Fear of writing

I don't really understand the concept of being afraid to write something--not that I don't think people actually feel it, but more that I've never been in that position, so my advice might be unhelpful.

There are parts of the publishing process that are somewhat out of your control: how a beta will respond to your story, whether an agent will like it, if it'll even find a publishing home, the general reader response if it makes it into the wild.... but as author, the writing part is all within your all-powerful grip.

Write whatever you feel like writing. Put it all out there, don't hold back. No matter what you write, you can always change it. If after you've written it, you decide it doesn't quite work, you can change it without anyone else ever having been the wiser. First drafts are for your eyes only, so go nuts. Pull back during the revision phase.

If it helps, Stephanie Meyer is only a punching bag *because* Twilight is so popular. There are plenty of badly-written books out there, but the ones that get the vocal hate are the ones that gain great popularity in spite of what others see as insurmountable textual problems. So if you do end up as the next Stephanie Meyer, you'll have both ends of it -- the hate and the massive amounts of success, money, and adulation from fans.

That said, I totally understand what you're saying. For me it's the fear that five years down the road, I'm going to look back at my work and say, "What the hell was I thinking??" and end up agreeing with any critics who take the writing to task. I don't mind being panned, but I live in fear that people will pan me, and then later I will come around to seeing that they were right.

But if I let the fear stop me, I'll never put anything out there. It helps me to look at it as that black-and-white. Either I put my work out there, and open myself to that risk, or I never share at all.

In any case, .

heza said:

Write whatever you feel like writing. Put it all out there, don't hold back.

Click to expand...

The fear is that what the author feels like writing is unpalatable to others and unpublishable. The author is afraid that the book reflects their own soul, and they are undeserving of love, therefore the book will never be appreciated. This is a fear I struggle with all the time.

One answer to this paralysis is to commit yourself to writing for a reason other than publication. Then your ability to produce remains unaffected, whether or not your books are successful. That's not a recipe for success, mind you -- just for continued productivity.

RemusShepherd said:

The fear is that what the author feels like writing is unpalatable to others and unpublishable. The author is afraid that the book reflects their own soul, and they are undeserving of love, therefore the book will never be appreciated. This is a fear I struggle with all the time.

Click to expand...

Yeah, that's above my pay grade.

So my advice remains the same. Write what you want. Worry about how it's going to fair in the marketplace after it's actually written. The worry is moot if you can't get it written down in the first place.

And at least if you write what you want to read and want to tell and you're passionate about it, you have that satisfaction in and of itself. A well-told story about little-loved tropes can speak to more people than a poorly told story that's just like everything else.

You can't really look at it objectively, though, until it's in front of you (and in front of someone else). Write it. If you still like it, let another human being read it. If they like it, go with it. If it's too far outside mainstream tastes, decide what's more important to you--making it more palatable or telling your perfect story--and revise (or not) accordingly.

But don't let fear keep you from drafting. You have all the control when you're drafting, and you can do whatever you want when drafting with no reprisals whatsoever. You've got the freedom to create anything you can imagine. It's your sandbox. There's no reason you HAVE to make major marketability decisions right now.

Or scrap it. You don't have to write it, at all if you don't want to. That's how free you are.

All true, Heza -- with the caveat that some stories can never be revised to mainstream standards, because they have structure or elements that are impossible to get published. (A sympathetic pedophile, a YA story told in a grandparent's POV, a rehash of the Adam & Eve sci-fi story, etc.)

If you begin one of those stories you should recognize at the start that it will be unpublishable. At that point you need to just write for yourself, ignoring any possibility of publication. If being published is more important to you, start with an idea that's more mainstream.

I've never been afraid to write anything, but I've always dealt with publishing concerns by writing a BUNCH of different things in different areas and different genres, and I write it fast. I really don't care much about any one thing I write.

I agree with all those who say to write what you want to write. If you write a book just to fit other peoples taste, you're likely not going to like it. Just sit down at the keyboard, put black on white, and make it something "you" enjoy.

