Regular readers of this blog won’t be surprised to hear that one of the main reasons I got into writing was to impress other people.
At first it was very difficult showing my work to anyone. What if they told me that it wasn’t very good? That just seemed too hard to bear.
But my need to impress managed to win out over this fear.
So I did show my work to people. And often impressed them. Particularly if they were my age or younger, and were often just impressed by the fact I was writing at all.
Except my work in and of itself wasn’t that good yet. When I started showing my work to more independent readers, I was forced to realise that I still had a long way to go.
What I started to cling to as a defence for my ego was to embrace the gap between ‘professional’ writers and me as a beginning writer. I didn’t need to be a good writer yet because I was just a beginner.
Around this time I was mostly writing short stories, at a pace that amazes me now. I would always work to finish a story in one day – that way I didn’t spend too much time on anything (and I could always use that lack of effort as an excuse if someone didn’t like it).
The main defence was that I was always on to the next idea. My ego was protected by being a moving target. And I got to be a better writer quickly because I was writing so much.
I kept on applying this technique while working on my first film scripts and into the TV series Love Bites, where I think it started to become a problem. My unwillingness to revise an idea led to many different versions of the first episode, in an effort to continue to impress through new ideas.
After Love Bites I moved into a different space, which wasn’t necessarily better in hindsight – though it was a growth for me.
In this phase of my writing career, I wanted to get something ‘right’ before I showed it to anyone. I wanted to impress through depth and power rather than new ideas and the weight of fresh material.
One problem here was that I gave full vent to my perfectionist streak. When I actually had to stand beside a project and not just abandon it, it had to be pretty damn good to protect my ego.
And it was slow. I was afraid to put pen to paper, so I didn’t do anywhere near as much writing. As a result, I don’t think I’ve improved enough as a writer given the amount of time – roughly seven years since the end of the TV series.
So now I’m looking for a third way. Neither phase works for me now.
I want to move to a place where I can show others my work as it progresses, continue to work on stuff, and see an evolution in my writing. Getting drafts finished and getting them out there to be read is now a key goal for me.
And self-reflection is important too in helping me develop by looking back at my writing career. I can look at my strengths and weaknesses, and to see how I want to behave in the future. This blog is an important element in that self-reflection.
Showing posts with label Love Bites. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Love Bites. Show all posts
Friday, August 15, 2008
Thursday, June 26, 2008
Why I Write: To recover
For periods between 2001 and 2004, I was working at home full-time as a writer. Projects included an unfinished and as yet untitled Katherine Mansfield biopic (various title suggestions include the completely unsuitable Katherine Mansfield and the Spiders from Mars) and a similarly unfinished fictional future documentary called Only Human.
Writing full-time was my dream and aspiration as a career. But I found this to be one of the hardest times of my life to date.
Writing was bringing out very dark feelings in me. Expectation of failure, tension, a lack of self-belief bordering on depression. Writing put me into a bad mood. Half an hour was enough for me to feel tense and want to lash out.
At the same time I really wanted to do it. I was drawn to writing, but the actual process of writing was really hard.
The immediate source for these negative feelings about writing was the damaging experiences I'd had while writing for the television series I co-created, Love Bites.
First, and most of all, I'd had a very hard time writing (or not succeeding in writing) parts of that show. The first episode, which I was in charge of, was rewritten too many times to remember. A few things fed into that experience in hindsight - uncertainty about my abilities and how to channel them in high pressure situations, a lack of clarity around what I wanted to produce, tight deadlines and the pressure of a production riding on my output, and sheer overwork.
Second, the show didn't make much of an impression in the cultural consciousness, so the sacrifices didn't seem to pay off into the finished product. The show came in for some criticism as well as some praise. My ego took a battering and that's something I've had to recover from as well.
The thing is, once the series had finished, I was eager to put into practice some of the lessons I'd learnt from writing on the show. And to improve on what I'd done. But now the actual process of writing had become incredibly difficult for me.
How did I get out of that? Persistence - I pushed through it by continuing to write. Awareness - knowing the writing process was hard for me, so not being so surprised when I felt bad while writing. Listening - hearing the negative voices inside of me, letting them have their say, and become part of me. Balance - I had come to place such pressure on writing that success or failure was too important to me. My life is now more balanced and I'm happier.
Writing still puts me in a bad mood. The less familiar I am with a particular part of the writing process (e.g. developing the idea, writing the first draft, editing), the more likely it is to bring out difficult feelings in me and more quickly. So the healing is ongoing. It's made me nervous of combining pressure situations and writing, which is something I still want to get over.
The process of writing Love Bites wasn't the only thing that caused me to feel the way I did then. The show came along at a particular time when I had a lot to learn, and I learned a lot from it. So I don't regret the show or blame the show - actually I thank it now and appreciate it.
Writing was hard before the show, and I think it'll always be hard. But it doesn't need to be as hard as that time of my life. I'm feeling the pleasures more now than the hurts, and that's something to celebrate.
Writing full-time was my dream and aspiration as a career. But I found this to be one of the hardest times of my life to date.
Writing was bringing out very dark feelings in me. Expectation of failure, tension, a lack of self-belief bordering on depression. Writing put me into a bad mood. Half an hour was enough for me to feel tense and want to lash out.
At the same time I really wanted to do it. I was drawn to writing, but the actual process of writing was really hard.
The immediate source for these negative feelings about writing was the damaging experiences I'd had while writing for the television series I co-created, Love Bites.
First, and most of all, I'd had a very hard time writing (or not succeeding in writing) parts of that show. The first episode, which I was in charge of, was rewritten too many times to remember. A few things fed into that experience in hindsight - uncertainty about my abilities and how to channel them in high pressure situations, a lack of clarity around what I wanted to produce, tight deadlines and the pressure of a production riding on my output, and sheer overwork.
Second, the show didn't make much of an impression in the cultural consciousness, so the sacrifices didn't seem to pay off into the finished product. The show came in for some criticism as well as some praise. My ego took a battering and that's something I've had to recover from as well.
The thing is, once the series had finished, I was eager to put into practice some of the lessons I'd learnt from writing on the show. And to improve on what I'd done. But now the actual process of writing had become incredibly difficult for me.
How did I get out of that? Persistence - I pushed through it by continuing to write. Awareness - knowing the writing process was hard for me, so not being so surprised when I felt bad while writing. Listening - hearing the negative voices inside of me, letting them have their say, and become part of me. Balance - I had come to place such pressure on writing that success or failure was too important to me. My life is now more balanced and I'm happier.
Writing still puts me in a bad mood. The less familiar I am with a particular part of the writing process (e.g. developing the idea, writing the first draft, editing), the more likely it is to bring out difficult feelings in me and more quickly. So the healing is ongoing. It's made me nervous of combining pressure situations and writing, which is something I still want to get over.
The process of writing Love Bites wasn't the only thing that caused me to feel the way I did then. The show came along at a particular time when I had a lot to learn, and I learned a lot from it. So I don't regret the show or blame the show - actually I thank it now and appreciate it.
Writing was hard before the show, and I think it'll always be hard. But it doesn't need to be as hard as that time of my life. I'm feeling the pleasures more now than the hurts, and that's something to celebrate.
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