Lovely, beautiful, self-conscious, and brave questioner: As always, George has given you a deeply thoughtful answer, full of wisdom, and with workable ideas to actively manage your inner voices. If what he says speaks to you, that is wonderful. I have something to add here from my personal experience that may or may not be helpful. Ignore my words entirely if I am simply off-base.
You mention that when you are in a conversation, inside your head you are thinking about what to say, and after you speak, you wonder if what you just said was quite right. I used to do this. With certain (if not most) people, I would think about what I was about to say, then I would say it, then I would analyze what I just said—all while the conversation was ongoing. It was deeply exhausting. I think many people do this same thing, but not to the extent that my own head went through these mental machinations. It was like trying to solve sixteen difficult math problems all at the same time, with a teacher yelling at me the whole time, no, no, you idiot, what are you doing???—and pretending that no such thing was occurring. Is this what you mean? If not, then no need to read on. If so, then what I think you may have, dear questioner, is anxiety. And not regular anxiety like many people have, but perhaps the debilitating kind. Anxiety of the kind I am speaking of here can ruin a person’s life. I know because I have been there. The constant analysis—which comes from fear—often left me paralyzed. At times, it was easier to simply stay home than venture out the door and make human contact, where I would invariably fuck up in some way I never meant to. Then, I’d come home, think think think, and start the apologies. OY.
George talks very rightly about sending the voices away and then inviting them back in. But an anxious person has a terribly hard time doing this. It makes writing a kind of personal nightmare. You have so many thoughts—an anxious person has SO many thoughts—and you want to put them down so badly. But the anxiety has moved in and will not budge, no matter how nicely you ask it to leave or how much you accept that it is a part of you, or how kind you are to yourself for being who you are. The anxiety just sucks. And your writing? How can a person write when those voices are mocking and strutting and saying terrible things?
So, how to get rid of it? Grasshopper, that is the million dollar question. Getting older helps, but who wants to wait? I’m guessing you know all of the usual ways: taking a tiny anti-depressant, exercising, meditating, therapy. I’ve done all of these and yes, they all help—sort of. The biggest help, for me, is daily walking. No headphones. No walking companion. Just me and the sidewalk and my legs moving briskly. Yes, my mind goes a bit crazy and ruminates while I walk, but it also gets into a bit of a rhythm with the rumination. The main thing is that when I get back home—I walk for one hour—I have moved my body and now it’s okay to sit for awhile. I don’t have to feel anxious about sitting. I can sit with my computer and not feel like I’m supposed to be doing something else. (I also take the aforementioned teeny medication.)
George suggests you find a way to use your self-consciousness, which I’m calling anxiety. I wish anxiety really were a super power that you could put to good use. But anxiety doesn’t have any good sides. It just does not. You can welcome it and ask it to sit down for tea and you can say, please be quiet please, but your anxiety is rarely quieted that way. To my way of thinking, you need to get rid of it. (I realize this is a radical departure from George’s comments. Forgive me, all.) So this last suggestion may sound ridiculous, but honest to god, positive affirmations help. I read from a couple little books every day—one is from al anon and the other from another twelve step program—and damn if those little daily prayers don’t often speak directly to my heart and help me calm down and love myself. Love is the opposite of fear, you know. Positive affirmations about your own strengths and abilities help. I used to think they were so dumb, but I don’t anymore. You don't have to be a 12 step person to get something out of these little kinds of books, by the way. Reading positive thoughts is simply helpful, no matter who you are.
The other thing that helps is focus. When you reach a true zen state of focus and the world falls away, then the anxiety lifts as well. But how to reach this state when writing? I find that if I approach my writing as a puzzle to be solved, then I can more easily focus. So, any kind of constraint really helps. Telling yourself that in the next paragraph you will insert a certain three words is a good little game. Writing three sentences in a row of 20 words each is a good little game. Writing a paragraph in one long sentence is a good little game. Anything that forces you to concentrate on an additional level to the content of your story raises your mind game and forces away the outside voices. We can only concentrate on a few things at once! And then, later, you can rewrite, delete, whatever. All first drafts suck, that is all there is to it. So inserting little games is helpful and you don’t have to keep any of it later.
Good luck to you. I feel for you. I hope the anxiety drops away and leaves you be. In the meantime, please know that there are so many people out here in the world who deal with anxiety and understand how debilitating it can be to one’s life.
Huge apologies if I am off base with this comment. You may not be anxious at all! xo
This is a really good point Mary. I have anxiety and recognised the poster's tendency to analyse every conversation straight away. Like you I take a little medication, exercise, meditate, etc. It all helps but the anxiety is something I accept and live with. Of course it's going to try and sabotage my writing. I like your idea of an hour's walking first thing and coming home with a clear head to sit at your desk. I swim in the Irish Sea all year round and that, more than anything, has helped me to live more peacefully with my anxious mind. It's impossible to think at all when you're catching your breath in freezing water!
Yes! The debilitating chatter of my mind held me prisoner for many years (childhood, teens, twenties, and so on…), and using bits of everything you mentioned has helped me so much - probably the medication and walking most of all, but also meditation and reading. And now that I’m in my 40s and a mother, I just seem to not give a shit about listening to that part of my mind as much, either. I just got SO TIRED of it. I have finally achieved enough separation to ignore its haranguing - most days at least. It’s not as easy on nights I’m awake in bed at 3 am. How is it able to get so loud at that hour?
I used to spend a lot of time wondering which was the REAL me. The critical voice or the other one who felt bullied by the critical voice. I like George’s description of them being in two different offices, each having their role and purpose, and finding ways to use both of them. It’s not a battle, it’s is a collaboration.
But I fully agree with you, Mary. There is self-conscious anxiety that everyone has from time to time, and there is Anxiety with a capital A. The latter is a beast and no one should feel like they need to just toughen up and pull themselves up by their bootstraps to get over it.
Thank you for this, Sara. I remember the 3 a.m. wide awake moments, those voices yammering on and on. The two things that helped me the very most were having my children grow up and leave, and simply getting older. But neither was in my control over the years of high anxiety. Well, somehow, I got through. But it wasn’t easy.
Those voices! George nails it--the parts that seem destructive but in fact think they have a helpful role to play. Sometimes they do. This is a quintessentially George piece on compassion and understanding.
Here's what I would add: I suffer when I use (or read others using) words like "good" or "bad" to assess what I am writing. I'm a good writer, I'm a bad writer, that's a good sentence, that's a bad sentence. Probably the "self-conscious" part. Carry too much judgment, too much a part of the "compete in order to be famous" mindset that can plague us. How about "that phrase exactly nails what I meant to convey about that character" or "that passage is flat, I want to get the feeling back in it." Even, "I'm confused about this character." Do you see? These latter are also assessing, but they are constructive, creative, meaningful for the writer.
Ahh, another walker. I am a walker as well, looking forward to Seattle walks. No headphones, no phones - I keep it in my pocket because it tracks my steps. I don't even listen to music when I exercise. I want to immerse myself in my surroundings, zone out or zone in if the environment calls for it. I *do* listen to music, but I engage with it. For me, it's sailing that really gets me to that zen state. So looking forward to getting back to the water.
So looking forward to that, mary. Enjoy your jump in the lake! I’ve got my year planned out. Plan to spend much time at Magnuson with the dachshund at the off-leash park and dog beach, at Sand Point for sailing (I’d love to get a job there), and writing time at Hugo House. So much to do! Exploring the national parks and woodland areas. Not long now - we hit the road on the 24th.
As someone who has anxiety this is spot on. I avoid the terms "suffers from," "dealing with," etc. from my descriptions now. Anxiety for me is biological. I just have these weather systems in my body that can be exacerbated by the environment or my attempts to manage them. I had to give up the idea that it would ever go away completely, but I could learn to live with it like a wild animal pacing the room -- don't provoke; don't attempt to tame; just let it be wild. Walking meditation works for me and looking back on my early years I realize how much of my wandering was walking through the anxiety -- burning off adrenaline and opening myself to the dialogue in my mind. It was becoming a parent and professional that began to limit my ability to work out the anxiety on my own that left me with the problem of anxiety attacks.
For too long, I waited for my anxiety to be cured before I could focus on writing. But it was when I started writing again that I realized writing itself was the walk in the desert that I craved. I could get into a flow state and keep moving through the anxiety. Key to that was allowing myself permission to be terrible, incoherent, and inconsistent. The one voice I allow in my head is, "Keep going." The goal is to see where this is all going. And the deal I made with the beast was, "When I'm done you can eat this work instead of me."
Love this. Thank you, Kevin. Sitting down and writing ameliorates much of my anxiety. Walking, hiking, riding a bike or swimming helps with the rest of it.
I love your ideas about anxiety Mary G. One more idea that helped me while walking was to list all the things I was grateful for. On a bad day my list might start like this: 1.) This green grass I am looking at 2.) The person who planted those lovely peonies 3). My hair is not falling out 4) I am able to walk... and so on from small to large.. I could walk miles and not repeat any items and it is hard to stay anxious or sad when doing this.
Yes absolutely. I wanted to mention gratitude as well but stopped myself from writing even more than I already did. Thank you for bringing it up. It absolutely helps in a huge way. And nature is soothing. Getting outside is key.
Hi Mary! I am wondering if one can take steps to lessen anxiety while simultaneously using it artfully? I suppose it’s a matter of degree. A little neuroticism goes a long way, but too much will result in paralysis. A razor edge. I like all of your suggestions. Fear and anxiety drive much of what I write, as I attempt to tilt toward understanding and love. (Those anxiety-reducing games sound delightful!)
This is a good question. I suppose that lessening anxiety is what i have done through medication and exercise, among other things. And then I guess I am using it artfully, as you say, because it is still there, it is still “me,” and I’m creating through it, or despite it. It’s complicated, and a struggle that comes and goes. As far as those exercises, I’m just a huge fan of constraints when I need them.
I’d also recommend writing by hand. Something about the rhythms, and the way the words don’t glare back at you crystal clear like they do on a computer screen (unless you have ultra discernible handwriting) has always proved helpful for me. Also, as an added bonus, if some part of you doesn’t have or feel the energy to translate it, it’s usually less an indicative sign of laziness I’ve found as knowing that the stuff you’ve written lacks that heat, or fire, or passion. In which case, just throw it away!
I’ve also found that, strangely enough, I’m usually more honest when handwriting rather than typing. Also, it’s interesting to note how constraints on prose forces you to work in a different rhythm or language. I’m a fast typer, but when I hand write it forces a constraint of slowness and time that produces maybe more finely honed prose. (Curious if typewriters are the same way)
I am fascinated by the difference between writing by hand vs by keyboard. Definitely activating different regions of the brain. (And wondering about the different synaptic connections when playing a piano, versus a guitar, cello, saxophone or trumpet? Or singing?)
My handwriting is so . . . difficult. I write some notes by hand, or when I'm working through a problem, but I used my handwriting for grading for so many years that it's all mixed up with a different more analytical process than a creative one. So I guess I've developed my creative typing muscles. I'm in year three of learning guitar after a lifetime of piano. Relearning music theory - and I'm finding that my brain is taping into my piano brain while thinking of notes. It's quite fascinating to watch my guitar learning brain translate the piano brain to figure it all out!
Wow. I picked up guitar and piano both when I was 16 and 17, so they feel somewhat interchangeable. Haven’t become any kind of virtuoso at either, but I’d like to, someday!
I’m sure you play better than I do. I love the piano but I wasn’t given a good foundation. With the guitar, I’m approaching it with the idea of play and I’m enjoying it so much! Didn’t think my “piano fingers” would ever be able to do that on strings. I find learning music enhances my creative process for when I’m writing.
I agree, Erik, writing by hand helps. See also Lynda Barry, a big proponent of writing by hand, especially her wonderfully helpful "What It Is". As she often says: In the digital age, don't forget to use your digits!
Writing by hand helps get me out of the analytical mode. I've used to it to get to know characters better and find out why the story is stuck. Most often it's stuck because I don't know the characters well enough or I'm trying to make them do something they wouldn't do. I rarely translated it back to the word document, unless I feel that it fits. I often rarely reread what I've written by hand as well. It's more like having a conversation with the story, which helps shut off that hypercritical part of my brain.
