It's the first Wednesday of the month and time for another Insecure Writer's Support Group post. I am honored to be one of this month's co-hosts, along with Donna Hole,
LG Keltner,
Lisa Buie-Collard, and of course,
Ninja Captain Alex J. Cavanaugh. If you're an insecure writer or just looking to give some support to those of us who are, check us out
here!
Two days ago a friend of mine posted something on my Facebook about writing -- it was an excerpt from Amy Poehler's newest work 'Yes Please', and it was dead on. On the subject of writing, she says:
“Everyone lies about writing. They lie about how easy it is or how hard it was. They perpetuate a romantic idea that writing is some beautiful experience that takes place in an architectural room filled with leather novels and chai tea. They talk about their “morning ritual” and how they “Dress for writing” and the cabin in Big Sur where they go to “be alone” — blah blah blah. No one tells the truth about writing a book. Authors pretend their stories were always shiny and perfect and just waiting to be written. The truth is, writing is this: hard and boring and occasionally great but usually not. Even I have lied about writing. I have told people that writing this book has been like brushing away dirt from a fossil. What a load of s***. It has been like hacking away at a freezer with a screwdriver.”
- Amy Poehler, Yes Please
I hate the term 'lol', but I literally (and I mean literally in the literal sense, not figuratively as people often do) laughed out loud when I read this. Because she's absolutely right. When I write, it's not lovely. It's not some BBC version of the melancholy artist, shut up in a beautifully sparse attic diligently hand writing great works of literary fiction.
It's ugly. It's typing out two pages of text, only to delete all but three paragraphs. It's reminding myself over and over again "show, don't tell" or "active voice, active voice, active voice". It's cursing at the monitor or taking a two hour "break" to binge watch cat memes because I have no idea where my story is going next. And when it's done, it's endless hours of edits and revisions. Of changing things that seemed to make sense at three in the morning when you originally wrote it.
And though I can't imagine doing anything else, it's rarely fun. It's work. It's hard. And it's what we do. So let's go out there and do it. Happy blogging people, but more importantly, keep up the good work and keep writing.
