The Guilt Factor: Motivation by Fear and the Means to Empathy

For me, the need to write has always had a face.

Whose face that is and what expression it wears varies. Typically, it's been the face of a writing professor that's haunted me during those long middle-of-the-night writing sessions. It doesn't matter how fair or kind the professor is; for some reason (maybe it's the dark and caffeine jitters), my imagination paints them with a steady frown, causing my stomach to knot over every word with the thought that they might be unamused by my metaphors. Other times, the face has been warmer -- that of a close friend, perhaps -- but with eyes sad and disappointed as they strain to find some value in my work. More recently, the face has been the loved one abroad, patient and smiling; it invokes a twinge of pain in me as I remember my promise to write novels in his absence, while his cheerful voice says, "It's okay, don't feel too bad about it."

There has always been a sense of guilt associated with my work, and that guilt has always felt personal because I've associated it with important people in my life. It's not that uncommon of a trait among overachievers, I suppose. How often have we psychoanalyzed the artist driven by a neurotic need to please an ever-dissatisfied parent or mentor, even years after the latter's demise? Whether it is for God or husband or mommy dearest, history is full of creators desperately striving to impress someone.

Why? Isn't love of the art enough?  

For my part, guilt in its worst moments has caused the writing process to be miserable. Mainly because those disappointed faces in my mind are entirely fictitious, not at all founded upon reality. I'm naturally self-critical to begin with, and for some reason or another I often project that criticism onto others. Even if any of the people whose faces I see tell me my work is fine, a small corner of my subconscious doesn't believe them, doesn't want to believe they're being honest in their praise. There's a fine line between constructive encouragement and being too nice, and I'll be damned if I can tell the difference.

But whether those frowns are fabricated or not, my fear of disappointing others says something interesting about the writing process, I think. I would like to believe that love of writing could be its own motivator, but for me it isn't so. Even as one who thrives on solitude, I find myself needing others in my writing -- for validation, for support. Call it insecurity (and I'm sure it is, partly), but I suspect that it has more to do with empathy. While "writing for the self" is a popular trend these days, and valid in its own right, I think it fails to see what makes great literature great: its ability to evoke something in another person, to touch something deep in his roots and make him see a commonality between himself and a stranger on a page. Writing gives the guise of speaking as an individual, when in reality it speaks of humanity.

While I have no grand illusions about inspiring millions, I can't bring myself to pull the "misunderstood writer" card and write without any regard to what others think. It goes against what has impacted me as a reader, and consequently what I can only hope to achieve as a writer: if what I write doesn't inspire, if it doesn't resonate with someone, I have failed.

But I know I don't have to please everyone, nor do I want to. In his part-memoir, part-advice book On Writing, Stephen King explains that "you can't let the whole world into your story," but you can -- and should -- let in those who matter most. According to King, every good writer must have an Ideal Reader (I.R., for short); someone for whom you write, someone who, in flesh or in spirit, is always "going to be in your writing room." As King points out, sometimes a writer's Ideal Reader (like the neurotic patient's mommy dearest) is miles away or many years dead. It doesn't matter. An I.R. gives the writer a tangible audience, a direction for the writing process; someone who the writer wants to make think, laugh, cry, and feel deeply. "And you know what?" King adds. "You'll find yourself bending the story [for them] even before the Ideal Reader glimpses so much as the first sentence."[sic!]
It takes a certain empathy to write with another person in mind, and to know that person well enough (at least, to think one does) to impact them. And that's marvelous, because empathy -- seeing and valuing each other's common humanity -- is what writing's all about, isn't it?

As for myself, I've found that guilt is not such a terrible thing to live with after all. That fear of disappointing my reader is what forces me to analyze my own work critically; it makes me take a second, third, and fourth look at everything, asking myself, "Is there anything else I can do to improve this part?" Having someone else in mind, moreover, often gives me a reason to write on my darkest days. As a naturally self-deprecating self-critic, I find it easy to conclude on a bad day that I'm not worth the time or effort to write. But, because I'm a compassion-driven person, someone else is always worth the work.

So, in spite of its bad rap, I don't mind living with guilt. If a visitation from a frowning face is what produces the work, so be it. Maybe, someday, I'll finally make that face smile. 

Emma Moser 

Website: antiquedwriter.blogspot.com

Twitter @em_mo_write ♦

Facebook.com/antiquedwriter

BIN TO BESTSELLERS: THE IMPORTANCE OF OTHER PEOPLE IN YOUR WRITING LIFE

Making money writing is the hardest job on planet earth, however, there are people who do it effectively and make a living out of it. Being not one of them is not your problem, but aspiring not to be one is.

