Do you remember when you were little? Remember playing superheros and coming up with all sorts of crazy super powers you had? I usually went with the drastic side and just said I had the superpower to defeat all other superpowers... Huh. Made for an interesting game with my brothers anyway.
I've outgrown so many of those games now, but I realized that I sometimes wish I could go back... It would be so nice if I could pretend, or better yet, actually have, the superpower to overcome that infernal thing called 'writers block'....
Seems like I wrote a post somewhere on how to tackle this little problem.. but, as is usually the case with 'professionals', we can be wrong! After exhausting all my 'brilliant' ideas, I find myself at a standstill with my writing. For me, this is especially frustrating because I no longer have control over my story. Rather difficult to write when you can't think of anything to write down.
Here is where it, once again, turns into a life lesson for me... It is actually rather interesting to see how many times the Lord has used my writing to teach me something. Probably more times than I would care to admit, but it's true.
This time He seems to be teaching me that, even if I have this 'schedule' in my mind of how this will all work out, even if I make myself sit down and write to 'train myself', even if I rack my brain for every possible idea that would fit in my story, He still has control. I guess He must be using this current writers block to teach me something, but I'm not exactly sure what just yet... however, here is something that I seem to have to learn over and over again....
See, sometimes there is a little thing that creeps into my writing... it's just a small thing, really, but it can make BIG problems. It's name is Pride. Ever heard of it? It can be rather frustrating, indeed.
When I was younger, I had dreams of being on Oprah and the Good Morning show for being the youngest novelist out there. The youngest novelist that actually wrote a good story, I should say. One that stunned adults with its complex plot twists and amazing conclusion. Yet, the years slipped by and nothing of the sort happened. If anything, I think it steered me away from actually reaching those goals. What happened instead is that nothing was perfect like I planned. My sentences sounded silly and unpolished, my storyline too plain. Therefore, I just didn't write. What was the point if it wasn't *perfect*?
Well, now that I'm 20 and only one book published so far (and not even an adult book, at that!), I've learned a lot. For one thing, it doesn't have to be perfect. That's why you edit. Yes, editing is a pain in the neck and really annoying, but it is something that has to be done in the writing process. Then, of course, you have to break it up into two different types of editing. What?!?! Yes, I know. Terrible. It's like multiplying the enemy by two. You have grammatical editing and then structure editing. The grammatical editing is probably the easiest because, when you are in the middle of a thought, it's hard to remember how to do your punctuations and such. The structure editing, however, is the toughest. This is the part where you literally get your baby, er, I mean manuscript torn apart. It is extremely painful.
When I first started writing, I couldn't stand a single word of criticism against my writing. It cut me to the core if anyone made a suggestion on how I should change something. You may think I'm over exaggerating, but just ask any one of my family members.
However, here is an amazing thing I've learned. There is a way to disconnect yourself from your manuscript. See, when people criticise, we tend to think it reflects back on us and that they are criticising us. This is, of course, not true, but we feel it all the same.
As a writer, I think this is probably the most critical in your writing career. It doesn't even matter if you're good at telling a story at this point. What's important is learning to disconnect at the appropriate times.
So how do we do this? Because obviously you can't be emotionally disconnected when you are writing an emotional scene in your book. It wouldn't have that push and shove you're striving for if you did that. It would be bland and boring. In fact, in all of your writing, you have to have emotional connections. Yet, when it comes to editing, how do we pull that plug?
First thing you need to do is realize that your critics are *not* your enemies. They are not out to hurt or kill you, they really simply are doing their job: critiquing. You do your job of writing and they do their job of critiquing. Simple as that. Realizing this, now, will help you move beyond feeling like they are trying to stab in you in the back just because they 'don't like you' or wish they were published, too, so now they are going to slam you down with hate. True, there are some out there who do that, but for the most part, the ones critiquing your book are not like that. They truly want the best for you and only want to help polish up your book to make it shine.
Once you've got that fixed in your head (and it might take a while! I know it did for me.) you can now move on to step two. Try to have most of your critiquing and editing done via email. Don't have someone read part of your book in front of you, and don't ask for their opinion right away. For one thing you *both* need time to process. The reader needs to process what they've just read before they can give an honest opinion, and you need time to process what they say. With email, you can each reply at your leisure. They can come up with more tactful ways to critique/edit and you have time to read the email, process the information, then get back to them. Even when I send things to my mom or sister to edit, I ask them to please reply to the email. It doesn't matter that we live in the same house and see each other every day. We don't even talk about it unless I bring up the subject. They've learned that sometimes I'm just not ready for a discussion because I'm still processing.
Here's something for you, the writer, to consider as well. If the editor says something is confusing. Don't explain it to them. If the storyline needs personal explaining because the reader didn't understand, *you* are the one that needs to change something. It's not the editor who is too stupid to understand.. you, friend, have not portrayed it correctly. Change it.
Hard blow, yes.. but see why I'm telling you this on my blog? =) Haha.
So what does this have to do with my pride anyway? Well, those were just a few things that I had to learn myself not too long ago. I realized that if I ever wanted to become a truly good writer, then I would need some training. Just like any truly great artist, they took hours and hours of practice time. Now, writing improvement may not show up as grandly as an amazingly painted portrait, but it will show and people will notice the difference.
Now with pride, I think it is good to keep ourselves humble by recieving critiques and maybe even an occasional bad review here and there. We aren't perfect therefore we can't expect our writing to be perfect. However, when you receive bad feedback via editor or reviewer, don't take it personally. Let it slide, listen to that they say, consider it and, if you think you need to, make the changes.
Just remember this... Only the best and purest gold has gone through several intense refining processes.
