My drive to keep pounding away on my computer seems like enough most days to drown out all pestering voices of doubt. I'm confident in my story and my characters. And most days I'm confident in my writing. What scares me to an almost debilitating state is the question - Is it enough? Am I enough? My characters chose me. I am responsible for telling their stories, but what if I don't have what it takes? What if I can't spill enough ink to give them life? I don't have an English degree. No, I had the great plan to be a lawyer until after I graduated with my bachelor degree and decided that wasn't going to work. What then? I discovered the Loft Literary Center and my passion for writing. But is it enough?
I follow great authors like K.M. Weiland who has become an unsolicited mentor to me. I'm inspired and greatly intimidated by her vast wealth of knowledge about the ins and outs of writing especially story structure. James Patterson is offering a MasterClass on writing that is appealing to me, but will it really help increase my confidence? No matter if my education is formal or self-taught, I do aspire to learn daily to improve my craft. But is the ability to be able to articulate every sentence structure and pinch point necessary for me to be a good writer? Do I need to get a masters in fine arts in order to silence these doubts?
I don't think so. In fact, several of my Loft teachers have said that an MFA is not necessary. I'd love to get my MFA. But my practical rational self says I have to be able to justify the tuition by first proving myself as a writer. This cycle seems to follow the same as the idea that one must be published in order to get published. Or the daunting reality for those in the corporate workforce that you need experience to get the job you want, but how does one get the experience if you can't get the job you need to get the experience? Ufda. The chicken and egg taunt me.
Currently Andy shouts at me to throw the damn egg against a wall. To forget all the self-doubt and let her finish telling me her story. That is exactly what I will do. I know the parts of a story. I know what is needed to make it sing and to get the readers to lean in. Sure, I might not know every technical term for parts of a story, but for now what I do know is enough. All I can do is get it all out, once, twice, as many rewrites as it takes me to do justice to Andy's story. That's what my passion and Andy demand.
What do you do to silence the doubts that follow you?
2 comments:
I can empathize with everything that you're feeling. Neither am I a formally trained writer. And I pose the same questions to myself too many times to count.
And yet, when that spark of inspiration is ignited inside me, there is not a single force in this universe that can extinguish that flame. The emotions of those fictional characters hold so many parallels to those who create them, as well as for those who read about them.
Whether we have formal training or not, if we have a story inside us, we owe it to ourselves and our audience to share it with the world. In the words of Sharon Adler, I write because my heart speaks a different language that someone needs to hear. I write because one day I will be gone, but what I believed and felt will live on.
Whether that story and those words live on in a thousand lives or just a single one makes no difference. It will live on and it will have made a difference. And that makes all the difference. Keep writing bravely with reckless abandon. I'll do the same :-)
Dave, thank you for your comment and encouragement. I appreciate hearing I'm not the only one with these struggles. Good luck and keep writing!
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