Gosh, its been quite a while!
Yes, its been over a week since I’ve posted here. I’ve had a lot on my mind. And it was a lot.
As I’ve mentioned, I have been job hunting since New Years’. As stressful as trying to find new work is, what is also stressful is wondering what job suits you best. Aside from salary and benefits, there has to be something to the actual work that will be fulfilling. Something that fits your energy, skills and abilities. Something that makes the 40+ hours a week worthwhile. Something that, at best, makes you feel like you’re making an impact on society, and doing what you are meant to do.
Which made me think for a few days that I made a huge mistake delving into writing fiction.
It was difficult to face that question. I had the nagging feeling in me for a few months that I was totally wrong in writing “The Dark Proposal” and setting out on a life of writing novels. It sounded impossible that my whole authorship was a wrong turn for me. After all, I showed storytelling skills as a young kid. I told everyone I knew that I was going to write a book while in elementary school. I was that kid everyone knew wrote stories and was going to be an author someday. I had been writing stories all my life, save for college and my early 20s when I got busy with my journalism career. Telling stories just couldn’t be natural for me.
So why was I feeling like me writing books was so wrong?
It took me a few days to clear my mind, shake things off and put everything in perspective. I read a few blogs and paged through Stephen King’s “On Writing” for answers. I soon realized that I had approached writing fiction all wrong. What I should be doing is write from my heart and soul, rather than my anxious mind. Writing is an expression; a form of communicating. You communicate your thoughts, fears, and ideas to people. You don’t write something just to say, “hey look at me!” It’s silly to think that way.
Yet, I was one of those silly people. When I came across the quote where Stephen King talked writing for yourself then your audience: “When you write a story, you’re telling yourself the story. When you rewrite, your main job is taking out all the things that are not the story. Your stuff starts out being just for you, but then it goes out.”
That was when I realized what I was doing wrong. I always thought writing for yourself was kind of selfish, but it is the good kind of selfish. And I’m sure it is a lot more fun that way.
I’m slowly getting back into writing fiction, and maybe even complete my sequel. I may have to start again, which sucks, but at least it will be with a better attitude and approach – and I may be a lot more satisfied with it!
Sometimes you need to step and ask yourself why are you doing something, especially if there’s a dark feeling in the back of your head that something is wrong. When you’re brave enough to ask that hard question, you may go into a tailspin. But chances are, you’ll come out of it much wiser!