The other day I was texting with a writer friend of mine (Alica McKenna Johnson), and I said I was jealous by how much she could write. The woman writes long, (and awesome!) books; I’m lucky if I can get my books within the publisher-accepted range of 40,000-60,000 words. Her response was perfect: “Only another writer would be jealous of the voices in my head!”
How true is that statement, though?! Unless your schizophrenic (sorry!) then having these voices telling a multitude of stories is a blessing and a burden. I think most writers would say it’s awesome having an intense imagination that can create entire worlds and life histories out of nothing but the synapses in our brain. But creative types are often the most critical of their own work, and we judge ourselves by our peers’ achievements.
When we judge ourselves by others we don’t always see or understand that the same person could be judging their own work and ability by us. I look at the women in my writing group who manage to pump out astounding lines of poetry in their stories, or create the most vivid images of a life lived, and I stand in awe of what they can do. I might throw myself a bone and think “I’m good, but I’m not that good”, but oftentimes I put myself down: “This is such crap! Why would anyone want to read this?” But those same amazing women push off my compliments and tell me how great my story is even when they don’t have to.
They encourage me, and I encourage them. We’re all trying to achieve the same goal: write the story well. Maybe we have different outcomes in mind- publish to get a paycheck, publish for free, write for pleasure- but we all have the same wish for our stories.
This seems to happen whenever I start to write a post. I think it’s about one thing, and it turns into something completely different. I started this thinking it might only apply to fellow writers and other creative types, but somehow I turned it into a feel-good, “let’s encourage each other because we don’t know what battle someone is fighting” sort of post. That’s not a bad thing at all; I’m just making an observation. Hopefully it reaches everyone on some level, and you all enjoy my semi-coherent ramblings.
PS. Check out Ms. Mckenna Johnson’s wonderful books here: http://www.amazon.com/Children-Fire-2-Book/dp/B016QAVVJ6/ref=sr_1_3?ie=UTF8&qid=1448299612&sr=8-3&keywords=alica+mckenna+johnson
These 2 are just the beginning; she has plenty more in store 😉