Great to see this conversation. There are actual studies that establish that the connection between hand, pen, heart, mind is a thing. Can’t remember the names of the papers , but I may be able to retrieve it. I love fountain pens. There is nothing like the flow of ink onto a page. To slow down the mind try calligraphy. Great practices .
I agree! Writing by hand works for me when I'm stuck because it looks less like a "real" book than when I type it. So who cares if I cross off big sections, or change POV a few times, or suddenly pull myself out of the narrative to free write about what I want the book to be doing, even? It's ok for the story itself to be messy if it's literally messy, my handwriting, ink smears, in a spiral-bound notebook I bought for $1.
Julie, I like reading that you experiment while you write. I do, too, and I find that it frees me up to explore and not get stuck in whatever ways that self-conscious mind wants to take control.
Oh yeah, definitely. If I write out "wait, is this story too much like this other story I wrote? Is it too much like this story someone else wrote?" and explore that, I can break it down rationally. But if I THINK "is this story like the others" without getting it on paper, my brain is likely to follow up with "you're a pretty bad writer, can't even come up with something original" and continue down that nasty path.
Yes, it seems like the thing to do is to keep on writing and save the judgment until later. Or...stop and leave it for awhile. Both are working well for me these days.
For decades, I would write by hand every morning... a few pages. I think it was mostly to find out/get to the bottom of what I woke up feeling or thinking about... having a guess that my very first thoughts would meander around and get off track and back again and that was okay. I always had the feeling this writing would lead somewhere... as in lead to an at-peace feeling at the end, like the breathless end of a good run or long walk. If I were working on a story, I always knew where I'd left off the day before, and if some writing happened where I thought... oh, I might be able to use that... I'd draw a border around it. Then if this were a day where I could write more and not have to go to work, I'd go out and walk in Riverside Park along the water, come back, sit at the computer and read the story from the beginning 'til I got to the where I stopped... then I'd type in the written words from my notebook - no editing... then go on writing the story and go back a edit later...
Then at some point my handwriting started to deteriorate... yes, there were physical reasons for this, (not so relevant here), but even though I still often hand-write in the morning, I can almost never read this back, even 2 minutes after writing it ... if I feel oh I want to read this later... I will hand print it...
So I do now sometimes write first thoughts non the computer... And it's okay... but, ah yes, it is different!
Handwriting a first draft has its advantages and disadvantages. Advantage: no backspace button. It encourages the delay of the editing process. Disadvantage: speed. It takes longer. That's been my experience, anyway.
Yes - it seems so... physical a change... how can it be any different whether writing on a keyboard or with a pen... but it really does make a difference for me being able to just.... WRITE
Better still, write with pencil, the words from our brain carbons flowing slow, dripping softly down through the limb carbons of our arm and hands, settling then drizzling words from the carbon tip of the poised pencil lead precisely held between svelte carbons of finger tips: smooth, suave drizzle or unruly, stormy drizzle the page awaits either - or some other form scratching or scribbling - with equanimity . . . until the page has been writ from mind to reading matter, turned over, and a fresh page teed for the writing to flow on.
There's this cartoon which depicts two Knights in shinning armor: One lays slain on the ground, sword still in hand. The other holds a huge fountain pen dipped in blood with which he writes: "The Pen is mightier than the Sword"
I'm so happy to read this Office Hours discussion.
Re: writing by hand. Many years ago, I wrote everything by hand. I’d end up with cross-outs, word changes, long curving arrows; the whole page, while messy, was the history of my thought process. Sometimes an entire page would only yield two or three sentences. But it was freeing and fun, and I would find myself in kind of a time-warp while I worked.
My problem is I can’t seem to get that back. I start to write something on paper, but about one or two paragraphs in, I crumple up the paper and throw it away. On a computer, I can type my thoughts, save a draft, and exit quickly before I get self-critical. What I’ve written sits, anonymous, in my computer with maybe a one-word “save as” title. I can pull it back up to work on or maybe never look at it again.
But I would really like to get back to the hand writing mode. I learned in a neurology class that hand writing — especially cursive creative writing — is a full workout for the brain. It accesses far more parts of the brain than simply typing does. You have to remember how to form the letters and how to connect them differently depending on what letter comes next. You go back and dot i and cross t whenever needed — while also remembering spelling and punctuation rules AND keeping track of your thoughts /coming up with new thoughts. All while physically using your hand and finger muscles for every word. I love everything about hand writing (and I love choosing a few perfect pens and having them on hand to switch up every so often). So I don’t know why I can’t get back to it — how to get past that crumple-after-first paragraph phase. Maybe this whole discussion will get me there.
Joan, I so encourage you to check out Lynda Barry, especially her "What It Is". She teaches at U Wisconsin at Madison and is a recent MacArthur fellow for her work in exactly what you're describing, that link between hand & brain for which science, as it turns out, has lots of proof. I was a student in one of her classes & I can't say enough good things. You can also find her on You Tube, but I'd especially recommend "What It Is"--completely hand-drawn/written/illustrated with hardly a typeset word in it, a sort of guide for your brain in the making of stories & complete with some very simple exercises that can yield surprisingly good results. Yes, she's a cartoonist but this isn't about making cartoons, it's about making stories. I, who am so not into cartoons or comics, found her approach so helpful. Maybe it'll help you, too.
I’m going to get this from the library when I’m there next week. Thank you for the recommendation… my reading list has gotten so much more interesting thanks to Story Club.
Lynda is spirited & delightful & so funny, but very serious about the physicality involved in story-making, and about stories themselves which she argues, and I do believe rightly, that they are biological, as in ingrained within us. If you're that close, you might want to see about a class with her. But do check out "What It Is", which will lead you to some of her other work.
That’s so interesting. I went through a long period of writing only by hand, then decided I should train myself to write directly onto the computer. But since this recent move, and my apparent reluctance to set up the office fully, I had to go back to writing by hand. It was awful at first—a trash can filled with crumpled paper—but now it seems to be working delightfully. Possibly because I have also been trading some work with another writer by typing into my phone some bits and pieces of stories, while handwriting other bits and pieces of it? Necessity is the parent of many things…
Answers like this from George -- his tone, his gentleness, his patience, his sharing of (often painful) personal experience -- make Story Club invaluable to me. I see myself in every question and in every answer.
The idea that we "contain many different writers" is a little bit ground breaking for me, and made some old wall in my mind come finally, fabulously tumbling down! Specifically, that there is no singular, specific "voice" in there that I need to find or hone through conscious excavation and control, but that instead, "voice" is like a chorus of all these different writers in me singing together. That's an especially helpful answer to something I've been struggling with as a person who exists at the crossroads between a lot of different identities (I'm mixed race, raised by immigrants, and working/creating in a wildly diverse set of industries), so I'm often not sure who the "writer" is in all of that. When I'm self-conscious about it, it feels like I'm bouncing around between selves, but if I take a step back to read with - as you say - the visceral part, I can see a voice emerging that is really a symphony of all those different pieces of identity and expertise... and there is a kind of magic in letting that happen. :)
I'm mixed race as well and have often felt stranded between two worlds, never entirely fitting into one or the other. This "bouncing between selves," as you say, is so familiar to me. I know this has affected my voice in life as much as it affects my "voice" on the page--at times I feel like a chameleon who can slip in and belong anywhere, at times I feel like a complete interloper. Love your comment for making me feel less alone, love George's reminder that "there is no solid self." (I sometimes repeat to myself: "I am large, I contain multitudes," from Whitman's Song of Myself. It helps! I should remember to think of it more often :))
Yes! And that chameleon-ness is actually a huge gift, because it means you can weave together so many different kinds of experiences authentically if you open to it, but it's definitely like an extended puberty of becoming, haha! Glad I'm not alone too! :)
Yes Tasha, I'm with you when you write 'the idea that we "contain many different writers" is a little bit ground breaking for me'. It has been for me in projecting a whole new way of thinking about 'The Arthurian Legend' right onto Centre of Centre Stage in my imagination..
This is a 'take a rain check / I'll get back on this' moment as I have to think of going inside, from the decking and the outside* table I'm writing from in this deep dark Broceliande August* night, to stop the little biting bug* bastards from dining on my exposed, naked ankles!
Not so much "Adieu!" as "A bientot!"
STOP PRESS
* and * and * signal edits that I've made, having retreated indoors, to my Comment as originally posted. It was just going to be to add 'bug', and most significantly remains so, because I released that all the flies, mouches and other flying insects are 'orphans'. Or may be you happen to know a fly, mouche or other flying insect that knows her or his genealogical lineage 🙀 ?
Which zips me, quicker than getting from my PC into a Zoom Meeting, back to a Joni Mitchell which having hit when I first heard has stuck close by me ever since, and I begin at its ending with Chorus 3:
My analyst told me that I was right out of my head
But I said, "Dear doctor, I think that it's you instead
Because I, I've got a thing that's unique and new
To prove it I'll have the last laugh on you
'Cause instead of one head, I got two
And you know two heads are better than one"
Oh boy, oh girl, what a gifted writer as well as chord picker and lyric warbler. FFYI the whole 'Twisted' piece is there to be read at https://genius.com/Joni-mitchell-twisted-lyrics . Enjoy? What's not to like? Go on, smile wry, we all know thanks to George, today, that we've all got, at least, two heads: 'free writer' and 'anxious editor'.
I wanted to sing this song in a talent show when I was in the fourth grade. My teacher said no. Ft Leavenworth Elementary you don't know what you missed! LOL
Oh yes David, the old curses are always the, well, 'old curses' . . .
We're not talking about 'Deadly Sins' are we?
"Much more, I suspect," said Holmes igniting his meerschaum, "this yet another case that will end up in that folder you keep under lock and key Watson."
"I'm sure, certain sure you'll turn out to be write about this Holmes" said Watson, who then dared to ask, with due timorous temerity "by the way, old chap, which folder is it that you have in mind?"
"Ah yes 'Seven'. If only there were, only, seven." Holmes said this as he sucked deep on the 'Old Shag' he'd layered and flamed in his bowl. "I see a dozen, or more likely at least a 'Boulanger's Dozen' at play in this Watson. What think you?"
"Eh? Urm? Well . . ."
"Just so Watson, the game is afoot and you've put on finger write on the pulse. Where the Dickens is our Bradley?"
Lately, I keep writing the same comment over and over here in Story Club, "these questions and answers are so good!" I had these questions as well, but didn't even know I had them until I read them.
Humor goes out the window when I get anxious, I freeze up. It's a real bummer, but...I do appreciate hearing that other people experience anxiety. "Appreciate" isn't the right word, but it helps to know others are dealing with this. Hope I can take self-conscious and keep trying to turn it into awareness.
Excellent advice all around. I suppose we all suffer with self-doubt when it comes to our writing. I know I do. (Will anyone like this; will they read it? How come no one leaves any comments? Am I any good?) I think the biggest freedom I've discovered for myself was when my mother died two years ago--I now write things I never did before. I suppose I was always holding myself back, thinking, What would Mom say if I wrote a sex scene? Stupid, I know, but it was probably something in my own psyche that was holding me back. Now, I write for myself. I edit, and hack, and chop, but I don't think about what the reader wants. I feel that someone out there will like what I write--and that's good enough for me.
I told my mom about a story idea I had once, at the beginning of college. It had some violence in it, and she winced. I saw her wince! It wasn't expecting that reaction and it stopped from writing anything with violence in it for years. But... but .... oh yes, the sway parents have, as David says below.
Do we, ever being children of our parents that we are, ever easily take responsibility for being who we are or do we, rather than cringe less than we might be under the bushels of 'sway' that our parents - we like to think, I minded to suggest - exert upon us, at least as seen from our POV?
Here following a full text of piece or writing 'On Children' that hit and stuck with me, though how well I have adopted, adapted and lived up to its ideal is for others to say:
And a woman who held a babe against her bosom said, Speak to us of Children.
And he said:
Your children are not your children.
They are the sons and daughters of Life’s longing for itself.
They come through you but not from you,
And though they are with you yet they belong not to you.
You may give them your love but not your thoughts,
For they have their own thoughts.
You may house their bodies but not their souls,
For their souls dwell in the house of tomorrow, which you cannot visit, not even in your dreams.