Is finding a publisher the best option for you as a writer? Richard Bach once mentioned in an interview; it’s not a publisher a writer searches for, but an editor. This relationship is one that should last for a lifetime. An editor understands where the music of words has to be slowed down or where it must run faster. But to get one worthy enough, you must do a lifetime’s waiting.

As a beginner in freelancing and in professional writing, how do you get an editor whose service can be worthwhile? Beginners are always stuck with the same problem; lack of funds. This in turn hampers your look out for an editor. Good editors are sale items with relatively high price money. There are many writers’ communities that offer editing services. Even some literary agencies offer you with editing services. However, if you are a first timer and one without enough weight in your bank account, hiring an editor for your book or manuscript will not be, normally, easy.

The best way to tackle this situation is to find reliable and easy options for editors. One need not go much farther for this end. Just look around and you will find yourself to be blessed with many minds, gifted with the one serum of eternal life—love—around you, ready to help reading your manuscript.

Showing your manuscript to your friends and family or girl friend would be a better option. In such a case, the money spent would be much close to null on editing services. The best editors are those who actually care for our work. You must be open to their criticisms; however, in harsh criticisms you can always rely on their lack of professional experience as the hideout from humiliation.

Stephen King, when he wrote his first novel, Carrie, did not think it would make up to the publishing standards and threw it into the bin. But his wife Tabitha King accidentally discovered the manuscript and read it. Thinking that it would be something worth of a quality, she put it back on the table and later helped King to rework on it. The novel went to become a best seller of its times and was made into a successful Hollywood movie.

This is one real life example from the life of America’s most celebrated and enthusiastic writer, Stephen King. This could be yours too. A relationship not just helps an individual to maintain one’s emotional health but the creative output as well. Now wait your sweet heart to tell you where to put the period.
ABOUT THE AUTHOR

Anu Lal is the author of Wall of Colors and Other Stories. His latest book is Clenched Hands, Bloody Nails.  You can catch up with him in Facebook too.  

MEASURE OF WRITING: Inborn Talent?

Image Courtesy: Google

In this glorious chaos of what to listen to, and what not to, I would like to invite your attention to the fantastic idea called “good writing.”

I am aware that one of the areas, a person coming to WGT might be looking for, is insights from personal experiences of other authors. Due to that very purpose, I would like to share an experience of mine here, in this ‘internet coffee house’ of a blog, as author and editor Scott Bury remarks.

Good writing is an imperative every writer pets with in one’s consciousness. Consequently, there are several myths circling this idea.                

 

Image Courtesy: blogs.denverpost.com

Stephen King once remarked that creative writing could never be taught in schools. He was telling the truth about ‘good writing’ too. Perhaps the biggest impediment in being a creative writer (and a good one in that) is the only boon capable of propagating one in the direction of a successful writing career—Inborn talent. But what about you, a person blessed with the gift of weaving extraordinary tales out of ordinary events in life? Are you born with “Inborn talent”?

What might be the secret of being a good writer, of selling more stories than the number of tickets for the next Hollywood blockbuster; of being the most loved and respected man of letters? The surest way to success in this dimension is perseverance.

As a writer, one might come across many external obstacles; obstacles from our day-job, obstacle in the name of family, etc. These obstacles, sometimes with our knowing and sometimes unknowing, sucks out what could be described as the surest key to becoming a good writer. I would never suggest one must wait for the right moment to pen a story or to edit a previously written manuscript. The right time for a writer is NOW.

Remember, you are here because you love reading about writing and want to learn a few techniques on improvising your writing. You have listened to your call, by coming here. You have that inner radio inside of you that could tune into the cosmic energy that is the Source of all Creation.  

If you arrived here with a desire to learn, I must tell you that you have the necessary ingredients in your DNA to make it big as an author. You are in alignment with that dream that you have nurtured throughout your life, of sitting on a table, signing books at one end of an incredibly long line of people, simply because you are reading this article.

This is not a self-help forum. Still, I would advice a new author to take perseverance as your measure when the path in front of you is not visible, when you meet a dead-end. For example, think about Dr. Viktor E. Frankl’s experiences in the concentration camp of Auschwitz. Had he not been persevering, his future and the future of psychoanalysis itself would have been something else. In such a situation, perseverance means you trust your abilities to risk every other madness around you. It results from trusting oneself. Dr. Viktor E. Frankl shares his experiences in the book titled Mans’ Search for Meaning.  

