Learning, Self Criticism & The Love of Writing

First off, {{{hugs}}}.

I personally don't think learning a lot hurts you as a writer, at least not in all cases. Sure, it makes you more critical of your work, but I guess it depends on what gives you satisfaction. If the joy of creation is what moves you, then yes, self-criticism could dampen that joy because you start second-guessing everything you do. But if you're like me and find thrill in the improvement as well as the act of writing, then self-criticism actually becomes part of that joy. I actually enjoy tearing apart my stories to incorporate what I've learned. Yes, I'm a masochist.

I do think the answer is different for every person, though. It sounds like you need to take a step back and think about why you write in the first place. What is it that made it fun for you when you started? Is there any way you can lock that self-doubt in a box until you get a first draft down?

Are you doing NaNo again this year? Maybe that will help the pressure off and get the words flowing again.

You're going to get a lot of different answers to that. My advice is to not focus on the mechanics but instead to lose yourself in the passion of your story. Turn off the internal editor and just focus on putting words down.

At some point in the learning process, it seems that all writers focus on the nitty gritty of writing mechanics and obsess over every detail. Eventually, we all move on to more important matters--the story itself. That's when your voice will emerge. You'll learn to balance the mechanics without thinking of them, but first you have to get past the stage of focusing on every minute detail, where it sounds like you're stuck now.

Write a short story to keep it simple enough to finish. Once you have that sense of accomplishment of completing something, you'll feel better too.

Bubastes said:

Are you doing NaNo again this year? Maybe that will help the pressure off and get the words flowing again.

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Ah, good shout. Nano is always fun. It put the fun back into writing for me last year, and I'm dying to get started on it this year again. Nano allows me to write. Just write. I actually don't care about the state of my first draft once it's finished--my annoying inner-editor seems to go missing in November.
It puts the fun back into writing for me.

As for your question: Do I think that learning a lot can seriously damage you as a writer? On a short term basis, maybe. In the long run? No.

I'm only 15, and having only been writing for a little over a year. Before I joined AW, I wrote for fun and as a hobby. The quality of my work didn't really matter-- it was only me who read it anyway.

Then I joined AW. I was suddenly bombarded with knowledge and information about the technical aspects, POV, publishers, pacing, character development etc. And if I'm being honest, I was terrified. I had never really looked into these parts of writing before.

It had an impact on my writing for a while. I thought everything I wrote was crap, and I couldn't write freely anymore (I was obsessed with getting every correct). Then after a while, my initial trauma started to fade. I realised that I had to pull myself together--I was capable of writing the way I had before, and in fact I could write even better with the wide range of advice and feedback given on here.

So yes, in the short term, learning a lot can impact one's writing. But in the long term I don't think it can do anything but aid and improve it.

I would recommend that you seek external validation. I remember going through this point - losing forever and always the Golden Word Syndrome that allowed me to rant and rail against The System, and believe with firm conviction that every agent and editor out there was a complete moron who just could not see my genius. Once that shiny gold vision wears off, you are suddenly a Worthless Shit Writer until you "succeed".

It's highly unlikely that you're an awful writer. Seriously. But losing that protective coating of naivety is really like stripping off your skin, and now you're exposed and raw and bloody, and wondering why the hell you ever left the safety of your ignorance.

I'll tell you, though, you've done the hardest and the most necessary thing any writer ever does. You're learning, you're striving to improve. And you WILL, because you're no longer blinded. The trouble is, once you've gone down to the bottom, it's almost impossible to pick yourself back up again by telling yourself that you don't suck - because you are now convinced that you do, and no amount of self pep talk is going to convince you otherwise.

So find a GOOD beta reader. One that won't go easy on your trouble spots, but will also give praise where praise is warranted. You need to hear from someone besides yourself that you don't suck. That will give you enough confidence to enjoy writing again - because it's really hard to enjoy something that pretty much takes over your life when you believe it's pointless to continue.

(It's going to be impossible to believe this too - but you don't suck. I can say that even without reading anything you've written, because just the fact that you're striving to improve your craft testifies to this. You would have never gotten this far if you sucked. So don't give up!)

Hmm. I'm one of those who always wants to learn more anyway. If it shows up my faults, good. I seek criticism, not praise. I already know what I'm good at. Show me where I'm bad, so I can become...not bad! Heh.

But then I'm weird. I'm sensitive to criticism - who isn't? - in other walks of life, but with writing...this will sound incredibly wanky, but...I love writing more than I love my ego.

