The theme of fear keeps popping up for me this month. My spiritual teacher used it for a focus of discussion at the beginning of the month and I’ve been contemplating what my fears are and which ones I need to push through and which ones I need to honour. For instance, the old example of jumping off a cliff into water. I’m okay with not doing that. I don’t chase an adrenaline high. Maybe I’m missing out, but I generally don’t like falling. Perhaps I’m just a creature of comfort, but I also know I have to push outside my comfort zone to grow anything.
I’m also listening to the book, The Gift of Fear: Survival Signals that Protect Us from Violence, by Gavin de Becker. He tells us how our bodies know when something’s wrong, it’s whether or not we listen to our own inner warning signals. The signs are always there even though people often say, I had no idea. Becker uses the example of our dogs, how they will react negatively to a person who wants to harm us in some way. The dog is not reacting to the stranger, the dog is reacting to you and the signals your body is giving. Often, in an effort to be polite, or nice, we override our own gut instincts getting us into trouble we could’ve seen coming.
So what does this have to do with writing? I have so much fear around my writing and it came up more than once in writing discussion last week. And my biggest fear stems from reading my own writing. How will it compare to the hundreds of books I’ve read? To some of my favourite authors? Will it be perfection? No! It won’t be.
And worse, I’m about to push my novel out into the world. Not only that, I have to sell my novel, make someone think it’s the next “must-read” book. And I have to read it, again. I’m about to hit the querying stage so took the step of printing and binding my book for a final read. It’s not just a line edit read, but making sure some of my signposts along the way are in the right spot, and repeated enough to have resonance, but not so much that I’m hitting you over the head.
I haven’t even started the re-read and I’ve already made changes. I was reviewing my first ten pages for a potential submission, and couldn’t help but tweak and edit. Will I ever be finished? Feeling discouraged, I went back to the notes my substantive editor had given me. At the time, I highlighted all the good bits so I could re-read them. And I do, whenever my courage fails me so that I can remember: someone actually liked my writing.
I’ve had a lot of positive comments over the years. I keep them in a special box in my mind, pull them out when I’m having difficulty believing that I can actually do this, that I could actually be a writer. Last night, in a moment of fatigue, I wondered who would ever care about my wee novel.
This is definitely a fear I have to push through. But perfecting a query, your first ten pages, your whole novel; polishing it so it shines and some agent will pick it out among the numerous queries they receive–how could that not be fear inducing? It’s in the doing that we get better, that we make mistakes and learn from them. We must love the process, even if the final product doesn’t meet our loftiest goals.
And thankfully, there are others around us to learn from. I reached out to my writers group and they’ve given some fine resources to learn from. (Links are provided at the end of the blog.)
- The Shit No One Tells You About Writing – This is an excellent podcast where Bianca Marais interviews authors, editors, and agents. Two of the agents critique query letters and the first five pages of the authors submission. And if you subscribe, you can get access to the actual documents with notes. An awesome resource.
- Book Ends – On YouTube, two agents have a series of videos about querying and other agent related matters. Listening made me feel better and even made the agents seem more approachable, especially if you follow the rules!
- Query Manager—A place to find potential agents and track your submissions.
- Publishers Marketplace—A place to see what’s happening in the world of publishing
And I had a little moment of joy this week, seeing myself in print. But even then, I was afraid to read what I’d written, knowing it wasn’t perfection due to a tight timeline. (See my earlier blog: https://ascribewriters.com/the-tortoise-and-the-hare-for-writers/)
As writers, we’re often looking for critiques, but it’s important to keep a stash of compliments close by, physical or mentally. Savour them in times of low-confidence to help find your courage. Surely querying is easier than jumping off a cliff? Maybe?
Links:
- https://www.theshitaboutwriting.com/
- https://bookendsliterary.com/
- https://querymanager.com/
- https://www.publishersmarketplace.com/
- https://gdba.com/
- https://www.meditationmag.com/
