Fanfare for the writer, please?
| October 19, 2011 | Posted by ljquillyn under did you see this?!!, Things that inspire me, Writing with confidence |
I want to share a great article with you, dear writers. The Writing Life by Stephen King
As I read this, I found myself chuckling frequently at the commonalities of the writing life that I recognized in myself as I took in Stephen King’s descriptions. I was also thinking, “Wow! I have something in common with this guy? This is super exciting, maybe it’s more confirmation that I really, really am a writer.”
I loved how King said that the writing life is pretty much just sitting on your ass. I’m doing that right now! He explained how he just writes. Sometimes in his writing room, sometimes in the park, and really, it isn’t all that glamorous. Passers by notice his lovely Welsh Corgi, but nobody goes into raptures about the fact that Stephen King is writing!
Writing often feels that way to me too. I rarely get any sort of praise for it, you know, unless I demand it (which I sometimes do). When writing comes up in conversation, here’s how it usually goes:
“Guess what I did today!”
“What?”
“I wrote several pages of a story! And this one scene, oh my gosh, it is amazing. Of course, I can’t tell you what happened.”
“Oh, cool. What else did you do?”
“Oh, not much.” Whomp.
On the inside, I’m a little less blasé. On the inside, I am saying, “Oh my gosh! Yay! I did it! I wrote today! Where’s the fanfare? I may have just written a chunk of the most amazing story of all time. I hope I can do this again tomorrow! I hope I can do it again right now! Maybe I’ll sit down and see what happens!”
I’m actually very lucky in that my husband is always very proud of me for writing. “Good job, darling! I’m so glad that you wrote today!” That’s usually what he says.
At any rate, the writing life, though it mostly involves sitting on your ass if you’re actually working, is pretty awesome. Sometimes, or, really most of the time, we do have to provide our own fanfare. That’s okay. It’s kind of fun, honestly. More than that, it is important to give yourself props for a job well done. Don’t be hesitant to encourage yourself. You can be your own biggest critic and your own biggest advocate.
Happy writing!
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