writing log * vol. 1
on reframing how i think about writing...and everything, i guess
[August 26, 2024]
Each time I sit down to write, it feels like Swift’s The Archer—me to my characters; my characters to the people who make up the fabric of their reality; my characters to me; me to the act of writing itself.
When does it stop feeling like we’re on the brink of being found out? Called out for being a liar and a cheat. A hedonist. A witch. Someone who knows nothing and believes they know everything. Never mind all the things I thought I was—a lover; a friend; a romantic; a truth teller; someone good. Where does the goodness go? Did it ever exist at all?
Maybe this isn’t the thing to think about on my way to hear someone tell me (hopefully) that I am good. At writing, at least. Maybe, this could wait until I’m no longer pining for the validation that I know will be fleeting, if it even registers at all.
I loved this part of being an artist when I had yet to finish anything. When there was nothing to hold in my hands and offer up as a kind of self-sacrifice. I’m always holding tight to the mirror, after all.
[September 19, 2024]
Looking back, I think I was being a little dramatic. Which, believe it or not, is not unlike me. That person did in fact tell me that I was good—and then another did, and then a few more. It wasn’t until I was on my third and final round of edits before querying that I really believed that I was, and still do now.
I tend to look at things as wins or loses. There’s no room for anything in between, and when you live like that, the cavernous space between winning and losing is filled to the brim with anxiety. That’s all that can exist there when you shut your eyes to nuance, when everything can only ever be wholly bad or wholly good, and when your entire self worth is tied to it.
If one person didn’t like my book, I’d lost and I was a bad writer and, simply: what was I thinking, thinking I could do this? If the next person liked it, it was a win, and maybe I actually had a chance. Maybe I just don’t give myself enough credit. I was giving myself whiplash—and not just with this one thing. This is how I saw everything, how I have been living my life. And in the words of my therapist: how sad is that?
All my anxiety around writing, about drafting, is because the act exists in that cavern between winning and losing. If I finish it I win. If I don’t, I lose. Writing exists in the in-between, which means that trying exists there too. And life is filled with trying, which means I’ve been living in the cavern, waiting for a success to pull me up or a failure to drag me further down.
I always thought being goal-oriented was good for me, and maybe, at some point, it was. Now, I don’t allow myself more than five seconds to relish an accomplishment before I’ve staked the next goal post and start making a plan to get to it. Shrugged off every “congratulations” that came with finishing my novel because the next goal post was querying and finishing my book meant nothing if no one wanted it (when only months ago, finishing it meant everything). Now that I’m sending queries out, there’s a new goal: a partial or full request.
I’m running a rat race against myself, against my own expectation and fear. I need to figure out how to fill the hole.
[October 17, 2024]
I haven’t totally filled the hole yet, but I’m trying. Dr. K and I talk a lot about experience. Nothing can be won or lost, just experienced. I hadn’t intended to pick the sound byte up as a mantra, and yet I find myself repeating it several times throughout the day (both in my head and aloud, probably scaring those around me on the street).
It’s really hard to believe you’re not losing when after a week of silence, you get three rejections in a row. The one for the full request, specifically, felt like such a loss that it tanked my entire day. I’m finding it hard not to be rocked by the disappointment of it. It’s always been easy for me to sink down into it and get comfortable, to let it shape everything I think until it’s convinced me I should quit.
I’m trying very hard not to. I know I’m being dramatic and prophetic (I still have 47 unanswered queries), but how do I not be? It’s so much easier to believe the worst than to hold onto hope.
I have these spurts where I tell myself that it doesn’t matter, that I’ll keep writing and one day, eventually, it will be good enough for someone to want. These shining moments of energy never last very long, dragged down into the pit by the realization that that means there’s nothing good enough to want now.
It’s all very discouraging right now, more than I thought the experience would be. But that’s okay, right? It really has to be, if I’m ever going to finish a book again. And I will. The journey to that end might just be a little more painful.