On Letting Things Go…

I think the hardest part, to date, of being an author has got to be all of the things that you have to know about yourself.  That sounds a little ridiculous until you lay it all out, then it makes perfect sense I promise.  You see, writing is a pursuit of the mind.  Writing is, in it’s most basic description, the taming of imagination.  I cannot speak for the imaginations of others, but mine is a wild beast, prone to follow it’s own head whenever it can.  For almost all of my life, my imagination has been my master, not the other way around.  So when I sat down in July and decided that I’d like to be the one calling the shots for a change, there were an enormous number of things I had to learn about myself very quickly, with hardly any training or understanding of just how crazy that was.   I had to learn what tricks were necessary in order to make myself work.  I had to learn what my actual motivations for the things in my life were, because my prior thoughts on that subject were mere paper tigers.  I’m trying to row a boat in the middle of a hurricane: Paper tigers will not do.  So I’ve managed to master that aspect of myself.  I know now what truly motivates me to put my butt in this chair and mash the keyboard like it owes me money: I want to earn the respect of the authors I admire.  For a change, I want our relationship to be one of equals, rather than the rockstar / groupie relationship I have now.  That’s some powerful motivation, and it’s one I’ve successfully levered on days when I would rather be doing anything else.  Trust me, doing anything other than writing is easy peasy. 

The second largest thing that I’ve had to master with myself is my own desire to finish everything that I start.  You can ask my wife, I’m horrible about it.  Even if it makes me miserable, I finish things.  That plate of food even when I’m super full?  I’m not leaving it anything but clean.  That terrible game which is actively making me mad?  Oh no, I will finish that game, make no mistake.  I often get snappy because of that decision, and more than once it’s cost me more than it should’ve.  Sometimes, you just have to know when to walk away.  You have to realize when something isn’t working, and remove all personal ties with that thing and start over.  You can’t let those moments get to you, either.  It’s hard for me especially, given that I’m my own worst critic, but sometimes things just aren’t working.   It’s not that I’m a terrible writer and that’s why it’s not working.  It’s not that I’m too green, or too inexperienced, or too unskilled, or too unpracticed, or completely unworthy of the profession when these moments occur.  It is just because I don’t like the thing I’m doing.  Writing is a mental exercise, purely and completely a machination of my tamed imagination.  If I don’t like the thing I’m writing, and I’m not excited writing about it or at the very least intrigued by the premise, then the story will suck.  I won’t give it my whole effort, won’t put my whole being into producing it.  So it’ll suck.  It’s that simple.  I have to write about things that I find enjoyable, that stroke my passions.  It is there that good writing is found.  It is there that my voice will most significantly be heard.  I can’t fight myself when something isn’t working: My mind is desperately trying to tell me that it’s bored.  Not good things.

Which brings me to Into the Silence.  I wanted that story so very badly, for myself if nothing else.  The concept of the story was amazing, the scientific discovery at it’s center a wonder of our age.  Seriously, the EM Drive works.  It’s not “possibly works”, it’s not “Might be effective”.  A large, highly skilled, well funded NASA Laboratory has verified the results.  It’s a thing, with a capital “T”.  So of course my imagination would be inflamed by the prospect of seeing such a miracle of science birthed right before my eyes.  Of course seeing reports of the possibilities such a drive represents have made me salivate and shout.   It’s amazing!  Breaking known laws of physics is always amazing, but just… wow.  My story however… That is not so good.  In the first place, it’s an attempt to write a story that I’ve never daydreamed about writing.  Present day, highly scientific speculative fiction has never been a story I’ve told, even to myself.  I’ve never gotten lost in a daydream with that sort of story in mind.  So, honestly, I’ve no idea how to craft it.  I’ve no ideas on the structures necessary to achieve success in such a world.  You have to be able to talk about real places, real people.  Actual scenarios which are both plausible and believable, while being completely fictionalized.  It’s just not within my scope of things which I have ever known about or done before.  Sure, I’ve read plenty of the stuff.  But I’ve never once even tried to attempt anything like it.  Mostly what it did was point out the areas of my writing which are currently very deficient.  Not an easy moment to live with, but it’s something. 

So where does all this self-actualization actually leave me?  It’s great to realize some of this, but it’s worthless unless it leads me to a place where I’ve utilized the information.  What that means is that when I reach a point where I was at with Into the Silence, where I can’t write it successfully, where I sit at the keys and blow off my only job as a writer, the sole thing which defines my profession.  Seriously.  I’m supposed to do five posts a week.  How many posts did I do last week? ONE.  Seriously, 20% of my post count for the week?   That’s just unacceptable.  So what I will do going forward is this:  If I find myself in a situation like that again, where I’ve bitten off a more ambitious project than I can chew, I will simply spit it out and try something else.  I won’t try to wallow, or moan, I will simply cut it off and move in a new direction.  Maybe I’ll come back to that at a later date.  Maybe when I’ve developed as a writer, everything old will be new again.  But I can’t let a story become a wrecking ball.  This site is designed to be a vessel for new ideas, not a minefield potentially wrecking my career.  So, that’s my actualization of the accumulated wisdom.  Let’s do it.

Minefully,
Justin