Getting the work done can be daunting for a lot of reasons. But I have decided that the biggest reason has got to be fear. Not the DougCleggDeanKoontzStephenKing-imposed kind of fear. I'm talking about the scaredy-pants kind that is much more terrifying, and comes in a variety of shape-shifting forms.
Writer fears tend to multiply because you have time to sit back on your WriterCouch and let those anxieties swirl about and fester. These can develop into bonafide nightmares.
You have to refuse to let these paralyze your writer selves. I will address some of the most common ones.
One of my favorites is Fear
of Becoming the Crazy Cat Lady. That's a very real fear; I know this from personal experience, because I have been called that by various family members. Writing means you are left alone for hours at a time with no human conversation. But this can actually work in your favor. My cat is awesome. He lets me read my WIP out loud to him and he doesn't check his text messages. Sometimes he even sticks around for the whole chapter.
Another common one is fear of never finishing your manuscript, or worse ... only being able to finish it in TwitterSpeak, which basically amounts to pages of disjointed paragraphs of 140 characters or less. Show up to your WriterCouch. Punch the time clock. It'll get done.
Yet another one that is so unbearable to many writers and would-be writers that it is often uttered no louder than a faint whisper: FearThatSomeoneWillStealMyIdea. Sadly, there are those who find plagiarism to be an acceptable form of behavior/sport. But unless there is some really cool X-Files Mind Feed thing going on, and unless you are actually tweeting your 140 character paragraphs, nobody is going to steal your story. And nobody can ever steal your Voice. It's your writer fingerprint. It's impossible. And as far as I know, Milli Vanilli is long gone, or in some abandoned cave somewhere being forced to listen to a continuous loop of one-hit wonders.
So ... put down that People Magazine crossword, open up that laptop, and punch that time card. Write that book. You. Can. Do. It.
What is your biggest writer fear? Put it in the comment section, and I will round up some of my FabulousWriterFriends to help you chase them away.
4 comments:
Never finishing was a big fear here. I just finally finished the first draft of my YA novel. Next big fear- submitting. I have a picture book that (I think) is ready to send out, but I haven't had the guts to do it yet!
Biggest fear???? Never being able to stop blogging! A month ago, I never had a problem writing PB manuscripts, but now...I just can't get off the computer to allow myself to write and imagine, etc. I fear that I have been sucked into the blogosphere and will never be able to pull myself out! Oh, what a to-do! (P.S. My daughter's name is Harper). =)
Rachel!
Send it out! You can do it!
Elizabeth,
My friend actually uses an old computer/word processor for his writing--no Internet hookup on that one! --and another computer for his blogging, Facebook, etc.! I've thought about doing that, myself! It's so easy to stop writing mid-paragraph and check my email and such.
--I love that your daughter's name is Harper!
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