19 July 2009
by 
Believing in yourself or the quality of your ideas is, perhaps, one of the greatest challenges writers must face before they’ll find success in this industry. Ideas are plentiful and, if you’ve read about the Idea Waterfall you know, there are no bad ideas. But which of the multitude of ideas we have every day can be transformed into something remarkable?
George Singleton says:
“We should believe in the possible existence of the Perfect Short Story or Perfect Novel in the same way that we believe in Bigfoot or the Loch Ness monster. They’re out there somewhere, but it’ll take some time to discover them.
Once discovered, without question, it will still take some work to convince people that it’s not a hoax. That should be your goal.” ~ Pep Talks, Warnings & Screeds by George Singleton
Believe In Yourself
As writers, our purpose is to convince others that the story we tell is one they want to read. The way we write encourages their interest, it holds them to the page. There are aspects in everything we write that influences the reader from our hooks, hangers, and the sequence of events, to the suspension of disbelief.
A writer needs to believe in more than the possibility that the perfect idea exists. The greater battle comes when we must believe in our ability to TELL the story perfectly. Our ideas begin, pristine, flawless, perfect, and from there it call all go terribly wrong. With every word we write we are growing, learning the craft, honing our talent, and so with each word we get better at transforming our ideas into the form they deserve. To tell a story we must have faith in ourselves and our ability to share our ideas in a way that expresses it clearly to our readers.
One of the greatest fears that cause writer’s block is a sense that we cannot write the story that deserves to be written. This fear is one causing me the greatest concern with my current novel. It is an inner agony to know you have a fantastic story, rich characters, an intricate but solid plot and face the foibles of our own fallacy. Self-doubt is a destructive force that leaves manuscripts unfinished or gathering dust. Too often it is a sense of being unable to bring to the page the idea that originally formed in the mind.
How do you reinforce your self-confidence? How do you convince yourself you can tell your perfect story?
Each time I face this fear I remind myself, “If not me, then who?” There might be thousands of writers better than I but this story is one only I can tell. It is an idea that came only to me and there is no way I could give enough of it to another writer that they would produce my idea exactly as I see it. I am the only writer who can breath life into these characters. I might not do it flawlessly. In fact, it is certain to be imperfect. In lowering our expectations to simply putting the story onto the page we take the pressure of perfection from our shoulders.
This is also the reason I LOVE first drafts. A first draft exists because we make mistakes. No author has ever told their story in a single telling. Novels particularly require careful crafting. The first step is to get an echo of our ideas, our characters on the page. The first draft is a shadow of the story we want to tell. We give ourselves permission to write badly because this first step does not require us to tell it right. Any mistakes we make in the first telling of our story can be repaired in second and third drafts.
Do you ever face self-doubt? What do you tell yourself so that you can move past fear? How do you learn to believe in yourself, to believe you are the one to tell this story? Do you believe in the perfect story?
Our RSS Feed location has changed!
I love this post, Rebecca! It’s so true that, while another person might be able to write our story, no one could do so from our unique perspective. As writers, each of us has so much to offer the world, and we need to silence our inner critic and remind ourselves continually that we have something valuable to say.
For most writers, first drafts present a wonderful opportunity to free our creative energy and use our right-brain abilities to create something of value that has never existed before. This is the most magical part of our work and often the most exhilarating step of the writing process. (Of course, many of us let our left-brain editing tendencies get out of hand at this stage, thereby interrupting the creative flow of our work by trying to perfect it as we go. I tend to be guilty of this “transgression.”)
While there may never be a perfect story, there will always be some perfectly wonderful ones — and if we’re willing to work at it (and to believe in ourselves), we may even have the privilege of creating some of them!
<3
Jeanne
Great post, Rebecca. I think one of the biggest stumbling blocks for writers is a lack of confidence, and it’s good to be reminded that we all have something unique to offer.
You’re right about first drafts. When we write without inhibition, we write to our full potential. Writing in some ways is like crafting a painting: you work in layers to allow yourself to make mistakes, make changes, and to build effects which give extra depth and brilliance to the work. No one else sees everything that happens behind the scenes, it’s just part of the process of creating a masterpiece.
What a wonderful analogy, Kezia!
Beautiful, Kezia.
I also like the comparison because to many viewers a finished painting is just the final image. Only a fellow artist sees the layers and work involved in taking blank canvas toward the final destination and, as with writing, no matter how many layers, tweaks, and touch-ups we make the final product is abandoned, not truly finished. 
Thank you for your wonderful feedback, Jeanne.
I suspect the sense of ‘freedom’ is a large part of what makes writing so scary, particularly in the early stages. Sometimes, we have to set our own boundaries just to give ourselves less vastness in the realm of inspiration and creativity.
Sometimes too much creative latitude can, in its own way, be inhibiting.
Exactly.