Why Do We Write?
“I’m not good enough.”
“None of my ideas are very creative.”
“Maybe I should just get a real job.”
“Nobody wants to read my stuff.”
It would be so much easier if Imposter Syndrome wasn’t a thing, you know? Imagine that world for a moment. Where you could just write, sing, play, dance, act, paint - whatever it is that you really want to do for a mode of self-expression - without the burden of self-doubt. Not only have I seen this from pretty much all my creative friends and peers, but I deal with this myself.
A while back my publisher asked me to answer this question: “Why should someone read my books?” And… my brain utterly shut down. I wrestled with finding the answer and in the end never really found a response that I felt good about. On the one hand, three cheers for modesty, but on the other hand, yeah, this is why people hire publicists, right?
sigh
Some truth, now. Serious truths.
At the risk of making some sort of “snowflake” metaphor (by which I mean how it was used years before being tainted into an insult), everyone is unique. Like a fingerprint, our combination of experiences and core personalities make us specific and different than any one other person. Yes, we have commonalities here and there, but the particular mosaic that makes any one person who they are is possessed of the sort of specificity reserved for, well, yes, snowflakes. You do have a unique voice. An unmatched point of view, and individual manner of expression all your own.
From an artistic perspective, it’s that marriage of experiences and voice that makes the things you make all your own. There is nobody else who is going to create the same things you create.
That part isn’t too hard to perceive or accept, but I think the part that tends to bog us all down is the second part of our confidence - comparative evaluation. It stops being a matter of being unique and starts being a matter of “am I good enough?” Or, worse, “is everyone else better than me?”
This question is practically impossible to quantify, though. It’s one thing to analyze creative works in terms of composition, construction, design or technique, but it gets a bit dodgy when you start to apply volume (no, musicians, not THAT kind of volume). “Billions and billions served” doesn’t put McDonald’s on the same level as a three Michelin restaurant. Sure, it does make them loads of money, but that’s another conversation.
At the end of the day, the most significant judge of your art is, unfortunately, yourself. And I say “unfortunately”, because all too often we let our own critique condemn us, and stop ourselves in our tracks. We usually know better than anyone our own failings. We look at the things we’ve conjured up and see all the flaws and scars and missteps. Case in point: on an album I recorded, “Obsidian Bridges”, there are three specific moments on three different songs that I absolutely cannot listen to. My body tenses as the songs approach the respective offenses, and once the nauseating moments have passed, the lingering nausea of regret remains usually well into the middle of the next song. One of the songs was so brutal in my memory that I left it off the digital release and replaced it with another song entirely. Would I record the album again? No, of course not. It’s been twenty years and my musical voice has changed substantially. Different experiences, different ideas, and… well, I have to be honest here - part of my changed creatively ideology is where it is because I recorded that album. The successes and failures have contributed to what sorts of things I make now. And the same is true of my books. I look back through them (sometimes I forget what I wrote and have to remind myself - don’t judge me!) and I can see a lot of things I would now write differently.
Key word here: “now.”
Time evolves us. Sometimes, we evolve in the middle of our own projects. For example, the process of writing even the first draft of our first novel is a whole learning experience. By the time we get to “The End”, we’ve had just as much of an adventure as our characters. Something worth remembering when you go back to do your first pass of an edit. The first chapters are probably going to look awful, but that is normal. To paraphrase the delightful Neil Gaiman, the first draft is always going to be terrible, but the point of the edit it to make it look like you knew what you were doing all along. That’s when you get to put those lessons you acquired during the first draft onto the page.
That second pass is not a condemnation of your ability as a creator. It’s the way to buff out the imperfection every first draft is going to have; it’s the polish, it’s the shine. Here’s the thing you should recognize: if you’re able to see the flaws in your work, it means you have gotten better. It doesn’t mean you’re still the artist you were when you began it - it means you’ve leveled up.
Recognize that. Celebrate it. Play the victory music from Final Fantasy. Do a little dance. Give yourself a high five, run your victory lap.
In short, enjoy your moment. Every iteration can be a step forward.
You’re good enough. Don’t forget that.