I think you may have something called Perfectionism . In extreme cases the suffers can be considered insane. Richard Dadd the English painter was a sufferer. He spent nine years panting Fairy Fellers Master-Stroke be for it was taken away from him.I have suffered with it all my life.It's not that you seek prefection, but you can only see what is wrong with things.If you try to polish the big scratches from a table top.All you end up is a table coved with a lot more smaller ones. Also, as you have pointed out, knowledge will not come to the rescue.New knowledge only allow you to see even more problems.
As far as I know,there is no cure. However, knowing you have the problem is a step in the right direction.You will need to develop your own ways of living with it. If you do the research you will find it is not that uncommon,but not always diagnosed,for writers,artist musicians etc to suffer the same as you. Strangely, knowing that is a help.
best of luck

I'm all for learning but if you allow yourself to get caught up in all the "this is the correct way" stuff - you can lose your natural flow and voice.

Give yourself a break if part of your writing does not fall into the "correct" way. Keep writing. You never know, that "incorrect" way may just work for you - and your story.

Ooo, I love Mama Bear's post.

I think it feels different to sit down to write and immediately think of all the rules. That can take all of the fun away for sure.

Write with your heart, the way you enjoyed writing before. Then it is good. Right there. All it needs is tweaking, really. Even a total rewrite is tweaking if you already have the heart in your story.

A year or so back, I would have said you can't learn too much. Lately, however, after having a running converstaion with several writer friends, we all came to the semi-conclusion that if you're trying to learn by reading technically oriented articles and how-to books, a new writer can certainly suffer from information overload, comflicting advice, and utmost confusion about what to do and how to do it.

Same with critique groups and beta readers. One or two trusted, qualified readers can be a wonderful thing, but if you're getting nineteen opeinions about a piece of writing, you'll go nuts trying to decide who to listen to, who to ignore.

Writing should be fun, and it should be, well, personal. Good writing comes out of the individual, not out of numbers, not out of technically oriented how-to books that very often don't even reflect how the writer of the book actually goes about writing fiction.

And I think you answered your own wuestion. I think finishing and submitting work is not only the easiest way to get an answer, I think it's the ONLY way to get an answer, and the only way to change that answer from a no to a yes.

1. Your inner editor is on overdrive while you're writing which is spoiling all the fun. Tell them to sit down and shut up, they'll get their turn.

2. You're putting too much pressure on yourself. Back off the writing goals and focus on the writing. Find one story and challenge yourself to write it, crank up that music and listen to the story not the editor.

3. Give yourself permission to write crap. You're not allowing yourself to write crap so you're freezing up before you even begin.

4. If you are looking for outside validation look at a piece you've already completed and focus your editing on it, not your WIP.

5. Write a fun short piece, today. It can be one page, five, twenty, doesn't matter, you just have to have fun with it. When I am having trouble getting back into my writing after a spell away, such as having a kid, then I write a few short pieces to get my groove on.

So Cranky, those are my challenges to you. Get crackin'!

OMG!!! JAMES IS BACK!!!

I think you need to remember that you are still in a learning process, and everyone's learning processes are different. It may just be that you're coming to the stage where you have to re-learn how to love it again.

I think the most damaging thing a writer can do is worry about their talent. We get it in our heads so often that there's a right way and a wrong way, and that if we don't measure up to our favorite author we're not good enough. It gets lost far too often that writing is an exercise in personal expression, not doing the "right" things. There is a degree of formality and structure to narrative writing, but focusing on the details blurs the overall picture. As long as your mind is occupied by thoughts about things other than how you can make your work more interesting, you're wasting your time. Counting the number of adjectives you use, or any of the other little nitpicking details we obsess over, is distracting us from the real goal of writing. Talent be damned, it can be done.

Have fun writing your first drafts. Stop thinking about if you're good enough, etc. etc.

Be a professional/perfectionist when you do your rewrites/edits (and after you emotionally detach yourself from the work).

I think you will find it much easier to both enjoy and improve your work.

(p.s. that was exactly what I did with my first career: IT. I had a lot of fun. Only when the work became "deadlines only" and I had to be "GOOD" all the time that it stopped being fun, because I wasn't allowed to make mistakes or try things out just for fun.)

C.M.C. said:

I think the most damaging thing a writer can do is worry about their talent. We get it in our heads so often that there's a right way and a wrong way, and that if we don't measure up to our favorite author we're not good enough. It gets lost far too often that writing is an exercise in personal expression, not doing the "right" things. There is a degree of formality and structure to narrative writing, but focusing on the details blurs the overall picture.

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IMO it's damaging to not worry about talent. Someone who's satisfied never tries to improve because they think they don't need to. Like it or not, there is a wrong way and a right way to write and we need to know the rules - and master them - before we can break them with impunity.