You may strive to be like them, but seek not to make them like you.
For life goes not backward nor tarries with yesterday.
You are the bows from which your children as living arrows are sent forth.
The archer sees the mark upon the path of the infinite, and He bends you with His might that His arrows may go swift and far.
Let your bending in the archer’s hand be for gladness;
For even as He loves the arrow that flies, so He loves also the bow that is stable.
This extract from 'The Prophet' by Khalil Gilbran can be read, better formatted than those of us who have occasion, now and then to cite excerpts from poems are accommodated on Substack , at https://poets.org/poem/children-,
That is possibly my favorite section of The Prophet. I first encountered it, with awe and delight, at about 14. It makes even more sense now. (But, can I really live it? Hope so!!)
My father was a sculptor, a powerful, gentle man. It was only after he'd died that my sister and I fully developed our creative careers. It was as though he did it for us when he was alive, or maybe we could never do it better than him, so we didn't try. Then he freed us.
Not stupid: our parents hold a huge amount of psychic sway, long after we’ve left the nest. Still negotiating with mine, now seven years gone. (I’ll know I’m as free as can be when I can bring myself to write a sex scene that includes them: a crazy conception!!)
Though I allowed my own version of my father to judge me, I also allowed the words of my actual father to guide me. He read a story I wrote when I was twenty, handed it back to me with the words, 'don't ever stop writing.'
Oh Lord, you're not alone! I tell my friends (the handful of nearest and dearest who know I write stories) that I'll think about sharing my work when my parents die, and I'm only half joking. (And I don't even write about them! At least, not exactly)
'Will anyone like these; will they even read them?' thought God as he handed the tablets of stone, onto which he'd had inscribed his long considered and oh so carefully composed Ten Commandments to Moses who'd made the long and winding trek up the mountain to take delivery.
STOP PRESS added via intervention of 'Edit'
"Like me to admit you to a secret only imaginable by 'The Cosy Cognoscenti'?
Still with me, despite the risk that comes with new knowledge?
Okay. Then I'll tell you, so long as you accept that what you are about to know can never be passed on, to anyone, under pain of termination.
You do accept. That's great.
Here's the so little known thing: the route that Moses had to take to ascend to the summit height of Mount Sinai was - so terribly long, and so terribly winding, and so terribly tiresome - that the 'Young Yet To Shave Prophet' he set off as returned to find a demographically changed population of Israelites as an 'Aged, Bearded and Veritable Ancient of Days'
And since you now know so much would you like to know more?
Okay, I'll take the nod of your head as yes and yes since you are in for penny you may as well be in for a pound.
Here you are, under pain of death to the power ten if you should tell another soul: The Beatles hot hit back in the day, yes 'The Long and Winding Road' was lifted from having a shufty at one of 'The Dead Sea Scrolls' - that had come up in one of those "Nudge, nudge, wink, wink side auctions that never happen in 'Sotheby Street' or on 'Christie Corner' - which one of 'The Fab Four', who happened to be be stashed with cash from early singles successes, decided, on the merest whim, to splash some cash.
Oh questioner! I feel you. My own "method" is painful and offends me, greatly. It is slow and sporadic and plagued by self-doubt. And I'm not really sure if what I write is ever "quite right." Some days I have to employ all kinds of trickery just to keep going! So it feels like madness to say that writing is still my favorite thing to do, that it matters and is important and worth all the time and effort (and self-doubt). Even if it goes nowhere, even if I never write anything worth sharing.
My own self-consciousness stems from a belief I've carried with me from childhood, where imperfection = failure = shame and judgment. I desparately wanted to avoid shame/judgment, which meant I had to be perfect. I've indulged in all kinds of self-sabotage, knowing that perfection doesn't exist. In high school I was a master procrastinator, waiting until the last minute to start on papers and projects (not group projects at least, because of my other great fear: letting other people down). If I got a bad grade, I could say well, that bad grade had nothing to do with my intelligence or ability--I merely didn't give myself enough time! But most times, unfortunately, my minimal efforts still worked out. I say unfortunately because in the long run, that tendency to procrastinate has done much more harm than good. The other thing I did (or do, because I'm still working on myself) was . . . nothing. I didn't even try. I have so much regret over this, over opportunities I've turned down in my life because I was . . . scared to fail? I'm glad Mary G mentioned anxiety, because anxiety's been a constant companion in my life and has had a hand in all the (poor) decisions I've made. But it's a chicken and egg situation for me. Am I self-conscious because I'm anxious, or anxious because I'm self-conscious? I don't know, and it doesn't matter. What I DO know is that everything I've done in my life that makes me proud was hard and took courage. And writing, without a doubt, takes courage.
I don't know if your issues with self-consciousness are anything like mine, but the fact that you catch yourself wondering what's the "right" thing to say in conversation makes me think: perhaps. When I'm nervous I babble and wind up putting my foot in my mouth. So I try to slow down, be more careful, but then I wind up sounding flat and inauthentic (or so I think). The same thing happens when I'm drafting. The editor/perfectionist second-guesses everything. Exercises help. Writing by hand helps. Setting a timer, like George mentioned, really helps! Though I confess: I often don't know what to do with the fragments that result from these sessions. Writing first thing in the morning, when my schedule allows it, helps. The inner editor is still sleepy! Also, and this is a tip for procrastinators, it helps to get the hardest task for your day (which, for me, is often writing) out of the way first. I've read that if you want to wake up and go for a run, you're more likely to actually do it if you leave your running clothes out and your shoes by the door. So I leave my notebook and my pen out at my table, ready to go.
But these are just some tips for getting words on the page. Overcoming self-consciousness . . . I don't know. I love George's suggestion of bargaining with that aspect of your Self. It's so gentle! But George's "self-conscious" mind is more gentle than mine as well. Mine's a total asshole who is rooting for my failure. I don't want to accept it as part of my existence! I'd much rather hunt it down and flog it into a corner somewhere. I will share one more thing (I promise) that helps me, when I'm striving for perfection and getting bogged down by it. I remember that the qualities I most love in others, the traits that most endear them to me, are their quirks, their idiosyncracies, their "imperfections." All those moments when they were most vulnerably, authentically themselves, not covered up or smoothed out by self-edits (this is what I love most about Story Club comments). I suspect that "Perfect," whatever that is, is not very interesting, or lovable. And so I let my idea of "perfect" go (for thirty minutes, at least :)).
I love all of this, Manami. I used to tell my kids all of the time that normal is boring. When I met my current husband, he actually told me that i had innumerable flaws! And that he loved all of them. And i know that i love flawed people the best, as well.
Thank you so much Mary, and your kids were so lucky to hear this from you! I know I'll say it to my daughter, I only hope she truly believes it.
Motherhood has been a wonderful opportunity to address a lot of anxiety and self-consciousness and let it go. Oh it's hard at times, because certain patterns of thinking are so familiar and comfortable, even if they make me miserable. And I hate that those patterns pop up in my creative life. The twin sister to feeling self-conscious while writing for me is never feeling that something is good enough to be done. And it's not a writing problem as much as it's a me problem, so it can't really be solved with an exercise, I don't think. The GOOD news about me problems is I know I made them for myself, so I should technically be able to unmake them.
Innumerable flaws here, too! And somehow I've still managed to get people to love me :). Thanks for reading and being here, Mary.
“And somehow I’ve still managed to get people to love me.” Those are such wondrous words! You are lovable! And I completely understand the comfort in the familiarity of misery. I spent most of my life not understanding that feeling bad was my norm and so it felt comfortable and even safe (though it was neither). Sounds so crazy in black and white on the page. Well flawed people are the most interesting people. (Motherhood only made me more anxious. So I’m happy to hear it’s helping you let go.)
Congratulations on the audiobook, George! It was wonderful to hear you read 'Liberation Day' - there is always something surreal about hearing an author narrate their work, like peeking behind the curtain and finding the Great Oz and seeing other layers of meaning and nuance.
I was also very happy - or, you know, less defeated - to read that your inner critic hits full volume at the 3/5 mark! It's exactly the same for me - I get to that point and I look back and my inner critic says, 'What is the point of all this? What have all these words accomplished? There is nothing unique here, nothing profound, nothing...' etc, etc, etc. I think it's partly because the novelty has worn off (I've been with the story and voice and characters for so long and the honeymoon period has worn off and whereas once they felt full of colour, now they feel kind of beige), partly because there's a weight and a bulk to what has already been written and my grand plans and ambitions and aspirations for this story haven't exactly come to fruition, and partly because it's at that point of the story where it all has to come together and make sense - the carnival ride is over kid, now you gotta walk on your shaky legs down those stairs and back to the ground. The journey is nice and all, but the destination is what you've paid the money for. (I'm pretty sure you've touched on something similar before - the punchline to the joke: the set-up is great, but it's the punchline they'll remember (which is why I'm forever stuffing up jokes much to the exasperated and wry amusement of everyone I know)).
Maybe, it's also partly that I start getting impatient towards the end. The new story ideas I've put aside are calling louder, I'm craving the 'new romance' of a different story and characters and voice, I'm tired by constantly wrestling with these other characters and story threads that just wait around for me to figure out their lives like ungrateful children (sort yourselves out! I'm tired!) - and I feel myself starting to maybe just dial it in. My writing gets lazier, which frustrates me, which puts the brakes on writing another sentence until I discipline that lazy sentence and force it back into shape. And maybe the laziness stems from that original 3/5 thinking of 'this book isn't great/as great as I hoped it would be', so why am I wasting time on it? Plus writing the ending is harder, which takes more discipline, when my writing discipline is already ebbing. Ah Yossarian, another Catch 22.
I like how your post encourages our visceral side to step forward. I think that's a big part of the solution - to find enjoyment in the story and in the writing, and to follow the threads that maintain that enjoyment. Maybe I just have to fall in love with my story again.
Dear questioner--thanks for your interesting question. I agree with George--20,000 words a year toward a novel is pretty good, probably about average for literary work. My own novel (82,000 words) took me about four years to write, and I wasted a lot of that time fretting about the process instead of just getting on with it. What you're referring to as self-consciousness sounds like something akin to doubt, a feeling endemic among creative people. George, as usual, has given great advice about embracing the feeling and learning to use it. I wish Story Club existed four years ago.
PS: It took William Gass twenty-six years to write his novel, "The Tunnel."
"I wasted a lot of that time fretting about the process instead of just getting on with it."
Or maybe, alternative way of seeing the same - developmental - timeline of incidents, events and epochs:
"I spent a lot of that time figuring out the process and just getting on with it, best I could as and when progress along my learning personal learning curve let me."
Dear questioner - it’s really a great question and George provides a sensational answer. I love writing process - it’s my jam as they say. If it takes you a year to get your 20,000 words then so be it. There are so many factors that could make that output more or less. But you’re in the game and producing. I’m not a fast writer myself and I work in an industry where people crank out words far more quickly than I do. Sometimes I’ll get up and say, “okay, today I spit out 5 articles” and it’s like the day before. Just 1, or half of one and an outline for another.
But here’s what I’ve learned about process (prewriting, outlining/planning, drafting, revising, editing) - you can’t park your car before you drive it. Editing is about getting that car placed just so. Drafting is the driving. Prewriting and planning are kicking the tires and revving the engine before throwing it into drive.
I used to have to have all my thinking in place before placing a single word on the page. I’d Painstakingly produce a “perfect” introduction and then write frantically because the deadline was upon me. I always had just enough time to rewrite that carefully produced intro to match the hastily rushed paper. So much for all that careful planning and thinking.
It took a while. But I’ve learned to play early in the process of writing. Now writing is fun. Revising is where the writing really happens for me. And editing is a more technical challenge and equally as fun.
I always love chatting writing process if you care to get in touch.
I love this driving analogy. It's funny to me how apt it is. I can recall to this day the feeling I had on the second day of driver's ed (30 odd years ago!). The second class was the first one where we had to take the car on the road. My reaction was a shocked, "Drive? On the actual road?!"
And I kinda still feel that way about writing. hahaha (god help me)
Haha. Thanks. Yeah, same with driver’s Ed. The very first time I tried to drive (innocent eye roll), it was a week before Christmas, and I borrowed my sisters car for an around the block joyride when I was barely 15. Well, I turned the wrong way and kept going and shortly thereafter jumped a curb on a corner lot and, thump-thump, landed atop two trees.
