Taking Inventory of Myself As a Writer
May. 1st, 2005 08:08 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
queenoftheskiesSo, yesterday, I took a look at my writing and everything I had accomplished over the last year. I made a few general comments about quantity and perhaps my lack of direction for most of that year, but I didn't really comment on the writing quality.
My feelings on the quality of my writing change with my moods, I guess. Or, more accurately, with my stress level from work and how exhausted I'm feeling at any particular moment. The combination of the two often makes it difficult for me to enjoy the act of writing, though I'm quite pleased to actually get the words written. The fact that it's hard sometimes does make me wonder if what I've written is any good, because I seem to have it in my head that GOOD = EASY.
Having said that, I hope that things that weren't good can be fixed on rewrite.
I did have a couple of short stories and a novella that I wrote that were easy or at least fairly easy writes. And, maybe I'm kinda pleased with them even though I do know they need work. I don't mind the work part. I'm willing to work hard.
I asked myself yesterday what I thought my strengths and weakness are as a writer. Not the strengths and weaknesses of my actual writing, because that's a separate topic. MY strengths and weaknesses as a writer.
I started a list and I'm sure I'll think of more things later. Some aspects were difficult to define and put into words, but I tried.
I think I boiled my strengths down into three main areas:
1. Dedication
2. Determination
3. Discipline
Put simply, I will NOT give up. And, I will continue to stick to goals and schedules and crank out words until the day I die. I have an abundance of ideas. I have the desire to learn. I don't mind critisicm.
Weaknesses were a little harder for me to define and refine because I think there are a lot of emotional aspects there. I can feel them, but I can't settle them into something concrete that I can battle.
But, as a start on a list, I came up with:
1. Insecurity (BIG problem)
2. Fear (another BIG problem)
3. Easily discouraged (though, I don't give up, which is a good thing)
4. Inability to determine where I am in the writing process and determine what areas to focus on in learning
5. Inability to stay completely focused through extreme periods of stress
6. Inability to set tangible goals other than word count. (I can stick to the word count, crank out words by the gazillions, but I can't make myself set concrete goals as to putting my work in front of people for review and/or submission. This, I think, goes back to the fear and insecurity.)
That's just a beginning. I'm sure I'll think of other things as I go along.
My problem comes in determining exactly what to do for the weaknesses. Not sure how to get rid of the fear and insecurity and being easily discourage.
I did manage to put a couple of chapters from a novella up at Quill N Ink for critique. Haven't gotten any yet, but we'll see, when I do, what people consider to be the weaknesses in my actual writing.
Trying to get up the nerve to post the same thing at OWW and Critters. Even though I haven't been as active as I'd like at Critters recently, I still have "passes" that would allow me to get to the head of the queue from back when I WAS critiquing regularly
But, I'm afraid. That old dang FEAR thing again. I'm afraid people will see no value at all in my writing and tell me I suck and laugh that I even want to be a writer.
That's something that's hard to overcome.
My feelings on the quality of my writing change with my moods, I guess. Or, more accurately, with my stress level from work and how exhausted I'm feeling at any particular moment. The combination of the two often makes it difficult for me to enjoy the act of writing, though I'm quite pleased to actually get the words written. The fact that it's hard sometimes does make me wonder if what I've written is any good, because I seem to have it in my head that GOOD = EASY.
Having said that, I hope that things that weren't good can be fixed on rewrite.
I did have a couple of short stories and a novella that I wrote that were easy or at least fairly easy writes. And, maybe I'm kinda pleased with them even though I do know they need work. I don't mind the work part. I'm willing to work hard.
I asked myself yesterday what I thought my strengths and weakness are as a writer. Not the strengths and weaknesses of my actual writing, because that's a separate topic. MY strengths and weaknesses as a writer.
I started a list and I'm sure I'll think of more things later. Some aspects were difficult to define and put into words, but I tried.
I think I boiled my strengths down into three main areas:
1. Dedication
2. Determination
3. Discipline
Put simply, I will NOT give up. And, I will continue to stick to goals and schedules and crank out words until the day I die. I have an abundance of ideas. I have the desire to learn. I don't mind critisicm.
Weaknesses were a little harder for me to define and refine because I think there are a lot of emotional aspects there. I can feel them, but I can't settle them into something concrete that I can battle.
But, as a start on a list, I came up with:
1. Insecurity (BIG problem)
2. Fear (another BIG problem)
3. Easily discouraged (though, I don't give up, which is a good thing)
4. Inability to determine where I am in the writing process and determine what areas to focus on in learning
5. Inability to stay completely focused through extreme periods of stress
6. Inability to set tangible goals other than word count. (I can stick to the word count, crank out words by the gazillions, but I can't make myself set concrete goals as to putting my work in front of people for review and/or submission. This, I think, goes back to the fear and insecurity.)
That's just a beginning. I'm sure I'll think of other things as I go along.
My problem comes in determining exactly what to do for the weaknesses. Not sure how to get rid of the fear and insecurity and being easily discourage.
I did manage to put a couple of chapters from a novella up at Quill N Ink for critique. Haven't gotten any yet, but we'll see, when I do, what people consider to be the weaknesses in my actual writing.
Trying to get up the nerve to post the same thing at OWW and Critters. Even though I haven't been as active as I'd like at Critters recently, I still have "passes" that would allow me to get to the head of the queue from back when I WAS critiquing regularly
But, I'm afraid. That old dang FEAR thing again. I'm afraid people will see no value at all in my writing and tell me I suck and laugh that I even want to be a writer.
That's something that's hard to overcome.
![[identity profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/openid.png){kind=small}
![[community profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/community.png){kind=small}
no subject
Date: 2005-05-01 03:53 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2005-05-01 05:34 pm (UTC)It is, very much so, but I think regularly putting your work out there helps. And getting a few people who you KNOW won't make fun of you helps. ;)
*hints*
no subject
Date: 2005-05-01 06:36 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2005-05-01 09:25 pm (UTC)(There's also a good book out there with famous writers' rejection slips, though I'll have to look up the title again).
Anyway, from the Marlo Thomas book, my favorite thus far is Sidney Poitier (around age 19 or so) getting dragged to a theater's back door by the collar and told not to waste anyone else's time, and to go be a dishwasher (which he already was, but the theater troupe leader didn't know that) or something else he could handle.