RemusShepherd said:

The fear is that what the author feels like writing is unpalatable to others and unpublishable. The author is afraid that the book reflects their own soul, and they are undeserving of love, therefore the book will never be appreciated. This is a fear I struggle with all the time.

Click to expand...

So it's not just me, then. Though I think of it in the opposite order. Someone saying "this is not interesting" about my writing, when I've put my soul on the page, is saying it about my soul. "I can't relate to this" is the same thing as "I can't relate to you."

But for me the fear is not "no one likes the real you, therefore no one will like your writing," it's "no one will like your writing, which will make them realize they don't like the real you either." Subtly different.

Don't be afraid of writing. Be afraid of not writing - or worse yet, of not having written.

Semantics aside, new writers should understand that they cannot satisfy every possible reader. To worry about that, or to use it as an excuse not to write, is crippling.

I have a lot of fear and it's almost never for a good reason. So my advice has nothing to do with the things you're worrying about because as other have shown, they are irrational anyway.

The only strategy against the fear itself that has worked for me is to TRY again every day. I sit down. I set myself a tiny goal, such as "write at least ONE word" or "read through at least one page" (when editing). With me, it gets better with time.

And I agree with everyone else: write what YOU want to write. You can't control other people's tastes or opinions anyway.

I come up with hundreds of reasons for writing. For example:

I write only for fish
I need to pick a project for editing so I can test this new software
My cat prefers to sleep on edited manuscripts, so if I print this out I have to edit it as well
I want to experiment with a new type of setting/atmosphere/character

One of my favourite things about starting or resuming a project is coming up with a fun and/or silly reason why I'm doing it. If, when I'm done, people happen to like what I've written... well, that's just the icing on the cake.

SianaBlackwood said:

I come up with hundreds of reasons for writing. For example:

I write only for fish
I need to pick a project for editing so I can test this new software
My cat prefers to sleep on edited manuscripts, so if I print this out I have to edit it as well
I want to experiment with a new type of setting/atmosphere/character

One of my favourite things about starting or resuming a project is coming up with a fun and/or silly reason why I'm doing it. If, when I'm done, people happen to like what I've written... well, that's just the icing on the cake.

Click to expand...

That is awesome! I need to remember that the next time I'm blocking myself for some stupid reason!

... one of the benefits of not reading any books pub'd after 1951 (except for ones by AWers!) is that I have no clue as to what's popular and what's not. So I write what I write what I write. Perhaps you might employ a similar tactic. Might I recommend 1949 for your own year.

Ken said:

... one of the benefits of not reading any books pub'd after 1951 (except for ones by AWers!) is that I have no clue as to what's popular and what's not. .

Click to expand...

That's a benefit? Sounds more like a huge disadvantage. Are you doing penance for some hideous crime?

One thing I tell myself is that it doesn't matter if I sit down this afternoon and write the biggest pile of horse crap every seen, because nobody else ever has to see it. The police won't come and take me away for writing some pages of bad fiction. It doesn't matter, because either I can say "okay, that didn't work", bin it and try a different way, or I can edit it into something I won't prefer death rather than allowing people to read.

OKay, I'm still scared later that however much I've edited and polished something that it might still be rubbish, but that isn't nearly as crippling a fear.

I got over the fear by becoming a good writer. It gave me inspiration to proceed. Years ago when I first started, I was like, "Ehh, this is ok at best. I need to get better."

And I did. Use that feeling as food, not as a block. Inspire yourself.

My little piece of advice: similar to what others have said, write it. You'll never know how good (or even how bad) it's going to be if you haven't written yet. One of the things I struggle with is that I think my ideas aren't original enough. Because if you really think about it, the books that are the most popular are something that haven't ever been done before. Your book sounds like that, something super original. So you've got to put your BIC, write the book, and then worry about it being published later. Because I truly think that if the book is good, and original, it will eventually sell.