There’s a story there. (I could put it on my own substack as I embark next week on a road trip, a cross country driving move.)
So when drivers Ed rolled around, I was tentative. The teacher had to reach his foot over and press on the gas for me to go faster So embarrassing.
I’ve never had an accident - though I’ve been rear-ended 3 times.
You hit the nail on the head for me when you said "play early in the process of writing." After all, am I writing because I'm in the gulag and forced to do it every day, (and if I am, how did I get there?) or because it's a process of creation that allows me to play without a strict set of rules? No question--that judging, critical self-consciousness loves to creep in and spoil the game, but the ongoing process dilutes its potency as I put pen to paper and practice. Thanks to all for your great comments, and of course, thanks to George for generating this conversation!
Yes! That critical self-doubt self talk will always be there in some form. It’s the same critical voice that praises as well as damns. But that doesn’t mean you have to listen to it.
For me, play is part of every stage of the writing process. Can I make this “whatever it is I’m making” - better, more beautiful, speak to others as it’s speaking to me?
I’m reminded of small children who talk to their toys, throw tea parties with adult conversations for their dolls and rocks and toy trucks - and it’s so real to them. That’s the kind of play that leads to seeing things differently.
Sometimes it’s almost as if I can see George having those very same conversations as he’s writing his stories - what if this caveman and woman in this diorama were able to talk? What if .... they were real? What if ... this was their job!
What if, indeed.
The play’s the thing. ... (okay, that sounds a little familiar). 😏
I am hugely struck by how different we all are, yet how the same. Maybe that's what our writing struggle is - to use our difference for something original but then use our sameness to connect.
Like many here, I'm a walker, but for different reasons. Reading Mary G's comments on anxiety, got me thinking about my own neurodiversity - I'm bi-polar - this seems to manifest in the opposite of anxiety, or even self-consciousness, with my writing. A similar challenge for different reasons. I storm away, loving what I'm writing, launching off on tangents, revelling in my characters complexity and wit, do a quick edit, which it doesn't need, because it's brilliant, and send it off. Only to be faced with complete disinterest or confusion. Wonder why...
The same in conversation, unlike our brave questioner, (I'm jealous of your self awareness btw) I'll launch confidently into any conversation, missing the point, alienating people and generally messing it up, sometimes only realising years later.
So George's writing, these comments, and Story Club in particular have helped enormously. Helped me to recognise I need to nurture my quiet, calm, rational editor self, helped me to understand that seeing things from the other perspective, be it reader or audience, is vital. I need more awareness, not less. Like others, I walk to get away from the bit of me that comes easily and find the bit that is more illusive.
I hope one day to get to the point where I don't end up explaining my work, but can just listen to people talking about what it means to them.
Noticing my reader self is new for me, and I've learnt that here. Listening to George's excerpt, I allowed my confusion to sit quietly and wait, and as I got less confused, I felt myself wanting more and more to laugh, until the pennies all dropped at once and I laughed out loud.
Fantastic advice, thank you George! Much to mull over, and to PLAY with. (I forget sometimes that it all works better if only I would check my serious demeanor when I pick up the pen and just, like, play, like I’m still a child—oh, wait...I am still a child! I should make the most of that!!)
And great to hear you reading the intriguing opening of “Liberation Day.”
Maybe it's because I'm handwriting my draft or maybe it's a personality thing, but my problem is a little different. I can turn that self-conscious voice off while writing or successfully ignore it. But once I put the pen down, it's paralyzing. The voice makes it so hard to pick the pen up again. Any thoughts or suggestions, Story Club community?
Andrew, If this helps any, I have a cartoon character that I keep at hand & which I look to whenever I need help quelling the voice(s) & bleeding off an attack of the willies. The drawing is of a very large woman in one of those cheap flowered rayon dresses. She has a pin head, frizzled hair & wears a smashed hat. Her ankles are fat, her shoes are too tight & she doesn't carry her pocketbook so much as she wields it, like a weapon. Her face is pinched, like an apple gone bad, and even if she's only two-dimensional, you can feel the judgement coming off her like an electrical current. Her name, which I gave her, is Mrs. Gorgonula Honyak. (Gorgonula for the Gorgons, those ancient terrors, and Honyak because its displeasing assonance was close enough for me & seemed a fit.) Below her disagreeable & zaftig self reads this caption: "I came, I criticized, I left." Whenever I get into trouble, such as you describe, with writing, I haul her out, we have a little bit of a screaming match, wherein I do most of the talking, then I slam her back into the drawer from whence she came (and where she lives with her beaten-down husband & their wayward son, but that's another story). She comes and she criticizes me all right (never at my invitation & never with any good suggestions, of course), but then, at my insistence & once exhaustion has set in for us both, she leaves, after which I'm always lighter & in for a laugh. If it will help you any, I believe she is available for "consultations." God knows, she works cheap. Let me know if you could use a laugh & I'll send her over.
Love this! And pretty sure I had Mrs. Honyak as a high school English teacher! She sounded just like the Jon Lovitz-voiced cartoon character from The Critic ("IT STINKS").
Hi Andrew. What's going on when you put down that pen? Suddenly a voice appears and tells you what you wrote is terrible? Is that what's going on? I have a couple of suggestions--no idea if they are helpful for you. But here goes:
If you are writing a short story, then the trick is to write the whole thing in one fell swoop. Like, don't stop until you have one entire shitty draft. You can leave out sections, you can write "paragraph here about the gunshot" as a filler section, you can have a character just disappear, you can write "blah blah blah" in place of dialogue--whatever it takes to finish a draft. Then you can tell yourself you wrote an entire story and now you can simply.....rewrite it. You have something to work with. That "creative editor" voice that tells you that what you just wrote is terrible can just go away because you already KNOW it's terrible. All drafts are terrible! Writing is all rewriting, not drafting.
If you're not writing a short story, but something longer, then instead of completing a story, complete a section, a scene or a chapter, as I said before. Just write it and leave it. Then, when you pick up the pen again, don't even look back at what you wrote. Start in anew, writing away in the same carefree fill-in-the-blanks section as before. The parts don't have to flow one to another. Maybe you write the ending now. Or maybe you write a section that is a weird tangent that you hadn't planned.
Do you see what I mean? You are so lucky to not be stopped while writing. You have to trick yourself I think by KNOWING that what you've already written is of no consequence. It's all going to be re-written anyway.
Thanks mary. You're right, I need to be more comfortable with it being terrible at first. Most of the time, I'm dropping the pen because I'm out of time. It has nothing to do with The Voice. It's a longer project, so it's between sessions that The Voice becomes a problem. I tend to start talking my way out of the project, telling myself that no one wants to read it, that I have no idea where it's going or whether it's valuable. I'd just listen and stop, but The Voice isn't alone. The characters in the project and the idea of the project keep popping up in my head, trying to work their way into existence. Neither side of the equation will leave me alone, honestly.
Sounds like you actually very much want to write it. Your characters (which are you) keep talking to you, urging you on. But your fear voice worries the book will suck and no one will read it. Why not just write KNOWING the book will suck? Release the pressure! Write freely and badly and arm in arm with your characters. All will be well! You’ll have a perfectly bad first draft to work with—just like all writers, everywhere.
Those two sides of the equation are what drives artists mad, I think. You try to do it, it’s never good enough. You try to give it up, and it won’t leave you alone. The only ways out are death, or madness, or lobotomy, or maybe some kind of good-humored acceptance of the insanity of this crazy calling!
I am totally in the “all writing is revising” camp as well, Mary, complete with notes and sidebars to fill in bits and pieces here and there as you go along.
That sounds like great advice. I can remember, back when it was just me, writing for hours at a time. Now if I can squeeze out enough time to get a page and a half in one stretch it’s some kind of victory. But maybe it will get much better in another year or two…(Kindergarten! First grade! Holy time loop, Batman!!!!)
Hi Andrew - I suppose, guided by George, just because picking up the pen again is difficult, doesn't mean you should use that as the reason not to do it, but know it will be difficult, when you do it, but do it.
Also, I wonder if you should try letting that ruthless, critical, editor self loose on the work. Let it cut and change, slash and burn, and see if what it leaves you with is better or worse. Maybe it's a hugely positive part of your writer self. And maybe when it has exhausted itself with the free reign it has been given, it will shut up and let your write the next bit. Then it will be hungry again...
Send negative Nelly to the corner. Make those critical voices do a good job. It's like a writing workshop - there's always that one who criticizes, but not helpfully. But if you're trying to get helpful feedback on a work, sometimes you have to insist from your responders to comment helpfully. Ask that critical voice if they can contribute anything to the conversation that helps. If not, be gone with you!
Avoid writing. Try not to think about it. Whatever happens, don’t pick up that pen…unless, and until, you can’t stand it any longer.
That’s one way. I have a similar problem. I have heard that many writers stop at a cliffhanging moment so they can’t wait to get back to it. It helps me to go for a walk or take a long bath, to leave my normal consciousness for a while. Also, having a small time-eating child around focuses mind and time.
This was SO helpful: Thank you, George! I especially appreciate the different parts inside, and the visceral, the knowing in your body intuition and the generosity—YAY. I love this approach to riding the emotional roller coaster not only of writing, but of being human. Is there a Story Club book being put together? A sequel to "Swim in a Pond"? Or one focused on Writing Advice for Living?
I always think of Story Club AS the sequel or continuation of "A Swim in a Pond in the Rain." But yes, there are so many new ideas here to be captured.
Knowing your interests in drama Angela, and George's delight in drawing out lessons from looking at iconic pieces, I'm imagining that a J B Priestly stage classic might feed into a future Saunderian short story which could give title to a fresh collection, how about 'The Death Cleaner Calls'?
I've been reading through these early postings in 'Chronological' sequence, so posted my comment in reply to Niall above before reading you Nancy. I do you like* your advice 'head for pencil any time I feel stuck' 🧱🧱🧱🧱🧱 < first five bricks in a building writer's wall in that place we all know: 'STUCKSVILLE'
* thought 'like' but didn't type it, hence the 'Edit'
Lovely, beautiful, self-conscious, and brave questioner: As always, George has given you a deeply thoughtful answer, full of wisdom, and with workable ideas to actively manage your inner voices. If what he says speaks to you, that is wonderful. I have something to add here from my personal experience that may or may not be helpful. Ignore my words entirely if I am simply off-base.
You mention that when you are in a conversation, inside your head you are thinking about what to say, and after you speak, you wonder if what you just said was quite right. I used to do this. With certain (if not most) people, I would think about what I was about to say, then I would say it, then I would analyze what I just said—all while the conversation was ongoing. It was deeply exhausting. I think many people do this same thing, but not to the extent that my own head went through these mental machinations. It was like trying to solve sixteen difficult math problems all at the same time, with a teacher yelling at me the whole time, no, no, you idiot, what are you doing???—and pretending that no such thing was occurring. Is this what you mean? If not, then no need to read on. If so, then what I think you may have, dear questioner, is anxiety. And not regular anxiety like many people have, but perhaps the debilitating kind. Anxiety of the kind I am speaking of here can ruin a person’s life. I know because I have been there. The constant analysis—which comes from fear—often left me paralyzed. At times, it was easier to simply stay home than venture out the door and make human contact, where I would invariably fuck up in some way I never meant to. Then, I’d come home, think think think, and start the apologies. OY.
George talks very rightly about sending the voices away and then inviting them back in. But an anxious person has a terribly hard time doing this. It makes writing a kind of personal nightmare. You have so many thoughts—an anxious person has SO many thoughts—and you want to put them down so badly. But the anxiety has moved in and will not budge, no matter how nicely you ask it to leave or how much you accept that it is a part of you, or how kind you are to yourself for being who you are. The anxiety just sucks. And your writing? How can a person write when those voices are mocking and strutting and saying terrible things?
