It’s a well-known fact that writers are an insecure lot in general.
I have to say that I’m no different. I worry about a nearly endless list of things all the time.
Since writing is such a solitary pursuit, it’s easy to compare myself to others and think that I’m the only one who’s afraid.
Luckily, there’s a group of writers who bravely air their fears and worries once a month and offer comfort and support to those who need it. Click here for a full list of participants.
Today’s optional question is: Besides writing, what other creative pursuits do you have?
Instead of talking about my other creative pursuits (mainly knitting and graphic design), I thought I’d tell you about one of my greatest fears.
I’m afraid that people won’t understand.
That even after they’ve read my story, they won’t understand and won’t care about the characters I’ve spent so many years getting to know.
It might be the same sort of fear you feel when you bring your beloved boyfriend home to your family for the first time. You want them to love him as much as you do, but you have a sneaking suspicion they probably won’t.
You can see he’s got a heart of gold, but he’s also got a tattoo and that isn’t really their thing.
But it’s also deeper than that.
Because these people in this story aren’t just people. They aren’t my friends or my parents or my lovers or even strangers wandering past on the street.
They’re me.
All of them.
A hundred different versions of myself, transformed and changed by visions of other lives leading other places than mine has.
And aren’t we all afraid of that? That if we revealed our true inner selves the world would look back at us with blank stares and quiet mutterings of “I don’t get it”?
What is your artistic insecurity? What are you afraid of? Share it with me in the comments and we can support each other!
It’s taken me too long to understand that I can’t please everyone. I’ve wasted a lot of energy and time trying to do that. So, just like I am not everyone’s cup of tea, neither are my characters, my stories. We just do the best we can – in life and on the page – then let go, move on. 🙂
Yes! I think this might be harder for me at this stage of my life and writing because I haven’t published yet, so my most interested potential readers are still my family who actually has no interest in reading the sort of stories I write and would never pick one up on purpose in the bookstore haha
My debut did well, but things have changed since then, both in my life and with book retailers and algorithms. I don’t fear being a bad writer so much as I fear that I’ve lost the momentum I had. It’s frustrating. Someday I’ll have time to devote to writing and marketing again.
Sometimes life just gets busy. I think what helps me is always making sure I carve out a few minutes for my writing. Even if I’m not making very fast progress, I’m still making progress 🙂
Welcome to the IWSG!
That’s the fear when we pour so much of ourselves into our writing and characters. And some people won’t get it. Your story wasn’t for them, so don’t worry about it. Focus on those who do get it.
Thanks for the warm welcome and the good advice!
I’m afraid I’m never going to finish writing my current WIP. I’m afraid I’ll never get it published. I’m afraid no one will read it. I’m afraid no one will like it. I’m afraid it’s going to annoy somebody and launch a twitter storm against me.
It’s all part of the neurosis of being a writer. Welcome to the club (no seriously, welcome to the IWSG)! There are always people who won’t “get” what we do, or like what we write. But somewhere out there are people who will. So we just keep writing for ourselves and hope we find them.
(BTW, if you see anybody who’ll like my work, lemme know, okay?) 😉
http://www.cdgallantking.ca/2019/02/a-lesson-6-year-old-should-be-able-to.html
The Undeserved Twitter/Instagram Storm is a thing we are all justified in being afraid of these days. Thanks for the welcome!
Very well worded, and so true! To write is to expose ourselves, versions of how we see and feel. It can be immensely rewarding when people say “I hear you and like you” but if they don’t do that, if they reject us, it can be awful.
This is why, despite the faults of having genres, I think they actually help, for it helps authors find those readers who will be most likely to understand the way we’ve depicted these “versions of ourselves.” Not every book is for every reader, and knowing this—knowing that how we write puts a lens between our hearts and the readers, a lens that changes how the readers see and interpret what we’re trying to show them—can make it less personal. It’s not necessarily our heart, ourselves that they don’t like—it’s the lens that threw them off. 🙂
Thanks for sharing!
Well put yourself! Yes, I think sorting books definitely helps them find their way to the right readers. It also definitely helps to try to remember to separate “myself” and “my work” so people not liking my work doesn’t translate to people not liking me.
I get what you’re saying. I used to tell people that hearing someone badmouth my book was like listening to people insult my kids. Now, my skin is a bit thicker. I realize that no matter how perfect, no one book will suit every person. I just quit reading the reviews constantly. I feel so much saner that way.
My thick skin development is still a work in progress 😉
Definitely. Our writing is part of us, it is us, so when it’s criticised it’s almost impossible to not feel bad. A little wallow and then a ‘stuff them’ is a good response. (Unless on reflection the criticism is justified.)
Such good advice! Learning to accept good criticism is definitely a process.
Tyler-Rose. – I’m guessing you have touched a lot of us with your few words. I know you have approached a truth I have known for a long time. (At 82 lots of things are a ‘long time.’)
I don’t ‘fear’ that people won’t ‘understand,’ I am more concerned that they won’t ‘care.’ Like you, all of us who lay our imagination bare on paper have invested ourselves in the people, places, and events we have imagined into being. Over the months those characters have become friends, speaking our words in the voices we have chosen for them.
And sadly, in this time when dozens of stories appear each day to compete for the readers’ interest ……so few of those potential readers seem to care about the people we have come to love, or hate.
The storytelling-blogging bug must really have its hooks in us to put up with all that.
It really does! Hope springs eternal, I guess 😉 I think after caring so much about our characters, we feel like they deserve to live out in the world even if there aren’t a horde of readers waiting for them.
Welcome to the IWSG, Tyler-Rose!
I used to be afraid that I would be labelled a “fraud”… afraid that I was not a “real writer”.
It’s the good, old, faithful Impostor syndrome that rears its ugly head from time to time. Though not so much anymore. I’ve gotten to the stage where I ignore it.
Just a reminder that we also have a facebook group as well as a Twitter and Instagram page where you’ll find loads of ongoing writing-related/book activities to keep those writing muscles sharp!
Writer In Transit February Co-host
I’ll definitely have to look for those other groups! Thank you! So nice to have other people to feel insecure with 🙂
I read an article somewhere online about how Neil Gaiman was in a party of industry movers (of all kinds of industries) and found his way to a conversation with someone who just happened to share the same first name. After a few drinks, Neil Gaiman admitted that he sometimes feels like a fraud. In response, that man said he felt he didn’t belong to this particular group, that he had nothing to contribute to the world. And Neil Gaiman said something like, “You did land on the moon, that has to mean something.”
If Neil Armstrong and Neil Gaiman, both successes in their industries, feel insecure, then I think it’s alright for the rest of us…
This made me laugh! I’ve heard this quote before, but it’s always good to be reminded of it. Sometimes we’re so busy worrying about our own insecurities that we forget other people have them too.
“That even after they’ve read my story, they won’t understand and won’t care about the characters I’ve spent so many years getting to know.” Wow. I’ve been hiding from this fear for a while now… I think I’ll go back in hiding 😉
Ronel visiting for Feb’s IWSG Day Being an Insecure Writer — And Happy About It
Yes, let’s only examine our fears on IWSG day, lest we all be overwhelmed and curl into quivering heaps under our writing desks 😉