JUST KEEP WRITING

/ Edwina Shaw / 2 Comments

Just past the 30 000 word mark of the first draft of my new novel manuscript. I’m glueing my bum to the seat and getting the words down but not without some hideous self-doubts raising their ugly heads.

When I first started seriously writing fiction, back in 2002, I wondered why more experienced writers talked about their fear of the blank page with such horror.

Now I know why. Even if you have some success, once you’ve been writing a while and some of it has been good, then the fear of crappiness sets in.

If you’re lucky the creative process will whisk you away and you’ll forget to check for shittiness of writing. But if you’re stuck in that, “Will it ever be good enough?” head space, then it’s best to work with the screen covered. (I once spent a whole month typing with the screen of my laptop turned down.)

On my very darkest days thoughts of quitting, cutting my losses and finding a real job that actually pays, make every word I smear on the page seem worthless.

That’s when I stop and ask myself, “Should I go on? Is it worth the effort?”
And every single time, this is the answer I get.

JUST KEEP WRITING.

So, if you’re in that dreary self-doubting place, I want you to hear these words too.

JUST KEEP WRITING! Your writing is good. Your work is valuable.

JUST KEEP WRITING.

with love,
Edwina

THE REST CURE

/ Edwina Shaw / 4 Comments

“Find the time to write. Protect the time to write. Be inventive: get gorgons. Forget email. Whatever it takes. Because you still need more time than there is, also it’s important to leave enough time to waste.”
Ann Beattie.

The truth of this quote was just brought home to me in a conversation with my fabulous writer friend Favel Parrett. She’s recently signed a two book deal with Hachette Livre Australia and they’re wanting her second book fast! She’s been working so long and hard on the first story that ideas for the second haven’t entered the picture. That’s where Ann’s “time to waste” comes in.

As creative artists we can’t keep pumping ideas out without stopping sometimes to refill the tank. Time to waste is actually some of the most important work we can do as writers.

Fuddling around, seeing movies, cleaning the house, sorting through old photographs, catching up with friends, going for long walks, travelling, visiting people or the art gallery or museum, reading all sorts of books, catching buses and talking to strangers, focusing on our real world and seeing what’s in front of us, spending lots of time in LaLa Land, dreaming up ideas and following them to see where they go, Steven King’s “essential afternoon nap”. This is where story ideas come from.

As writers we simply can’t afford to spend all our time writing! We need to go out and live and stockpile images and ideas then sit around doing nothing but day dreaming about them.

For a writer rest is as important as work.

Sometime, however, you are going to have to sit down, face the blank page, and turn those daydreams into words!