As for comparing oneself with another author? I do that all the time. Why? Because I want to get better. I cannibalise other authors' techniques and use them to improve my own work.

C.M.C. said:

As long as your mind is occupied by thoughts about things other than how you can make your work more interesting, you're wasting your time.

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This is a dangerous way to think for a writer. Particularly if one asserts that rules of grammar, structure, etc are not ways to make the writing more interesting. The rules are there for a reason - to make the writing fade into the background and make the story stand out. If a writer has no regard for standards, I have no care to finish reading his book. If I read a blurb and come away still wondering what the hell he's talking about, I'm not even going to bother with the first paragraph.

C.M.C. said:

Counting the number of adjectives you use, or any of the other little nitpicking details we obsess over, is distracting us from the real goal of writing. Talent be damned, it can be done.

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What you call nitpicking, I call attention to detail. Details matter. Any writer who thinks otherwise isn't a writer I'll pay to read.

To quote tt42 on MSN just now:

Obviously...practiced writing is necessary to TELL the stories we want to tell. It's being able to say things in a new, fresh, and profound way, without all the car chases and explosions to add excitement. Yeah, I had to focus on NOT filtering for a long time after you pointed it out to me, and it was frustrating for a while, but my writing is stronger for it.

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Rules and guidelines are there for a reason and only the most foolhardy of writers would disregard them, or the need for constant improvement.

Stop posting here! Get back to work!

Don't make me go all Scottish-bint-with-a-baseball-bat on you.

*smacks fist*

Cranky said:

Most importantly of all: writing has stopped being fun. "Am I good enough yet?" I'm asking myself this question, and I am not satisfied with the answer. The easiest way to get a solid answer, of course, is to finish work and submit it. My track record on that is not good. No acceptances as of yet. Now it’s gotten to the point where I’m so self-critical that it’s rare I can actually write any fiction at all. I hate it before I’ve even written “Chapter One”.

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Just remember the market is brutal right now, so don't let your 'good enough' worries revolve completely around acceptances or the lack of them. Like others have said, I think trusting good beta readers will help.

We had a guest column on AuthorScoop a while back that addresses some of this, the conclusion of which I particularly liked -

What, then, would I have you take away from all this? Well, at the risk of placing it in some infamously ill-advised company, my plan of attack is three-pronged…

Listen to your readers, but don’t let them put you off your aim. Seek acceptance, but embrace your most ferocious rejections. And above all, if you’re only as good as your last review, make sure you set aside some time to write yourself a good one.

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One of the very hardest parts of this writing process, for me, is finding out if I'm any good. I know people say they do it for the love of it, but I can't love it if I'm not especially talented at it. I'm proficient at a good many things, which is fortunate and can make a life contented. I think. Maybe. But it's just this one craft, the one set of achievements, that I want so desperately it makes my teeth hurt. I'll never be a race car driver, or anything brave. I won't be a doctor or a detective, because my interest was always overshadowed by my circumstances, which loosely translates to - I didn't have the drive. But if I can do this, I can be all those things, and there's a spark of drive for this that might be enough to manage it. It's a hard candle to burn, though. Tiring. Time consuming. I don't want to be clogging up the publishing process with second-rate work, and I often fear I may stall out at top tier mediocrity. That is quite scary for me.

So, I hear you. I don't know how helpful this was, but at least you're not alone. But I suppose you knew you wouldn't be.

You may be in an adolescence of sorts. All this discovery and angst to find that you are just around the corner from utter competency. Don't give up.

And I'll go against the grain a little and tell you that I think your concern over whether you're "good enough" is noble. Everyone works differently of course, but my internal editor is my best friend. It can crest into neurosis, but until then, it's my conscience.

And here's the way I see it - it's not supposed to be fun. Like any other endeavor that you expect to be worth something and might even pad your back account, it's mostly drudgery shot through with pure golden moments of satisfaction. The triumph of the artist is the same as that of a mountaineer, a surgeon, a student, a toddler, that guy in IT gritting his teeth trying to make-this-shit-work. It's a job that adds value to the human experience. But, it's a job, unless it's just for fun. Then it's a hobby and that's fine too.

I took a degree in linguistics to get the gist behind taking sentences apart and then putting them back together to see how creativity works. Maybe there was a secret formula out there and all it needed was unravelling...

Now I just see writing purely in mechnical terms and it's taken away a lot of the msytery. It takes a lot to break away from that and write creatively. So, yeah, I understand how you feel, hun. Eesh...