Every writer has a life outside of writing. We have friends, family, significant others, kids, bills, jobs, etc. etc. ad nauseam. All those outside things can cause serious pressure. Major stress. Overwhelming emotional trauma.
Still, through all that, we’re expected to write, to make beautiful words flow across the page with ease and emotion. No one wants to know the writer of their books had a bad day/week/month/year/decade, they just want a good book. They want consistent good books. As do publishers and editors. So. It’s a writer’s job to perform. End of story.
Where does that leave us as people? Even under enormous pressure, mental break downs, and other Shakespearan drama we have to be creative. And yeah, yeah. Everyone goes through bad stuff and has to work, but being really inspirationally creative is a whole different ball of wax. We have to write comedy and witty dialogue when we just want to sit down, sob our eyes out, and give up. But the people who make it in this business are the ones with talent who persevere. Who pull themselves up and keep their fingers firmly on the keyboard. No matter how bad it sucks for them.
So, how do you cope? What do you do when life, liberty, and the pursuit of publication stresses you out to the point where you just can’t anymore? Me? I’m just coming off an I-can’t-write bender. What got me back on track? Reading old books that I love, handling the things that were stressing me out, and having a critique partner that would just not let me quit. Sometimes you just don’t have the ability to pull yourself up and continue. That’s why networking and making writer-friends is so important to your career. When things get so bad that even chocolate can’t fix it, we sometime need to turn to our friends to help us limp along this long, creative road we’re traveling.
That’s my thoughts for today. How about you? What’s your pressure strategy?
September 11th, 2006 at 3:23 pm
Even at the lowest point of my life, when I found out I was prego and my boyfriend wanted nothing to do with it… and all my ‘romantic illusions’ built up by my books came crashing down, well i still wanted to write romance novels. I just switched to historical for awhile
Stress happens, life happens, but I think if you’re a writer, it it’s in you–you’ll come back. Reading or watching movies can bring me back. Going to conferences and chapter meetings. There’s always someone ready to drag you back
September 12th, 2006 at 3:55 am
I admit that I didn’t write for almost a year before I sold my first story to Cobblestone. But I agree with Shelli, if writing is what you really want to do, something will find away to inspire you to come back to it.