Cleaning up

I've been stuck in a strange no-man's land with my writing for about a month or so, ever since I woke up to the realisation that I was trying to WRITE A BOOK! I had cleverly protected myself from a full appreciation of the outrageousness of this endeavor up until that point by focusing only on the process of writing down all my stories. I carefully avoided thinking about publishers or agents or an actual book at the end of it all.

This blissful, wilful ignorance of the audacity of my project had been serving me well. I could write thousands of words every day and I was having fun doing it! I was reliving some of the most exciting, moving and surprising episodes of my life and I was enjoying the process of finding the shape of a story within the disparate threads of my life. It wasn't easy every day, but by and large I was enjoying writing and was feeling good about it.

Then a few people asked me if I had been touch with publishers or agents and explained that although first time fiction writers really need a full manuscript before they get in touch with agents or pusblisher, for non-fiction it is often useful to get in touch early in the process. 'Put together a book proposal' they told me. Research similar books to yours, write a one paragraph summary of your book, sketch out the contents page and write the introduction. Set yourself a deadline and get that book proposal out the door!

I got excited, and confused. I didn't feel anywhere near ready to put together a book proposal, I felt I was still exploring my material and not yet even sure of the shape or tone of my book. But I was hearing the same thing from three or four different people, all of whom I admire very much and who have achieved amazing things in their creative work.

The problem was that as soon as I started researching similar books to mine I was totally frozen. Some of those other books were so amazing that I couldn't imagine what I could add to their contribution to the world. Others were not so good and I cringed at the thought that my book would end up in the remainder pile with them. Books written by people with a great a story but who were not great writers.

For a few weeks I didn't write. I also stopped eating well, started doing less yoga and exercising less. I got sick - twice. I said yes to all sorts of other things and found myself frantically busy, which is an excellent excuse not to write. I was doing important things, of course, helping to save the world from catastrophic climate change and convincing New Zealand to buy fair trade. But I wasn't writing and I wasn't even taking proper care of myself.

Two weeks ago I spotted Julia Cameron's "The Artist's Way" on my shelf and realised that I needed to stop sabotaging my own creative dream and start nurturing myself, my writing and my story. Two weeks in I'm still fairly wobbly on my keyboard, but every day that I write my morning pages I know that it is a day that I have made a commitment to taking care of my creative self and even if I get no other writing done I feel good about being on the right track.

Yesterday I started phase two of the recovery. I kicked off an adventure cleanse tune-up with Kris Car over at Crazy Sexy Life. Kris is most well-known for her book and film "Crazy Sexy Cancer" and the extraordinary joy and energy she brought to them both. In the past I've noticed that cleaning out the gunk from my body helps clean out the gunk in my monkey mind and puts me back on track to believe in myself inside and out. So this seemed like something I could do to speed up the process of rebuilding my sense of the possible.

But most importantly of all, I'm going back to what works for me: just writing. I was having fun letting it all pour out and watching what came. I knew that what I was writing wasn't "good writing" but it was good material and I know that in time I'll rewrite it to make it a little better. Today I read this great interview with Anna David at Maria Schneider's blog about rewriting and I was stopped in my tracks by this sentence:

My greatest asset as a writer is that I feel fairly confident that what I’m putting on the page isn’t going to be very good.

Anna goes on to explain that because she knows that what she writes won't be good at first, she feels free to simply write, and leave the editing and censoring for the rewriting.

I may be absolutely jinxing myself by thinking this, let alone writing it down, but this lack of perfectionism is I think what staves off writers’ block. When other writers tell me they’re staring at blank white pages that are taunting them with words they can’t think of, I can’t help but think that they’re holding themselves to impossible-to-meet standards. If I know it’s not going to be anything I’m proud of, what’s to stop me from typing?

I know this doesn't work for everyone, but it did seem to be working for me. So I'm going back to it. This afternoon I'm switching on Freedom, putting Rosy Tin Teacaddy on the CD player and writing whatever comes, no matter how bad it is. Wish me luck!

Comments

[gem]

wishing you luck!
always - thank you for writing.
in joy,
gem

[Chookooloonks]

In my very limited experience, there's no rule that says you can't write a book first, and then do all the business stuff that goes with selling a book after.

Do your thing, girl. It'll all fall into place. I know this.

K.

[gypsy Alex]

We are so similar, Mari. I've been feeling much the same and have been telling myself to just trust my own pace.

I'm also going into an Aloe Vera mild cleanse right now. Just to purify a bit and move the stale energy. Walked a lot in my trip and that's helped too.

I wish we could go do a writing/ photography/ yoga retreat right now. Maybe we can pretend? ;-)

Walking by your side xo

* This post rocks, by the way. So fluid! You are an amazing writer. Just keep going and do what is right for you!

[Swirly]

I think that is a very wise observation, and I am happy to hear it gave you one more nudge towards having fun with your writing process. I am with you on the other side of the Pacific - swimming through a sea of words!

[Natasha]

I hope the quotes below will help you Marianne.

Thoreau's most beautiful pieces were as a result of his connection and peace with nature.

Thoreau:

” There is nothing so sanative, so poetic,” he writes, ” as a walk in the woods and fields even now, when I meet none abroad for pleasure . Nothing so inspires me, and excites such serene and profitable thought. . . . Alone in distant woods or fields, in unpretending sproutlands or pastures tracked by rabbits, even in a bleak and, to most, cheerless day like this, when a villager would be thinking o£ his inn, I come to myself, I once more feel myself grandly related. This cold and solitude are friends of mine. . . . I get away a mile or two from the town, into the stillness and solitude of nature, with rocks, trees, weeds, snow about….I enter some glade in the woods, perchance, where a few weeds and dry leaves alone lift themselves above the surface of the snow, and it is as if I had come to an open window. I see out and around myself. . . . This stillness. solitude, wildness of nature is a kind of thorough Nvort or boneset to my intellect. This is what I go out to seek.”

Nature and the Poet

The poet must live open to the sky and the wind ; his road must be prepared for him ; and yet not only for strength, but for beauty, the poet must, from time to time, travel the logger’s path and the Indian’s trail, to drink at some new and more bracing fountain of the Muses.

[John Mullis]

I will wish you luck, but you don't need it. You're a natural!
As a friend once told me,'until you get some words on the paper you'll have nothing to correct or improve on."

Peace

John

[Laura]

If ever in doubt again remember this -
The blank page fears you.

Hugs,
Laura