A Midsummer Night's Creative Crisis

 

Sitting at my keyboard burning the after midnight oil in late June/early July making last minute edits to my book, I could feel it creeping in again like the breeze through an open window. Despite the fact that the changes were small - a new phrase here, a deleted one there - somehow it made me feel I had done a horrible job. 

Self-doubt is like a little gremlin that enjoys popping up to try and sabotage you when it sees you writing. It especially loves to sit there watching you edit your story with a big "I told you so" grin on its face.

Each mistake I encountered in this final round of editing and perfecting my finished project had the self-doubt gremlin jumping around in glee. I beat myself up over the errors while breathing a sigh of relief that they had been caught. I couldn't believe I had missed that period that was supposed to be a comma, but it wasn't as cringey as an earlier catch, where I'd left my character outside and forgot to replace the deleted sentence that mentioned her coming back in. (It's a good argument for having an editor, a luxury not all of us indie authors can afford.)

Writer's block is nothing compared to crippling self-doubt that not only makes you second-guess your creative decisions on a project, but makes you question whether you should even be writing. 

As I rewrote a couple of sentences, I told myself that I was making the story read better, that I cared enough to do the best writing I could, so I must be doing a good job. And yet at the same time I wondered if this was all a sign that I should give up writing. The self-doubt gremlin whispered in my ear: Maybe you should quit. You're a crappy writer if you can't write the most amazing sentence on the first try. 

I just wrote and published my first novel, and there were times while I was writing it that I thought of abandoning the whole project. I was upset that I had to delay publishing because I was still fixing/changing things, and the gremlin kept trying to get me to give up. What kept me going? The same things that always do when I write:

My story. As a short story writer, a novel was new territory for me that I really wanted to explore. I wanted to write this story so much. I liked the way it came together, and the way the genres blended and complimented each other. And I really wanted to meet my goal of completing my first novel.

My characters. I love my characters. All of the ones I've created. I was with the people I created for my novel for a lot longer. Like the others, I gave them life; I couldn't abandon them. They helped me cross the finish line.

Remembering why I write. I love it. It makes me happy. It's so satisfying to take an idea and turn it into an actual story. I love getting it out of the warehouse of ideas in my head and seeing the words on the page.

I also find that a good way to fend off self-doubt is to not compare yourself to other authors. We all have our own style. It's really important to stay true to yourself and tell the story you want to tell, the way you want to tell it, and not think about what others are doing.

So now I am moving on to the next project, which will be another short story. And as for the self-doubt gremlin, I've breathed a sigh of relief that it's gone. For now.