So, how to get rid of it? Grasshopper, that is the million dollar question. Getting older helps, but who wants to wait? I’m guessing you know all of the usual ways: taking a tiny anti-depressant, exercising, meditating, therapy. I’ve done all of these and yes, they all help—sort of. The biggest help, for me, is daily walking. No headphones. No walking companion. Just me and the sidewalk and my legs moving briskly. Yes, my mind goes a bit crazy and ruminates while I walk, but it also gets into a bit of a rhythm with the rumination. The main thing is that when I get back home—I walk for one hour—I have moved my body and now it’s okay to sit for awhile. I don’t have to feel anxious about sitting. I can sit with my computer and not feel like I’m supposed to be doing something else. (I also take the aforementioned teeny medication.)
George suggests you find a way to use your self-consciousness, which I’m calling anxiety. I wish anxiety really were a super power that you could put to good use. But anxiety doesn’t have any good sides. It just does not. You can welcome it and ask it to sit down for tea and you can say, please be quiet please, but your anxiety is rarely quieted that way. To my way of thinking, you need to get rid of it. (I realize this is a radical departure from George’s comments. Forgive me, all.) So this last suggestion may sound ridiculous, but honest to god, positive affirmations help. I read from a couple little books every day—one is from al anon and the other from another twelve step program—and damn if those little daily prayers don’t often speak directly to my heart and help me calm down and love myself. Love is the opposite of fear, you know. Positive affirmations about your own strengths and abilities help. I used to think they were so dumb, but I don’t anymore. You don't have to be a 12 step person to get something out of these little kinds of books, by the way. Reading positive thoughts is simply helpful, no matter who you are.
The other thing that helps is focus. When you reach a true zen state of focus and the world falls away, then the anxiety lifts as well. But how to reach this state when writing? I find that if I approach my writing as a puzzle to be solved, then I can more easily focus. So, any kind of constraint really helps. Telling yourself that in the next paragraph you will insert a certain three words is a good little game. Writing three sentences in a row of 20 words each is a good little game. Writing a paragraph in one long sentence is a good little game. Anything that forces you to concentrate on an additional level to the content of your story raises your mind game and forces away the outside voices. We can only concentrate on a few things at once! And then, later, you can rewrite, delete, whatever. All first drafts suck, that is all there is to it. So inserting little games is helpful and you don’t have to keep any of it later.
Good luck to you. I feel for you. I hope the anxiety drops away and leaves you be. In the meantime, please know that there are so many people out here in the world who deal with anxiety and understand how debilitating it can be to one’s life.
Huge apologies if I am off base with this comment. You may not be anxious at all! xo
This is a really good point Mary. I have anxiety and recognised the poster's tendency to analyse every conversation straight away. Like you I take a little medication, exercise, meditate, etc. It all helps but the anxiety is something I accept and live with. Of course it's going to try and sabotage my writing. I like your idea of an hour's walking first thing and coming home with a clear head to sit at your desk. I swim in the Irish Sea all year round and that, more than anything, has helped me to live more peacefully with my anxious mind. It's impossible to think at all when you're catching your breath in freezing water!
Fabulous solution. In the water we are freed from so many burdens.
Thank you for your comment, Allyson. A swim in the Irish Sea sounds amazing (and yes, freezing)!
Yes! The debilitating chatter of my mind held me prisoner for many years (childhood, teens, twenties, and so on…), and using bits of everything you mentioned has helped me so much - probably the medication and walking most of all, but also meditation and reading. And now that I’m in my 40s and a mother, I just seem to not give a shit about listening to that part of my mind as much, either. I just got SO TIRED of it. I have finally achieved enough separation to ignore its haranguing - most days at least. It’s not as easy on nights I’m awake in bed at 3 am. How is it able to get so loud at that hour?
I used to spend a lot of time wondering which was the REAL me. The critical voice or the other one who felt bullied by the critical voice. I like George’s description of them being in two different offices, each having their role and purpose, and finding ways to use both of them. It’s not a battle, it’s is a collaboration.
But I fully agree with you, Mary. There is self-conscious anxiety that everyone has from time to time, and there is Anxiety with a capital A. The latter is a beast and no one should feel like they need to just toughen up and pull themselves up by their bootstraps to get over it.
It takes so much time and work to be able to slam the door shut in the face of the oppressor within. But what a relief to get there.
Thank you for this, Sara. I remember the 3 a.m. wide awake moments, those voices yammering on and on. The two things that helped me the very most were having my children grow up and leave, and simply getting older. But neither was in my control over the years of high anxiety. Well, somehow, I got through. But it wasn’t easy.
Those voices! George nails it--the parts that seem destructive but in fact think they have a helpful role to play. Sometimes they do. This is a quintessentially George piece on compassion and understanding.
Here's what I would add: I suffer when I use (or read others using) words like "good" or "bad" to assess what I am writing. I'm a good writer, I'm a bad writer, that's a good sentence, that's a bad sentence. Probably the "self-conscious" part. Carry too much judgment, too much a part of the "compete in order to be famous" mindset that can plague us. How about "that phrase exactly nails what I meant to convey about that character" or "that passage is flat, I want to get the feeling back in it." Even, "I'm confused about this character." Do you see? These latter are also assessing, but they are constructive, creative, meaningful for the writer.
Ahh, another walker. I am a walker as well, looking forward to Seattle walks. No headphones, no phones - I keep it in my pocket because it tracks my steps. I don't even listen to music when I exercise. I want to immerse myself in my surroundings, zone out or zone in if the environment calls for it. I *do* listen to music, but I engage with it. For me, it's sailing that really gets me to that zen state. So looking forward to getting back to the water.
Lee I am on my way to Magnuson park at this very moment to jump in the lake! Your soon to be hood!
So looking forward to that, mary. Enjoy your jump in the lake! I’ve got my year planned out. Plan to spend much time at Magnuson with the dachshund at the off-leash park and dog beach, at Sand Point for sailing (I’d love to get a job there), and writing time at Hugo House. So much to do! Exploring the national parks and woodland areas. Not long now - we hit the road on the 24th.
The perfect Seattle lifestyle! I hope the drive is enjoyable. (I swam for hours today in the lake.Heaven.)
That sounds so invigorating!
As someone who has anxiety this is spot on. I avoid the terms "suffers from," "dealing with," etc. from my descriptions now. Anxiety for me is biological. I just have these weather systems in my body that can be exacerbated by the environment or my attempts to manage them. I had to give up the idea that it would ever go away completely, but I could learn to live with it like a wild animal pacing the room -- don't provoke; don't attempt to tame; just let it be wild. Walking meditation works for me and looking back on my early years I realize how much of my wandering was walking through the anxiety -- burning off adrenaline and opening myself to the dialogue in my mind. It was becoming a parent and professional that began to limit my ability to work out the anxiety on my own that left me with the problem of anxiety attacks.
For too long, I waited for my anxiety to be cured before I could focus on writing. But it was when I started writing again that I realized writing itself was the walk in the desert that I craved. I could get into a flow state and keep moving through the anxiety. Key to that was allowing myself permission to be terrible, incoherent, and inconsistent. The one voice I allow in my head is, "Keep going." The goal is to see where this is all going. And the deal I made with the beast was, "When I'm done you can eat this work instead of me."
Keep going. That is the all and everything.
The alpha and the omega; the alphabet omelette.
Love this. Thank you, Kevin. Sitting down and writing ameliorates much of my anxiety. Walking, hiking, riding a bike or swimming helps with the rest of it.
I love your ideas about anxiety Mary G. One more idea that helped me while walking was to list all the things I was grateful for. On a bad day my list might start like this: 1.) This green grass I am looking at 2.) The person who planted those lovely peonies 3). My hair is not falling out 4) I am able to walk... and so on from small to large.. I could walk miles and not repeat any items and it is hard to stay anxious or sad when doing this.
Yes absolutely. I wanted to mention gratitude as well but stopped myself from writing even more than I already did. Thank you for bringing it up. It absolutely helps in a huge way. And nature is soothing. Getting outside is key.
Stop stopping yourself, please :)
Ha! Thank you, David.
Hi Mary! I am wondering if one can take steps to lessen anxiety while simultaneously using it artfully? I suppose it’s a matter of degree. A little neuroticism goes a long way, but too much will result in paralysis. A razor edge. I like all of your suggestions. Fear and anxiety drive much of what I write, as I attempt to tilt toward understanding and love. (Those anxiety-reducing games sound delightful!)
This is a good question. I suppose that lessening anxiety is what i have done through medication and exercise, among other things. And then I guess I am using it artfully, as you say, because it is still there, it is still “me,” and I’m creating through it, or despite it. It’s complicated, and a struggle that comes and goes. As far as those exercises, I’m just a huge fan of constraints when I need them.
❤️
I’d also recommend writing by hand. Something about the rhythms, and the way the words don’t glare back at you crystal clear like they do on a computer screen (unless you have ultra discernible handwriting) has always proved helpful for me. Also, as an added bonus, if some part of you doesn’t have or feel the energy to translate it, it’s usually less an indicative sign of laziness I’ve found as knowing that the stuff you’ve written lacks that heat, or fire, or passion. In which case, just throw it away!
I’ve also found that, strangely enough, I’m usually more honest when handwriting rather than typing. Also, it’s interesting to note how constraints on prose forces you to work in a different rhythm or language. I’m a fast typer, but when I hand write it forces a constraint of slowness and time that produces maybe more finely honed prose. (Curious if typewriters are the same way)
I am fascinated by the difference between writing by hand vs by keyboard. Definitely activating different regions of the brain. (And wondering about the different synaptic connections when playing a piano, versus a guitar, cello, saxophone or trumpet? Or singing?)
My handwriting is so . . . difficult. I write some notes by hand, or when I'm working through a problem, but I used my handwriting for grading for so many years that it's all mixed up with a different more analytical process than a creative one. So I guess I've developed my creative typing muscles. I'm in year three of learning guitar after a lifetime of piano. Relearning music theory - and I'm finding that my brain is taping into my piano brain while thinking of notes. It's quite fascinating to watch my guitar learning brain translate the piano brain to figure it all out!
Wow. I picked up guitar and piano both when I was 16 and 17, so they feel somewhat interchangeable. Haven’t become any kind of virtuoso at either, but I’d like to, someday!
I’m sure you play better than I do. I love the piano but I wasn’t given a good foundation. With the guitar, I’m approaching it with the idea of play and I’m enjoying it so much! Didn’t think my “piano fingers” would ever be able to do that on strings. I find learning music enhances my creative process for when I’m writing.
Music and drawing both! I love listening to songs and working out the melodies and chord progressions, where I can. (Zeppelin can be befuddling…)
I agree, Erik, writing by hand helps. See also Lynda Barry, a big proponent of writing by hand, especially her wonderfully helpful "What It Is". As she often says: In the digital age, don't forget to use your digits!
Writing by hand helps get me out of the analytical mode. I've used to it to get to know characters better and find out why the story is stuck. Most often it's stuck because I don't know the characters well enough or I'm trying to make them do something they wouldn't do. I rarely translated it back to the word document, unless I feel that it fits. I often rarely reread what I've written by hand as well. It's more like having a conversation with the story, which helps shut off that hypercritical part of my brain.
Great to see this conversation. There are actual studies that establish that the connection between hand, pen, heart, mind is a thing. Can’t remember the names of the papers , but I may be able to retrieve it. I love fountain pens. There is nothing like the flow of ink onto a page. To slow down the mind try calligraphy. Great practices .
I agree! Writing by hand works for me when I'm stuck because it looks less like a "real" book than when I type it. So who cares if I cross off big sections, or change POV a few times, or suddenly pull myself out of the narrative to free write about what I want the book to be doing, even? It's ok for the story itself to be messy if it's literally messy, my handwriting, ink smears, in a spiral-bound notebook I bought for $1.
Julie, I like reading that you experiment while you write. I do, too, and I find that it frees me up to explore and not get stuck in whatever ways that self-conscious mind wants to take control.
Oh yeah, definitely. If I write out "wait, is this story too much like this other story I wrote? Is it too much like this story someone else wrote?" and explore that, I can break it down rationally. But if I THINK "is this story like the others" without getting it on paper, my brain is likely to follow up with "you're a pretty bad writer, can't even come up with something original" and continue down that nasty path.
The idea of originality is a slippery creature. Sometimes I can’t tell whether it’s muse or bogeyman.
Yes, it seems like the thing to do is to keep on writing and save the judgment until later. Or...stop and leave it for awhile. Both are working well for me these days.