 

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The craft of good writing also stems from trusting oneself. However, I would also suggest you should not limit your trust upon the blind faith that ‘whatever you do would be good’; or daydreams about long lines of people waiting for your autograph. Although, it sounds almost naïve, I must say that one must act in order to bring success into the world of reality. This, I consider, is a valid thought for any aspiring writer. Most aspiring writers never make it to the successful line of authors. The reason for that is simple: most aspiring writers only aspire. Their aspirations are not strong enough to manifest themselves into material reality.

The next best thing to do in order to bring in your ‘good writing’ is to trust your own intuitions and write steadily. By carrying the purpose, and following the discipline required to finish specific writing projects, you are sure to succeed. In writing-life, failure has only one meaning—stopping a work. This means, essentially that if you don’t stop, you never fail.  

About The Author:

Anu Lal is the author of Wall of Colours and Other Stories, Book-1 in the Hope, Vengeance, and History Trilogy. He resides in India. His second book You Should Know How I Feel has been a bestseller in Amazon India.

Blog: http://anu-lal.blogspot.in/

Author Page: Here

Twitter: @Anulalindia

James Lee Burke- How Writers an Learn from other Writers

I'm convinced you can't write well unless you read books by writers who have figured it out and learn from them. Classic writers like Hemingway and Faulkner and Wolfe and Steinbeck. Present day writers like Michael Connelly, Nelson DeMille, C.J. Box, Lee Child, Stephen King and Robert Crais. All very different. All highly accomplished. All able to touch something human in us that goes beyond adventure and trouble and crime and spies and bad guys and good guys and all that.
I'm a big fan of James Lee Burke. I've read all of his Dave Robicheaux novels. I just finished Feast Day of Fools, Burke's latest in a series featuring an aging, small town Texas sheriff named Hackberry Holland.
So, what's so great about Burke's writing? What can I (and maybe you) learn from reading a book about dysfunctional, psychopathic characters who consistently carry out brutal and heinous acts as a routine day's work? Why would we want to read about people like this?
 Because Burke is much more than a creative writer with the required skill sets of crafted scenes, powerful dialogue and twisting plots. He's a master at revealing the human heart and the demons that reside within all of us. He's an absolute master of natural description, immersing the reader in the desert harshness of Mexico and Texas or the lush coast of Louisiana or the hard streets of New Orleans. He's a master at revealing the depths of a character in a simple paragraph, of choosing exactly the right words.
Here's an example from Feast Day of Fools. Hackberry Holland, Burke's protagonist, is watching his deputy Pam Tibbs at a crime scene.
In moments like these, when she was totally unguarded and unmindful of herself, Hackberry knew in a private place in the back of his mind that Pam Tibbs belonged to that category of exceptional women whose beauty radiated outward through their skin and had little to do with the physical attributes of their birth. In these moments he felt an undefined longing in his heart that he refused to recognize.
It paints an instant picture of Pam Tibbs. From prior parts of the book we know she's not beautiful in the conventional sense. Burke could have just said she wasn't particularly pretty, not that her beauty had little to do with the physical attributes of her birth. I think the ability to describe a character with a phrase like this is as good as it gets for a writer. To me, it borders on genius.
The paragraph reveals Hackberry. It tells us the essence of who he is. He longs for connection he cannot define. More, he refuses to acknowledge it's there. He must control his emotions or things might turn bad for him. He fears their power.
Two characters defined. All in seventy words. Hackberry, over seventy years old, struggles with unresolved feelings about Pam, who is half his age. Along with the dangerous and evil characters Burke spreads across the pages, we find ourselves engaged with a protagonist aware he is long past his prime, taking it one day at a time, struggling with unexpressed and powerful emotions and doing the best he can to see that justice is done.
Dave Robicheaux is another character any aspiring writer can learn from. He's gentle and full of love for his wives (they get killed every now and then) and his adopted daughter, Alafair. He's full of destructive anger that comes raging out past the walls of polite manners he's built to contain it. He's from a nightmare of a dysfunctional family that was laced with love, sex and alcohol. He's driven by demons many of us might find familiar. He's a Vietnam Vet. He struggles to stay sober and sometimes he slips. He has deep integrity. He cares. He seeks and believes in social justice. He sees Confederate ghosts slipping through the mists of the Bayou.
One hell of a character. Read James Lee Burke and learn.
Alex Lukeman, Author of WHITE JADE and THE LANCE. If you like thrillers, you'll like these. Ebooks and paperback.