Who I Am
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| Image courtesy of posterize / FreeDigitalPhotos.net |
I am an overachieving perfectionist in recovery, an avid reader, and a shameless whore for my husband’s gravy. And his lasagna and beef stew and barbecue ribs and chicken alfredo and…. Okay, I’m a whore for my husband’s anything.
*snickering*
But this past week, the last few really, I have discovered
some new truths about myself. I covered my hard-headedness last week, but here
are four more.
I am frighteningly naïve, so optimistic I am often
blindsided and frustrated by difficulties others expect.
I yell at rowdy teenagers on the subway, telling them to
clean up their language for the sake of my six-year-old’s innocent ears.
I will do nothing—no matter how highly recommended by
someone I trust—if I do not have peace about it.
Most surprisingly, in personal areas which matter most, I
have a shockingly low self-opinion.
Take this journey to finish this draft of my novel for
example.
Every time I sit down to write, I doubt the story. I wonder
if anyone will want to read it, if I made a mistake abandoning the former
manuscript for this one, if I should be a writer at all.
Oddly enough, I face none of these insecurities in the
fanfiction world. Yes, I worry people will disapprove of a plot development or that
my intentions will fall short in execution. After posting, I crave alerts and reviews, and private messages that might make me a new friend.
But I don’t doubt my writing prowess, believing I’ve lost the ability to tell a compelling story. I
don’t fear Stephenie Meyer tracking me down to demand I stop torturing her
characters with my inanity and incompetence.
I told my husband my fanfiction confidence is rooted in the
safety of playing in an established universe, of assuming readers come to my
stories partly engaged by default. The ability to write one chapter at a time
at my chosen pace eliminates deadline concerns, and knowing I cannot be paid
for my trouble allays fears about my work’s effect on my livelihood.
But this self-doubt manifests in other areas. Being a
mother, my singing dreams, my relationship with my husband. In every
significant part of my life, potential paralysis lurks beneath the surface of
my most important decisions, paralysis rooted in fears of not being as good as I
think I am, of not being what people expect.
Of not being enough.
Then I hear a familiar voice in my ear, reminding me
His strength is made perfect in weakness, that empowered by His love I am more
than a conqueror: a conqueror able to mother her children, achieve her dreams,
and finish her manuscript with minimal emotional scarring. I focus on who
Christ is instead of what I am not, remembering his grace is sufficient for
every task before me.
And armed with His power and strength, I shed my fears,
silence my doubts with the truth of His word, and rise to write another day.
Right after I sneak another spoonful of Hubby’s gravy.
You ought to join the Insecure Writer's Support Group (yes, it's a real thing. I'm a member.) You would see that this self-doubt is completely natural. It goes with the territory, I'm afraid.
ReplyDeleteI naively believed I would grow in confidence with every novel. Instead, my confidence seems to shrink with every work I produce. Third novel coming out in January. Finishing manuscript of fourth novel this month, and I wonder who I'm kidding. That ugly voice tells me no one is ever going to want to read this, and I can't tell a story any better than a distracted three-year-old.
As the saying goes, here's where they "separate the men from the boys," the wanna-bes from the professionals: you plow through it, babe. You keep writing, even when you question every single word. You can always go back and edit later; you can't edit a blank page. Keep going, even when you feel like you're throwing words at the screen like Jackson Pollock threw paint. And when you go back and read it a few months from now, you might discover that, hey-- that's not so bad after all!