That said, I admit I am fairly clueless about my own writing. I am constantly re-touching it. Changing it. Trying to make it better. I am never finished. And yet, when I write, if I am really open and in that zone, I know exactly when to stop and when too much has been done.
Still, that doesn't stop me from re-reading and trying that much harder to pull the essence out and let it show.
I am always slightly amazed (okay I'm always HUGELY amazed) that someone likes what I've written. I don't get accolades. To me, everything could be better and surely nothing that I would do would ever be worth that much attention, could it?
Ah.. in such lies the eternal struggle of the writer: The need to communicate and be brilliant at it while still believing you stink at it.
Writing is tough, don't get me wrong. When you're blocked and even your shopping lists look strained, you'd rather shear sheep on a cold December morning in your skivvies than sit down at a type writer and write. And even when you're writing smoothly, it can go wrong. You can give into the self-doubt and nagging feeling that you should be out changing the world and not sitting in front of a computer screen worrying about the fact if your character is too much of a flirt or not. There are these things that will and can drive you crazy if you write for too long a time. I start to question verb usages. I start to think I know nothing at all. I start to believe that I'm dsylexic or have developed a brain disorder that distorts everything I'm trying to say.
It goes around this feeling and all you can do is shake it and keep typing. Hoping that by the end you have something that makes sense.
And that moment, that moment when you share what you've done? That is the longest moment in your entire fucking life, because oh my god, what if they don't like it? What if, oh my god, what if you stink?!
Writing more than any other art is bare bones and bare bones emotions. It doesn't matter that your character isn't you- it doesn't matter that what you're writing about is something that doesn't really exist- there is still the YOU- that you that is writing it- putting your blood, sweat and tears into it and how painful that is to be rejected. It's like being rejected for your soul.
So yeah, writers have to develop thick skins. Otherwise we'd all kill ourselves, instead of just the chosen few that do. I think it goes with the artistic mind-set. I think there is something inherently tender about people who have creative tendencies as opposed to those who do not (Repulicans for instance-ha).
Anyway, I just thought I would share. Every day I wake up and have two thoughts. I'm not a writer. Followed by yes, I'm am.
It's the fight that keeps it interesting.