I Want to Keep Writing
When I worked at a coffee shop, I dreamed of having a real job, as I poured drinks for a cast of regulars who’d swing by on their way to an office somewhere. That summer, I was also a yoga teacher and restaurant server, sometimes working all three jobs in a single day.
In the fall, I quit. I left California and began graduate school, studying journalism in Chicago. The coursework was rigorous and it was my first time both out of state and taking out student loans, adding to the pressure. But when I felt aimless and lost a few months in, I was able to pinpoint the unease to a surprising source. I wasn’t helping anyone.
Journalism itself is arguably a public service. But no matter the impact of a story, it’s a far contrast from a daily chorus of “thank yous” as students left my yoga class, or as I set down a medium paper cup of dark roast, or a plate of spaghetti marinara.
This clarity into what gratifies me, and its applications for career, continues to bring me useful insights into myself.
This past weekend, Taylor Swift announced her new album while accepting a Grammy win, but it was what she said in her second acceptance speech of the night that caught my attention.
She reflected on how much she loves writing, rehearsing, and playing shows, as much as winning awards, and said, “All I wanna do is keep being able to do this. I love it so much, it makes me so happy.”
The part of me that’s constantly negotiating a desire to make art against a need for income to live on is thinking, Taylor, you have a billion dollars. You can easily keep writing music and pay a production team for the rest of your life.
But, another part of me understands what she means. Releasing the music to an audience who interacts and responds is part of the art. It’s not about earning money or validation. Art is communication.
When I wrote articles for magazines and online media, I didn’t get much as far as reader responses, but I did get to interact directly with the people I interviewed. Whether it was a local chef or a startup founder, I got to help them tell their story.
Whether it’s a magazine feature or a fictional short story, the writing itself is a tool for sharing information, emotions, epiphanies. When a piece of writing is in a middle state where it’s had effort poured into it but hasn’t yet been released to an audience, it can feel empty, like the tree falling in the forest with no one to hear.
The truth is, what I’m looking for in writing is not the writing itself. It’s something deeper.
I’ve taken courses from author and coach Becca Syme’s Write Better-Faster program, and one line from her (free) course on productivity had me floored. She writes, “Admonishments to believe in yourself or your work, when you do not possess the skill of accurate self-concept feel shameful and overwhelming.”
She’s commenting on the psychological process of reparenting one’s inner child. Even with parents or teachers who offered positive feedback, making art tends to awaken a tough inner critic.
For a fiction writer, whether working on short stories or novels, there can be an extended amount of time, often multiple years, while writing is in progress but not ready to share. During this time, trying to see yourself, your progress, or the value of your work is like looking into a funhouse mirror. Is it brilliant? Is it bad? How do we find our accurate self-concept in this interim phase?
I’m reminded of Anne Hathaway, who not only survived a slew of commentary in 2013 on “why people hate her,” but continued to produce great work. The reasons given at the time gravitated around her being too bubbly or too earnest, part of the cultural trend of attacking women for the sin of liking themselves. Somehow, she was able to anchor to her own self-concept and not be swayed by public opinion, which we can now see, was entirely temporary.
I wonder if a seed of her story is within my own resistance to keep believing in myself and the value of my creative work while it’s still in progress.
In his book on emotions, Power vs. Force, David Hawkins writes, “Characteristic of [joy] is capacity for an enormous patience and the persistence of a positive attitude in the face of prolonged adversity.”
We know of people like this throughout history, the activists and artists who devoted a lifetime to their work, sometimes dying before achieving their goal or receiving a more widespread success that would come later.
I’ll often logic with myself that the writing alone should be enough. There is the thrill of discovery when I brainstorm a weird situation or come up with a funny line of dialogue. But, at least for me, even the best ideas lose their glimmer and my productivity slows when the full process is in isolation. When I do write something that I find especially entertaining, it’s like pulling a fresh batch of chocolate chip cookies out of the oven. Yum, but I certainly don’t want to eat these all myself. Who would enjoy this, too?
I’m coming back to the motivation I identified back in graduate school. The joy in writing is sharing it. I write as a gift. My art is not complete otherwise.