But it does seem that, as George and others have pointed out, when we allow our innate selves out of the hide bound box, originality is a given.
Now THATS an amazingly good idea…..
I thought that was you, but wasn't sure. Good to have you back, Kate!
Thanks!
Hey Kate! so glad you are still here.
Thank you! I’ve had a bit of a difficult time recently. And thus not posting. But your message warms my heart ❤️
hope things improve or are improving for you, Kate.
Seconding that!
Several of us were hoping you were about to post. Great to know you are here!
For decades, I would write by hand every morning... a few pages. I think it was mostly to find out/get to the bottom of what I woke up feeling or thinking about... having a guess that my very first thoughts would meander around and get off track and back again and that was okay. I always had the feeling this writing would lead somewhere... as in lead to an at-peace feeling at the end, like the breathless end of a good run or long walk. If I were working on a story, I always knew where I'd left off the day before, and if some writing happened where I thought... oh, I might be able to use that... I'd draw a border around it. Then if this were a day where I could write more and not have to go to work, I'd go out and walk in Riverside Park along the water, come back, sit at the computer and read the story from the beginning 'til I got to the where I stopped... then I'd type in the written words from my notebook - no editing... then go on writing the story and go back a edit later...
Then at some point my handwriting started to deteriorate... yes, there were physical reasons for this, (not so relevant here), but even though I still often hand-write in the morning, I can almost never read this back, even 2 minutes after writing it ... if I feel oh I want to read this later... I will hand print it...
So I do now sometimes write first thoughts non the computer... And it's okay... but, ah yes, it is different!
Handwriting a first draft has its advantages and disadvantages. Advantage: no backspace button. It encourages the delay of the editing process. Disadvantage: speed. It takes longer. That's been my experience, anyway.
Yes - it seems so... physical a change... how can it be any different whether writing on a keyboard or with a pen... but it really does make a difference for me being able to just.... WRITE
Better still, write with pencil, the words from our brain carbons flowing slow, dripping softly down through the limb carbons of our arm and hands, settling then drizzling words from the carbon tip of the poised pencil lead precisely held between svelte carbons of finger tips: smooth, suave drizzle or unruly, stormy drizzle the page awaits either - or some other form scratching or scribbling - with equanimity . . . until the page has been writ from mind to reading matter, turned over, and a fresh page teed for the writing to flow on.
Gorgeous! What about the Marquis de Sade, bereft of quills, writing a novel in his own blood: that is true commitment!
There's this cartoon which depicts two Knights in shinning armor: One lays slain on the ground, sword still in hand. The other holds a huge fountain pen dipped in blood with which he writes: "The Pen is mightier than the Sword"
Love that.
I'm so happy to read this Office Hours discussion.
Re: writing by hand. Many years ago, I wrote everything by hand. I’d end up with cross-outs, word changes, long curving arrows; the whole page, while messy, was the history of my thought process. Sometimes an entire page would only yield two or three sentences. But it was freeing and fun, and I would find myself in kind of a time-warp while I worked.
My problem is I can’t seem to get that back. I start to write something on paper, but about one or two paragraphs in, I crumple up the paper and throw it away. On a computer, I can type my thoughts, save a draft, and exit quickly before I get self-critical. What I’ve written sits, anonymous, in my computer with maybe a one-word “save as” title. I can pull it back up to work on or maybe never look at it again.
But I would really like to get back to the hand writing mode. I learned in a neurology class that hand writing — especially cursive creative writing — is a full workout for the brain. It accesses far more parts of the brain than simply typing does. You have to remember how to form the letters and how to connect them differently depending on what letter comes next. You go back and dot i and cross t whenever needed — while also remembering spelling and punctuation rules AND keeping track of your thoughts /coming up with new thoughts. All while physically using your hand and finger muscles for every word. I love everything about hand writing (and I love choosing a few perfect pens and having them on hand to switch up every so often). So I don’t know why I can’t get back to it — how to get past that crumple-after-first paragraph phase. Maybe this whole discussion will get me there.
Joan, I so encourage you to check out Lynda Barry, especially her "What It Is". She teaches at U Wisconsin at Madison and is a recent MacArthur fellow for her work in exactly what you're describing, that link between hand & brain for which science, as it turns out, has lots of proof. I was a student in one of her classes & I can't say enough good things. You can also find her on You Tube, but I'd especially recommend "What It Is"--completely hand-drawn/written/illustrated with hardly a typeset word in it, a sort of guide for your brain in the making of stories & complete with some very simple exercises that can yield surprisingly good results. Yes, she's a cartoonist but this isn't about making cartoons, it's about making stories. I, who am so not into cartoons or comics, found her approach so helpful. Maybe it'll help you, too.
I’m going to get this from the library when I’m there next week. Thank you for the recommendation… my reading list has gotten so much more interesting thanks to Story Club.
Wow -- I will check it out. If she's at UW Madison she's almost my neighbor, too. Thank you!
Lynda is spirited & delightful & so funny, but very serious about the physicality involved in story-making, and about stories themselves which she argues, and I do believe rightly, that they are biological, as in ingrained within us. If you're that close, you might want to see about a class with her. But do check out "What It Is", which will lead you to some of her other work.
Thank you for all of this!!
You're very welcome!
That’s so interesting. I went through a long period of writing only by hand, then decided I should train myself to write directly onto the computer. But since this recent move, and my apparent reluctance to set up the office fully, I had to go back to writing by hand. It was awful at first—a trash can filled with crumpled paper—but now it seems to be working delightfully. Possibly because I have also been trading some work with another writer by typing into my phone some bits and pieces of stories, while handwriting other bits and pieces of it? Necessity is the parent of many things…
Answers like this from George -- his tone, his gentleness, his patience, his sharing of (often painful) personal experience -- make Story Club invaluable to me. I see myself in every question and in every answer.
The idea that we "contain many different writers" is a little bit ground breaking for me, and made some old wall in my mind come finally, fabulously tumbling down! Specifically, that there is no singular, specific "voice" in there that I need to find or hone through conscious excavation and control, but that instead, "voice" is like a chorus of all these different writers in me singing together. That's an especially helpful answer to something I've been struggling with as a person who exists at the crossroads between a lot of different identities (I'm mixed race, raised by immigrants, and working/creating in a wildly diverse set of industries), so I'm often not sure who the "writer" is in all of that. When I'm self-conscious about it, it feels like I'm bouncing around between selves, but if I take a step back to read with - as you say - the visceral part, I can see a voice emerging that is really a symphony of all those different pieces of identity and expertise... and there is a kind of magic in letting that happen. :)
I'm mixed race as well and have often felt stranded between two worlds, never entirely fitting into one or the other. This "bouncing between selves," as you say, is so familiar to me. I know this has affected my voice in life as much as it affects my "voice" on the page--at times I feel like a chameleon who can slip in and belong anywhere, at times I feel like a complete interloper. Love your comment for making me feel less alone, love George's reminder that "there is no solid self." (I sometimes repeat to myself: "I am large, I contain multitudes," from Whitman's Song of Myself. It helps! I should remember to think of it more often :))
Yes! And that chameleon-ness is actually a huge gift, because it means you can weave together so many different kinds of experiences authentically if you open to it, but it's definitely like an extended puberty of becoming, haha! Glad I'm not alone too! :)
What a great phrase! Title of your next book.
Yes! Haha! That's absolutely that's gunna be the title
What a lovely title!! So many of us would relate, on so many levels.
“An extended puberty of becoming.” Love that so much!
Better to be lost in many selves than stuck in one! Then the many are free to connect with one another.
Yay you, Tasha! As Whitman had it: "I am large, I contain multitudes."
Yes Tasha, I'm with you when you write 'the idea that we "contain many different writers" is a little bit ground breaking for me'. It has been for me in projecting a whole new way of thinking about 'The Arthurian Legend' right onto Centre of Centre Stage in my imagination..
This is a 'take a rain check / I'll get back on this' moment as I have to think of going inside, from the decking and the outside* table I'm writing from in this deep dark Broceliande August* night, to stop the little biting bug* bastards from dining on my exposed, naked ankles!
Not so much "Adieu!" as "A bientot!"
STOP PRESS
* and * and * signal edits that I've made, having retreated indoors, to my Comment as originally posted. It was just going to be to add 'bug', and most significantly remains so, because I released that all the flies, mouches and other flying insects are 'orphans'. Or may be you happen to know a fly, mouche or other flying insect that knows her or his genealogical lineage 🙀 ?
The more voices the better, but don’t tell your analyst!
Or tell your analyst, but pick the best voice to tell your analyst with, the one that can negotiate a better price.
😂
Which zips me, quicker than getting from my PC into a Zoom Meeting, back to a Joni Mitchell which having hit when I first heard has stuck close by me ever since, and I begin at its ending with Chorus 3:
My analyst told me that I was right out of my head
But I said, "Dear doctor, I think that it's you instead
Because I, I've got a thing that's unique and new
To prove it I'll have the last laugh on you
'Cause instead of one head, I got two
And you know two heads are better than one"
Oh boy, oh girl, what a gifted writer as well as chord picker and lyric warbler. FFYI the whole 'Twisted' piece is there to be read at https://genius.com/Joni-mitchell-twisted-lyrics . Enjoy? What's not to like? Go on, smile wry, we all know thanks to George, today, that we've all got, at least, two heads: 'free writer' and 'anxious editor'.
"Only 2 heads 🎭? You must be joking 🤣!"
I wanted to sing this song in a talent show when I was in the fourth grade. My teacher said no. Ft Leavenworth Elementary you don't know what you missed! LOL
Ah. With which head were you going to sing it? 🤩
While writing I usually have seven contentious heads gurgling, drooling and jabbering.
Oh yes David, the old curses are always the, well, 'old curses' . . .
We're not talking about 'Deadly Sins' are we?
"Much more, I suspect," said Holmes igniting his meerschaum, "this yet another case that will end up in that folder you keep under lock and key Watson."
"I'm sure, certain sure you'll turn out to be write about this Holmes" said Watson, who then dared to ask, with due timorous temerity "by the way, old chap, which folder is it that you have in mind?"
Seven deadly perfectionistic heads.
"Ah yes 'Seven'. If only there were, only, seven." Holmes said this as he sucked deep on the 'Old Shag' he'd layered and flamed in his bowl. "I see a dozen, or more likely at least a 'Boulanger's Dozen' at play in this Watson. What think you?"
"Eh? Urm? Well . . ."
"Just so Watson, the game is afoot and you've put on finger write on the pulse. Where the Dickens is our Bradley?"
Lately, I keep writing the same comment over and over here in Story Club, "these questions and answers are so good!" I had these questions as well, but didn't even know I had them until I read them.
Humor goes out the window when I get anxious, I freeze up. It's a real bummer, but...I do appreciate hearing that other people experience anxiety. "Appreciate" isn't the right word, but it helps to know others are dealing with this. Hope I can take self-conscious and keep trying to turn it into awareness.
Excellent advice all around. I suppose we all suffer with self-doubt when it comes to our writing. I know I do. (Will anyone like this; will they read it? How come no one leaves any comments? Am I any good?) I think the biggest freedom I've discovered for myself was when my mother died two years ago--I now write things I never did before. I suppose I was always holding myself back, thinking, What would Mom say if I wrote a sex scene? Stupid, I know, but it was probably something in my own psyche that was holding me back. Now, I write for myself. I edit, and hack, and chop, but I don't think about what the reader wants. I feel that someone out there will like what I write--and that's good enough for me.
I told my mom about a story idea I had once, at the beginning of college. It had some violence in it, and she winced. I saw her wince! It wasn't expecting that reaction and it stopped from writing anything with violence in it for years. But... but .... oh yes, the sway parents have, as David says below.
I know that wince.
Do we, ever being children of our parents that we are, ever easily take responsibility for being who we are or do we, rather than cringe less than we might be under the bushels of 'sway' that our parents - we like to think, I minded to suggest - exert upon us, at least as seen from our POV?
Here following a full text of piece or writing 'On Children' that hit and stuck with me, though how well I have adopted, adapted and lived up to its ideal is for others to say:
And a woman who held a babe against her bosom said, Speak to us of Children.
And he said:
Your children are not your children.