So worry about writing the book, and then worry about the publishing. Even if it doesn't sell, you will have grown as a writer and gotten a better feel for the publishing market. Then you try again. That's what writing is. =)

If one is serious about writing, he/she should realize that it is important to write stories that fire a personal passion, instead of (or maybe in addition to) writing for a specific market [This is what others have said upstream]. The key word, however, is stories. While we concentrate on the project at hand, we should also expect to write a second one after the first is done, and a third one after the second is done, and so on. And, as with all creative endeavors, we should expect to see (or at least seek) improvement in both the craft of writing and in storytelling through the experience of completing each new story. I can understand a fear that a project might not be good enough, or that it may be panned by reviewers, but does that extend into a fear that one can't improve with experience and with a desire to learn? If the answer is no, I don't understand the paralysis. If the answer is yes, then perhaps some other creative outlet should be sought.

scribbledoutname said:

Urghh, how do you stop the fear from crippling you?

Click to expand...

I've thought about this OP for a few days because this is something that I struggle with constantly. Sadly, I have no answers. All I have is a laundry list of things that are stretched across the road like a fallen tree.

It's really stifled the creative flow in me. All the advice of ZOMG JUST WRITE is not working. It was just frustrating me further.

So, I grabbed my chainsaw to start cutting that tree up for fire wood.

I made a list of those things. Listed them out line item by line item. What was my fear and what was the worst thing that could happen?

Like, #1 is the fear that the character will be so boring and so Mary Sue/Self Insert that people's eyes will bleed just by reading his name.

#2 is that my writing is so juvenile and awkward and stilted and I'll never ever ever be a good writer and why am I even trying when people will spit on it and set it on fire and toss it against the wall?

I recently reminded myself of David Hines' post OH JOHN RINGO NO. Something really resonated with me in that piece.

GHOST is Ringo's own admitted Lord King Badfic, his id run wild. By his own account, he was trying to write several books he was actually contracted for, but GHOST kept nudging at him, and finally he just wrote the damn thing to *make it go away* so he could get back to fulfilling his contracts.

Click to expand...

The entire piece is just a scream. It's long and it's a trainwreck and worth reading.

Most specifically, John Ringo's reaction to it really said something to me.

I decided early in the book that I was simply going to ignore reality whenever possible.

Click to expand...

There was something truly liberating in that one, simple statement.

It's okay to suck and it's okay to indulge in a bit of ID fulfillment.

Because of that, for my own edification, I've started writing to the fear of each of those things. Things that no other eyes will see EVER.

I've taken my Mary Sue and I've started writing him just like I would if I were truly writing wish fulfillment. It's outlandish, it's outrageous, it's so far out there in MS/SI field that he should be the poster child of MS/SI characters.

I'm directing this fear energy onto the page. I'm saying 'It's okay he's a MS/SI. It's okay he's the Mary Poppins of the SF universe. It's okay he's Wesley Crusher's long lost twin. It's okay'.

This will never see the light of day. No one will ever read it. This is not for public consumption. And I'm saying 'It's okay that this is bad. It's okay that this is a vanity project. It's okay that people would think it's the worst dreck that ever drecked a dreck. It's okay because no one will ever see it to tell me.'

I'm accumulating a nice load of firewood.

/teal deer ramble.

This, to the nth power.

No one has to see all the stuff I write, so it is safe to write some truly awful stuff along the way. I admit right now that for the first eight years of my writing life, most of my output was so bad I cannot look at it without cringing. But it was fun to write, I learned from it, and I've been able to go back and mine certain parts.

slhuang said:

That said, I totally understand what you're saying. For me it's the fear that five years down the road, I'm going to look back at my work and say, "What the hell was I thinking??" and end up agreeing with any critics who take the writing to task. I don't mind being panned, but I live in fear that people will pan me, and then later I will come around to seeing that they were right.

Click to expand...

This is so me. It drives me crazy when I can't get the words to say exactly what I mean, because I know that if I can see that, then there's other stuff that a reviewer will see that I'm missing. And they'll be right.

I try to remind myself that I don't have to publish with the Big 5/6, that I have the choice to work my way up the ladder and let my confidence grow with my skills. And that maybe my gradual improvement will help someone else over this hump. Because, at the very least, you can always be a lesson to someone else.