepting that writing is hard is just one of the things we should do to help us believe in ourselves more.
If we can concentrate on writing a little bit every day, not worrying about the final product, accepting that writing is a learning process and there will always be more to learn and new ways to grow. If we can support one another, and, above all, keeping pushing through even when writing feels painful and boring and tedious we might just be writers after all!
Yes, I have felt that not writing everyday does not make me a true writer. But now that I have read this I believe that doing just a little whenever you can helps you become the writer you've wanted to be. Last night, I found myself editing more of my memoir, in one of the chapters I'd edited recently. I still have more chapters to edit and print. The ones I found myself editing were among those I'd recently edited and printed. Sometimes I'll looked at the most recently printed copy to edit or I will look on the computer copy, since I am on the computer nearly all the time! I've made so many printouts I have to keep them separate as not be confused. What started out as 89 pages has since increased to 141 pages at present (This is including the title page and table of contents page). Also, I got a new computer last December and have the new Mac word processing program as a result, and that accounts for the increase as well as the details I added and those on which I expanded. I copied my original manuscript from the PDF I had sent as an email attachment since the original email with the attachment is still in my "sent-email" folder.
I'm not sure I want to say I'm finding writing hard. Rather I'm finding it a little hard to do as much as I think I should write each day. But now I think any little bit helps you to get better and be the writer you want to be.
As I said in this post, I believe everyone the writer's life in their own way, doing what works best and when for each of them. It does not always have to be a scenario like this:
[Of course today, most of us are using a computer for our stories, but you get the idea:) ]
I keep thinking I want to try some writing in a notebook at night while in bed , but have found myself too tired to do so. I mostly read at night when I can't sleep. I've wanted to try jotting down some of my dreams, even just portions, to see where I can go from there. I just haven't been doing so. I guess I may have to push myself more to do so. I do recall a portion of a dream I had recently that I have been wanting to make down, but I still haven't! Often it's just hard to push oneself into to doing things like this. But if you want to do it, you will. I want to try at some point to do any or all of these ideas.
I do believe that a large chunk of us have days when writing is stressful and difficult and for sure we are our worst critics. I used to want to bare my teeth when people called it a hobby.
ReplyDeleteBut it's what we do and no matter how much or how little time each of us spend at our craft, it's the act of writing that makes us writers;)