They are the sons and daughters of Life’s longing for itself.
They come through you but not from you,
And though they are with you yet they belong not to you.
You may give them your love but not your thoughts,
For they have their own thoughts.
You may house their bodies but not their souls,
For their souls dwell in the house of tomorrow, which you cannot visit, not even in your dreams.
You may strive to be like them, but seek not to make them like you.
For life goes not backward nor tarries with yesterday.
You are the bows from which your children as living arrows are sent forth.
The archer sees the mark upon the path of the infinite, and He bends you with His might that His arrows may go swift and far.
Let your bending in the archer’s hand be for gladness;
For even as He loves the arrow that flies, so He loves also the bow that is stable.
This extract from 'The Prophet' by Khalil Gilbran can be read, better formatted than those of us who have occasion, now and then to cite excerpts from poems are accommodated on Substack , at https://poets.org/poem/children-,
That is possibly my favorite section of The Prophet. I first encountered it, with awe and delight, at about 14. It makes even more sense now. (But, can I really live it? Hope so!!)
My father was a sculptor, a powerful, gentle man. It was only after he'd died that my sister and I fully developed our creative careers. It was as though he did it for us when he was alive, or maybe we could never do it better than him, so we didn't try. Then he freed us.
Not stupid: our parents hold a huge amount of psychic sway, long after we’ve left the nest. Still negotiating with mine, now seven years gone. (I’ll know I’m as free as can be when I can bring myself to write a sex scene that includes them: a crazy conception!!)
Though I allowed my own version of my father to judge me, I also allowed the words of my actual father to guide me. He read a story I wrote when I was twenty, handed it back to me with the words, 'don't ever stop writing.'
Love that, Tom!
And here I thought it was just me!
Oh Lord, you're not alone! I tell my friends (the handful of nearest and dearest who know I write stories) that I'll think about sharing my work when my parents die, and I'm only half joking. (And I don't even write about them! At least, not exactly)
You have great company!
'Will anyone like these; will they even read them?' thought God as he handed the tablets of stone, onto which he'd had inscribed his long considered and oh so carefully composed Ten Commandments to Moses who'd made the long and winding trek up the mountain to take delivery.
STOP PRESS added via intervention of 'Edit'
"Like me to admit you to a secret only imaginable by 'The Cosy Cognoscenti'?
Still with me, despite the risk that comes with new knowledge?
Okay. Then I'll tell you, so long as you accept that what you are about to know can never be passed on, to anyone, under pain of termination.
You do accept. That's great.
Here's the so little known thing: the route that Moses had to take to ascend to the summit height of Mount Sinai was - so terribly long, and so terribly winding, and so terribly tiresome - that the 'Young Yet To Shave Prophet' he set off as returned to find a demographically changed population of Israelites as an 'Aged, Bearded and Veritable Ancient of Days'
And since you now know so much would you like to know more?
Okay, I'll take the nod of your head as yes and yes since you are in for penny you may as well be in for a pound.
Here you are, under pain of death to the power ten if you should tell another soul: The Beatles hot hit back in the day, yes 'The Long and Winding Road' was lifted from having a shufty at one of 'The Dead Sea Scrolls' - that had come up in one of those "Nudge, nudge, wink, wink side auctions that never happen in 'Sotheby Street' or on 'Christie Corner' - which one of 'The Fab Four', who happened to be be stashed with cash from early singles successes, decided, on the merest whim, to splash some cash.
Oh questioner! I feel you. My own "method" is painful and offends me, greatly. It is slow and sporadic and plagued by self-doubt. And I'm not really sure if what I write is ever "quite right." Some days I have to employ all kinds of trickery just to keep going! So it feels like madness to say that writing is still my favorite thing to do, that it matters and is important and worth all the time and effort (and self-doubt). Even if it goes nowhere, even if I never write anything worth sharing.
My own self-consciousness stems from a belief I've carried with me from childhood, where imperfection = failure = shame and judgment. I desparately wanted to avoid shame/judgment, which meant I had to be perfect. I've indulged in all kinds of self-sabotage, knowing that perfection doesn't exist. In high school I was a master procrastinator, waiting until the last minute to start on papers and projects (not group projects at least, because of my other great fear: letting other people down). If I got a bad grade, I could say well, that bad grade had nothing to do with my intelligence or ability--I merely didn't give myself enough time! But most times, unfortunately, my minimal efforts still worked out. I say unfortunately because in the long run, that tendency to procrastinate has done much more harm than good. The other thing I did (or do, because I'm still working on myself) was . . . nothing. I didn't even try. I have so much regret over this, over opportunities I've turned down in my life because I was . . . scared to fail? I'm glad Mary G mentioned anxiety, because anxiety's been a constant companion in my life and has had a hand in all the (poor) decisions I've made. But it's a chicken and egg situation for me. Am I self-conscious because I'm anxious, or anxious because I'm self-conscious? I don't know, and it doesn't matter. What I DO know is that everything I've done in my life that makes me proud was hard and took courage. And writing, without a doubt, takes courage.
I don't know if your issues with self-consciousness are anything like mine, but the fact that you catch yourself wondering what's the "right" thing to say in conversation makes me think: perhaps. When I'm nervous I babble and wind up putting my foot in my mouth. So I try to slow down, be more careful, but then I wind up sounding flat and inauthentic (or so I think). The same thing happens when I'm drafting. The editor/perfectionist second-guesses everything. Exercises help. Writing by hand helps. Setting a timer, like George mentioned, really helps! Though I confess: I often don't know what to do with the fragments that result from these sessions. Writing first thing in the morning, when my schedule allows it, helps. The inner editor is still sleepy! Also, and this is a tip for procrastinators, it helps to get the hardest task for your day (which, for me, is often writing) out of the way first. I've read that if you want to wake up and go for a run, you're more likely to actually do it if you leave your running clothes out and your shoes by the door. So I leave my notebook and my pen out at my table, ready to go.
But these are just some tips for getting words on the page. Overcoming self-consciousness . . . I don't know. I love George's suggestion of bargaining with that aspect of your Self. It's so gentle! But George's "self-conscious" mind is more gentle than mine as well. Mine's a total asshole who is rooting for my failure. I don't want to accept it as part of my existence! I'd much rather hunt it down and flog it into a corner somewhere. I will share one more thing (I promise) that helps me, when I'm striving for perfection and getting bogged down by it. I remember that the qualities I most love in others, the traits that most endear them to me, are their quirks, their idiosyncracies, their "imperfections." All those moments when they were most vulnerably, authentically themselves, not covered up or smoothed out by self-edits (this is what I love most about Story Club comments). I suspect that "Perfect," whatever that is, is not very interesting, or lovable. And so I let my idea of "perfect" go (for thirty minutes, at least :)).
I love all of this, Manami. I used to tell my kids all of the time that normal is boring. When I met my current husband, he actually told me that i had innumerable flaws! And that he loved all of them. And i know that i love flawed people the best, as well.
Thank you so much Mary, and your kids were so lucky to hear this from you! I know I'll say it to my daughter, I only hope she truly believes it.
Motherhood has been a wonderful opportunity to address a lot of anxiety and self-consciousness and let it go. Oh it's hard at times, because certain patterns of thinking are so familiar and comfortable, even if they make me miserable. And I hate that those patterns pop up in my creative life. The twin sister to feeling self-conscious while writing for me is never feeling that something is good enough to be done. And it's not a writing problem as much as it's a me problem, so it can't really be solved with an exercise, I don't think. The GOOD news about me problems is I know I made them for myself, so I should technically be able to unmake them.
Innumerable flaws here, too! And somehow I've still managed to get people to love me :). Thanks for reading and being here, Mary.
“And somehow I’ve still managed to get people to love me.” Those are such wondrous words! You are lovable! And I completely understand the comfort in the familiarity of misery. I spent most of my life not understanding that feeling bad was my norm and so it felt comfortable and even safe (though it was neither). Sounds so crazy in black and white on the page. Well flawed people are the most interesting people. (Motherhood only made me more anxious. So I’m happy to hear it’s helping you let go.)
Congratulations on the audiobook, George! It was wonderful to hear you read 'Liberation Day' - there is always something surreal about hearing an author narrate their work, like peeking behind the curtain and finding the Great Oz and seeing other layers of meaning and nuance.
I was also very happy - or, you know, less defeated - to read that your inner critic hits full volume at the 3/5 mark! It's exactly the same for me - I get to that point and I look back and my inner critic says, 'What is the point of all this? What have all these words accomplished? There is nothing unique here, nothing profound, nothing...' etc, etc, etc. I think it's partly because the novelty has worn off (I've been with the story and voice and characters for so long and the honeymoon period has worn off and whereas once they felt full of colour, now they feel kind of beige), partly because there's a weight and a bulk to what has already been written and my grand plans and ambitions and aspirations for this story haven't exactly come to fruition, and partly because it's at that point of the story where it all has to come together and make sense - the carnival ride is over kid, now you gotta walk on your shaky legs down those stairs and back to the ground. The journey is nice and all, but the destination is what you've paid the money for. (I'm pretty sure you've touched on something similar before - the punchline to the joke: the set-up is great, but it's the punchline they'll remember (which is why I'm forever stuffing up jokes much to the exasperated and wry amusement of everyone I know)).
Maybe, it's also partly that I start getting impatient towards the end. The new story ideas I've put aside are calling louder, I'm craving the 'new romance' of a different story and characters and voice, I'm tired by constantly wrestling with these other characters and story threads that just wait around for me to figure out their lives like ungrateful children (sort yourselves out! I'm tired!) - and I feel myself starting to maybe just dial it in. My writing gets lazier, which frustrates me, which puts the brakes on writing another sentence until I discipline that lazy sentence and force it back into shape. And maybe the laziness stems from that original 3/5 thinking of 'this book isn't great/as great as I hoped it would be', so why am I wasting time on it? Plus writing the ending is harder, which takes more discipline, when my writing discipline is already ebbing. Ah Yossarian, another Catch 22.
I like how your post encourages our visceral side to step forward. I think that's a big part of the solution - to find enjoyment in the story and in the writing, and to follow the threads that maintain that enjoyment. Maybe I just have to fall in love with my story again.
Dear questioner--thanks for your interesting question. I agree with George--20,000 words a year toward a novel is pretty good, probably about average for literary work. My own novel (82,000 words) took me about four years to write, and I wasted a lot of that time fretting about the process instead of just getting on with it. What you're referring to as self-consciousness sounds like something akin to doubt, a feeling endemic among creative people. George, as usual, has given great advice about embracing the feeling and learning to use it. I wish Story Club existed four years ago.
PS: It took William Gass twenty-six years to write his novel, "The Tunnel."
"I wasted a lot of that time fretting about the process instead of just getting on with it."
Or maybe, alternative way of seeing the same - developmental - timeline of incidents, events and epochs:
"I spent a lot of that time figuring out the process and just getting on with it, best I could as and when progress along my learning personal learning curve let me."
Sense or nonsense?
Dear questioner - it’s really a great question and George provides a sensational answer. I love writing process - it’s my jam as they say. If it takes you a year to get your 20,000 words then so be it. There are so many factors that could make that output more or less. But you’re in the game and producing. I’m not a fast writer myself and I work in an industry where people crank out words far more quickly than I do. Sometimes I’ll get up and say, “okay, today I spit out 5 articles” and it’s like the day before. Just 1, or half of one and an outline for another.
But here’s what I’ve learned about process (prewriting, outlining/planning, drafting, revising, editing) - you can’t park your car before you drive it. Editing is about getting that car placed just so. Drafting is the driving. Prewriting and planning are kicking the tires and revving the engine before throwing it into drive.
I used to have to have all my thinking in place before placing a single word on the page. I’d Painstakingly produce a “perfect” introduction and then write frantically because the deadline was upon me. I always had just enough time to rewrite that carefully produced intro to match the hastily rushed paper. So much for all that careful planning and thinking.
It took a while. But I’ve learned to play early in the process of writing. Now writing is fun. Revising is where the writing really happens for me. And editing is a more technical challenge and equally as fun.
I always love chatting writing process if you care to get in touch.
