Soul Fever: Thoughts about writing

There's a strangeness to writing, drawing, and creating in general. When you get an idea, it's like a beautiful, brilliant, all-encompassing fire that consumes you, a perfect vision of an end goal imbued with a very specific and powerful emotion. You know what it means to you, how you feel about it, and imagine this neat place in the world for it, and how other people might feel about it.

But when you try to bring it to life, putting pen to paper and fingertips to keys, it never turns out quite as good. As someone who's been trying for almost a decade, I recognize it intellectually as an essential part of the process: the unavoidable, messy rough sketch, the all-important shitty first draft. "Before trying to make it good, first just make it exist." Get it all out on paper, allow yourself to work on it, and focus completely on taking one step at a time.

That's what separates a professional from a filthy casual. Nothing wrong with being an amateur, but there is something wrong with starting just to never finish. Emotionally, I just can't seem to get there quite yet. I have a wonderful idea; I start working on it, it's far uglier than I could ever imagine, and then I stop believing in it at all. I don't feel like it should even exist, so why bother working on it? If I were a professional, someone would just give me a little push. 

"Listen, you just have to power through it, okay? People are relying on you to deliver this within the deadline. Just don't think about what it means or whether or not it deserves to exist. Take your ego out of it, stop being so selfish, get your head out of your arse, and JUST DO IT! You'll find, eventually, looking back, that it was better than you prematurely deemed it to be, and it would've actually made a difference in the world. You'll only ever get better by doing more of the actual thing."

Of course, I wouldn't deny that or argue against it. It's as sound in logic as physics or chemistry. Unfortunately, I'm not quite a professional just yet, so I twiddle my thumbs and sit around doing nothing instead. I respect the value of it; I really do, but after going through the gauntlet, after forcing myself to be creative in professional settings, I've arrived at my own conclusions that differ significantly.

There are writers, and then there are writers. That is, there is an idea of a professional as it fits within the larger capitalistic, economic system that assigns value to things through their place in the world, dictated by public relations, utility, supply, and demand. Then, there is a way of life that's bigger than that. Even writing it down, it seems all high and mighty, a petty, vain justification to feel good about sitting on your arse.

But in a world where you can generate a story in a few seconds, do we really need more books on the shelf? Or do we need better books? This might seem to circle back to "you'll never get good without working on it," but just because that's true doesn't mean you should work on anything under the sun. Perhaps, if after putting it on paper, you don't feel good about it anymore, instead of treating that as noise to be tuned out, you should listen to it as well.

Now, feelings shouldn't dictate our every choice, but I've found that in matters strongly tied to intuition, like creating something of your own from scratch, you must heed what your heart is trying to tell you. I also realise when I read my own words that they always sound so weak and indecisive. Why would anyone read something full of contradictions? Who would trust a person who seems so unsure? One who is always trying to argue against themselves and paint a boring, balanced picture...

I do it anyway, because I believe that through my non-fiction writing, the world could use a more balanced perspective that doesn't seek to ignite conflict, hijack attention, and push people's biological buttons. So regardless of any criticism, I can confidently stand by my diplomatic stances that refuse to play a losing game of sowing division. My point here is simple: if you are writing your own story or building your own world, you need to believe in it.

You need to feel an unbearable, unyielding passion for bringing your vision to life. You will definitely face countless moments of fear, insecurity, and indecision along that path and question exactly what shape it should take. That is the best sign you can get that what you're working on will matter to someone and that you care enough about how it will affect them. But there must never be even a single moment of doubt about whether or not the thing should be made at all. 

If there is, something has gone terribly wrong, and you must step back to treat it as such, just as a war surgeon must make ruthlessly pragmatic decisions.