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lagilmanThis was originally posted in response to a thread elsewhere, but I decided it was worth reposting here, since it's something I've had to deal with more than once along the way, and it might be useful to folk reading here.
The origin discussion was about having the blahs and fuckits when writing. Someone opined that if it's not fun, you should stop. I respectfully disagreed, as follows.
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I wish I could agree with that but... I can't.
Yes, writing is enjoyable. Especially when it's going well, and you feel like a creative goddess. When it's not, it's a damned agony and annoyance and general feh and meh.
That's exactly when you can't give up. Because the writing hasn't changed. The goal -- to produce a story that has impact and effect -- hasn't changed. It's just that it's a tougher slog right now than when things are going well, for whatever reason, and that's going to feed the bad mood you started in, into a possible downward cycle.
Stopping won't stop the cycle, though. It will just make you feel like crap for giving up.
So what do you do? You forgive yourself for lack of progress... and then keep going. Write crap. Forgive yourself for writing crap. Write a rant about the crap you're writing. Write long notes in other peoples' LJs so that your fingers don't lose the familiarity of keyboarding. Send e-mails or letters to people you haven't written to in a while. Somewhre in there the love of words and of communicating will come back to you, and the storytelling will come back, and the fuckits will eventually disappear.
(That's my theory, anyway. Here's hoping...)
But don't ever, ever think that writing has to be fun. Because a lot of the time, it's not. It's what we do, it's what we love, but it's not always fun.
YMMV, natch.
The origin discussion was about having the blahs and fuckits when writing. Someone opined that if it's not fun, you should stop. I respectfully disagreed, as follows.
-------------------------
I wish I could agree with that but... I can't.
Yes, writing is enjoyable. Especially when it's going well, and you feel like a creative goddess. When it's not, it's a damned agony and annoyance and general feh and meh.
That's exactly when you can't give up. Because the writing hasn't changed. The goal -- to produce a story that has impact and effect -- hasn't changed. It's just that it's a tougher slog right now than when things are going well, for whatever reason, and that's going to feed the bad mood you started in, into a possible downward cycle.
Stopping won't stop the cycle, though. It will just make you feel like crap for giving up.
So what do you do? You forgive yourself for lack of progress... and then keep going. Write crap. Forgive yourself for writing crap. Write a rant about the crap you're writing. Write long notes in other peoples' LJs so that your fingers don't lose the familiarity of keyboarding. Send e-mails or letters to people you haven't written to in a while. Somewhre in there the love of words and of communicating will come back to you, and the storytelling will come back, and the fuckits will eventually disappear.
(That's my theory, anyway. Here's hoping...)
But don't ever, ever think that writing has to be fun. Because a lot of the time, it's not. It's what we do, it's what we love, but it's not always fun.
YMMV, natch.