I love this driving analogy. It's funny to me how apt it is. I can recall to this day the feeling I had on the second day of driver's ed (30 odd years ago!). The second class was the first one where we had to take the car on the road. My reaction was a shocked, "Drive? On the actual road?!"
And I kinda still feel that way about writing. hahaha (god help me)
Haha. Thanks. Yeah, same with driver’s Ed. The very first time I tried to drive (innocent eye roll), it was a week before Christmas, and I borrowed my sisters car for an around the block joyride when I was barely 15. Well, I turned the wrong way and kept going and shortly thereafter jumped a curb on a corner lot and, thump-thump, landed atop two trees.
There’s a story there. (I could put it on my own substack as I embark next week on a road trip, a cross country driving move.)
So when drivers Ed rolled around, I was tentative. The teacher had to reach his foot over and press on the gas for me to go faster So embarrassing.
I’ve never had an accident - though I’ve been rear-ended 3 times.
😂 Learning to Drive: An Anthology. I suspect we could *very* quickly fill that volume with funny/scary stories.
You hit the nail on the head for me when you said "play early in the process of writing." After all, am I writing because I'm in the gulag and forced to do it every day, (and if I am, how did I get there?) or because it's a process of creation that allows me to play without a strict set of rules? No question--that judging, critical self-consciousness loves to creep in and spoil the game, but the ongoing process dilutes its potency as I put pen to paper and practice. Thanks to all for your great comments, and of course, thanks to George for generating this conversation!
Yes! That critical self-doubt self talk will always be there in some form. It’s the same critical voice that praises as well as damns. But that doesn’t mean you have to listen to it.
For me, play is part of every stage of the writing process. Can I make this “whatever it is I’m making” - better, more beautiful, speak to others as it’s speaking to me?
I’m reminded of small children who talk to their toys, throw tea parties with adult conversations for their dolls and rocks and toy trucks - and it’s so real to them. That’s the kind of play that leads to seeing things differently.
Sometimes it’s almost as if I can see George having those very same conversations as he’s writing his stories - what if this caveman and woman in this diorama were able to talk? What if .... they were real? What if ... this was their job!
What if, indeed.
The play’s the thing. ... (okay, that sounds a little familiar). 😏
George's account of the death cleaning discoveries reminded me of a poem I am fond of, which I will write here in case it gives pleasure to others:
Who was he that lived my life and now
is some Other? Who was the little boy
asking questions? Who the teenager asking
who the little boy was? The yellowing photo
remains, and the hand holding the photo. The photograph,
the hand, the image of the boy, the hand's image.
Claes Andersson
Beautiful. That’s exactly the feeling. Thanks for this.
I am hugely struck by how different we all are, yet how the same. Maybe that's what our writing struggle is - to use our difference for something original but then use our sameness to connect.
Like many here, I'm a walker, but for different reasons. Reading Mary G's comments on anxiety, got me thinking about my own neurodiversity - I'm bi-polar - this seems to manifest in the opposite of anxiety, or even self-consciousness, with my writing. A similar challenge for different reasons. I storm away, loving what I'm writing, launching off on tangents, revelling in my characters complexity and wit, do a quick edit, which it doesn't need, because it's brilliant, and send it off. Only to be faced with complete disinterest or confusion. Wonder why...
The same in conversation, unlike our brave questioner, (I'm jealous of your self awareness btw) I'll launch confidently into any conversation, missing the point, alienating people and generally messing it up, sometimes only realising years later.
So George's writing, these comments, and Story Club in particular have helped enormously. Helped me to recognise I need to nurture my quiet, calm, rational editor self, helped me to understand that seeing things from the other perspective, be it reader or audience, is vital. I need more awareness, not less. Like others, I walk to get away from the bit of me that comes easily and find the bit that is more illusive.
I hope one day to get to the point where I don't end up explaining my work, but can just listen to people talking about what it means to them.
Noticing my reader self is new for me, and I've learnt that here. Listening to George's excerpt, I allowed my confusion to sit quietly and wait, and as I got less confused, I felt myself wanting more and more to laugh, until the pennies all dropped at once and I laughed out loud.
Tom, thank you for your willingness here to be open with all of us. I really appreciate your presence here in these threads.
Fantastic advice, thank you George! Much to mull over, and to PLAY with. (I forget sometimes that it all works better if only I would check my serious demeanor when I pick up the pen and just, like, play, like I’m still a child—oh, wait...I am still a child! I should make the most of that!!)
And great to hear you reading the intriguing opening of “Liberation Day.”
Maybe it's because I'm handwriting my draft or maybe it's a personality thing, but my problem is a little different. I can turn that self-conscious voice off while writing or successfully ignore it. But once I put the pen down, it's paralyzing. The voice makes it so hard to pick the pen up again. Any thoughts or suggestions, Story Club community?
Andrew, If this helps any, I have a cartoon character that I keep at hand & which I look to whenever I need help quelling the voice(s) & bleeding off an attack of the willies. The drawing is of a very large woman in one of those cheap flowered rayon dresses. She has a pin head, frizzled hair & wears a smashed hat. Her ankles are fat, her shoes are too tight & she doesn't carry her pocketbook so much as she wields it, like a weapon. Her face is pinched, like an apple gone bad, and even if she's only two-dimensional, you can feel the judgement coming off her like an electrical current. Her name, which I gave her, is Mrs. Gorgonula Honyak. (Gorgonula for the Gorgons, those ancient terrors, and Honyak because its displeasing assonance was close enough for me & seemed a fit.) Below her disagreeable & zaftig self reads this caption: "I came, I criticized, I left." Whenever I get into trouble, such as you describe, with writing, I haul her out, we have a little bit of a screaming match, wherein I do most of the talking, then I slam her back into the drawer from whence she came (and where she lives with her beaten-down husband & their wayward son, but that's another story). She comes and she criticizes me all right (never at my invitation & never with any good suggestions, of course), but then, at my insistence & once exhaustion has set in for us both, she leaves, after which I'm always lighter & in for a laugh. If it will help you any, I believe she is available for "consultations." God knows, she works cheap. Let me know if you could use a laugh & I'll send her over.
"No dear, it's not Avon Calling but somebody says she knows you well. A Mrs. Gorgonula Honyak, according to her business card. Shall I invite her in?"
Thanks for sending her over Rosanne, to all of us ever in need of a laugh as we Wanna-Be-Writer-Beings are wont to be 😂
Glad she gave you a laugh, Rob. I can send her right over! Mileage for Mrs Honyak is no barrier!
Keep her hypercritical zaftig banality out of my face! Oh no, here she comes, oh no, oh no, oh no no no no no…..
David, Just keep breathing. Just keep on breathing. She'll pass.
Breathing and sweating silver bullets over here, boss…
Love this! And pretty sure I had Mrs. Honyak as a high school English teacher! She sounded just like the Jon Lovitz-voiced cartoon character from The Critic ("IT STINKS").
“Her disagreeable and zaftig self”! Love the poetry in your post, Rosanne!
Ha! Thanks, David!
Hi Andrew. What's going on when you put down that pen? Suddenly a voice appears and tells you what you wrote is terrible? Is that what's going on? I have a couple of suggestions--no idea if they are helpful for you. But here goes:
If you are writing a short story, then the trick is to write the whole thing in one fell swoop. Like, don't stop until you have one entire shitty draft. You can leave out sections, you can write "paragraph here about the gunshot" as a filler section, you can have a character just disappear, you can write "blah blah blah" in place of dialogue--whatever it takes to finish a draft. Then you can tell yourself you wrote an entire story and now you can simply.....rewrite it. You have something to work with. That "creative editor" voice that tells you that what you just wrote is terrible can just go away because you already KNOW it's terrible. All drafts are terrible! Writing is all rewriting, not drafting.
If you're not writing a short story, but something longer, then instead of completing a story, complete a section, a scene or a chapter, as I said before. Just write it and leave it. Then, when you pick up the pen again, don't even look back at what you wrote. Start in anew, writing away in the same carefree fill-in-the-blanks section as before. The parts don't have to flow one to another. Maybe you write the ending now. Or maybe you write a section that is a weird tangent that you hadn't planned.
Do you see what I mean? You are so lucky to not be stopped while writing. You have to trick yourself I think by KNOWING that what you've already written is of no consequence. It's all going to be re-written anyway.
hope this is a tiny bit of help in some way.
Thanks mary. You're right, I need to be more comfortable with it being terrible at first. Most of the time, I'm dropping the pen because I'm out of time. It has nothing to do with The Voice. It's a longer project, so it's between sessions that The Voice becomes a problem. I tend to start talking my way out of the project, telling myself that no one wants to read it, that I have no idea where it's going or whether it's valuable. I'd just listen and stop, but The Voice isn't alone. The characters in the project and the idea of the project keep popping up in my head, trying to work their way into existence. Neither side of the equation will leave me alone, honestly.
Sounds like you actually very much want to write it. Your characters (which are you) keep talking to you, urging you on. But your fear voice worries the book will suck and no one will read it. Why not just write KNOWING the book will suck? Release the pressure! Write freely and badly and arm in arm with your characters. All will be well! You’ll have a perfectly bad first draft to work with—just like all writers, everywhere.
All right! I'm on it!
Those two sides of the equation are what drives artists mad, I think. You try to do it, it’s never good enough. You try to give it up, and it won’t leave you alone. The only ways out are death, or madness, or lobotomy, or maybe some kind of good-humored acceptance of the insanity of this crazy calling!
I am totally in the “all writing is revising” camp as well, Mary, complete with notes and sidebars to fill in bits and pieces here and there as you go along.
That sounds like great advice. I can remember, back when it was just me, writing for hours at a time. Now if I can squeeze out enough time to get a page and a half in one stretch it’s some kind of victory. But maybe it will get much better in another year or two…(Kindergarten! First grade! Holy time loop, Batman!!!!)
Hi Andrew - I suppose, guided by George, just because picking up the pen again is difficult, doesn't mean you should use that as the reason not to do it, but know it will be difficult, when you do it, but do it.
Also, I wonder if you should try letting that ruthless, critical, editor self loose on the work. Let it cut and change, slash and burn, and see if what it leaves you with is better or worse. Maybe it's a hugely positive part of your writer self. And maybe when it has exhausted itself with the free reign it has been given, it will shut up and let your write the next bit. Then it will be hungry again...
The struggle is all too real.
Send negative Nelly to the corner. Make those critical voices do a good job. It's like a writing workshop - there's always that one who criticizes, but not helpfully. But if you're trying to get helpful feedback on a work, sometimes you have to insist from your responders to comment helpfully. Ask that critical voice if they can contribute anything to the conversation that helps. If not, be gone with you!
Avoid writing. Try not to think about it. Whatever happens, don’t pick up that pen…unless, and until, you can’t stand it any longer.
That’s one way. I have a similar problem. I have heard that many writers stop at a cliffhanging moment so they can’t wait to get back to it. It helps me to go for a walk or take a long bath, to leave my normal consciousness for a while. Also, having a small time-eating child around focuses mind and time.
This was SO helpful: Thank you, George! I especially appreciate the different parts inside, and the visceral, the knowing in your body intuition and the generosity—YAY. I love this approach to riding the emotional roller coaster not only of writing, but of being human. Is there a Story Club book being put together? A sequel to "Swim in a Pond"? Or one focused on Writing Advice for Living?
I always think of Story Club AS the sequel or continuation of "A Swim in a Pond in the Rain." But yes, there are so many new ideas here to be captured.
I love this use of ‘visceral,’ in the sense of mind, body and soul in agreement.
YES, exactly!
Knowing your interests in drama Angela, and George's delight in drawing out lessons from looking at iconic pieces, I'm imagining that a J B Priestly stage classic might feed into a future Saunderian short story which could give title to a fresh collection, how about 'The Death Cleaner Calls'?
The Bell Tolls For the Death Cleaner.
Also for me, something about pencil to paper makes the writing flow. I try to write by hand for the first draft and any time I feel stuck.
I've been reading through these early postings in 'Chronological' sequence, so posted my comment in reply to Niall above before reading you Nancy. I do you like* your advice 'head for pencil any time I feel stuck' 🧱🧱🧱🧱🧱 < first five bricks in a building writer's wall in that place we all know: 'STUCKSVILLE'
* thought 'like' but didn't type it, hence the 'Edit'