I'm a little bit paralyzed. I've spent over two
years writing and editing two books in a series, and the ideas are there for a
third, but I find them just sitting there in the folds of my brain, waiting for
me to DO SOMETHING.
Unfortunately, like I said, nothing will come
out.
I think to myself, maybe what I need is a change
. . . new characters, new setting, new world. So, lucky me, I have another promising
idea for a book for a slightly younger audience (maybe 8-12, instead of 10 and
up). I've developed the characters, laid out much of the plot. I've gotten excited
about it. But still, it sits inside of my head—in the confines of this
dense skull that insists on hoarding my ideas and keeping them prisoner. I can’t write a word of it.
Why is this happening?
I think it happens to all writers at some point
or another, and right now just seems to be my time. You see, the rejections
have started rolling in, and despite my intellectual understanding that facing
rejection is, indeed, the lot of the writer . . . I also know that we’re a sensitive
bunch. Well, perhaps I should just speak for myself:
I am a sensitive, wildly open-hearted, hopeful,
vulnerable soul. And rejection hurts.
My head tries to tell my heart that there are a
million reasons why an agent will decide not to take on a manuscript. I know
this. I know that it is not enough for them to like it. It's not even enough to LOVE it. They have to love it more
than they love fifty or more others (and that’s once they've weeded away the hundreds
that they REALLY don't want).
But this mind-brain connection of mine doesn’t
seem to be functioning properly. Someone pulled the plug on those nerves whose
job it is to get this message to my heart—the message that says that none of
this polite (even encouraging) rejection means that I’m not talented, that my
story is worthless, or that my voice is useless. I cling to stories of famous
authors who were told there work was un-publishable (James Rollins) or who got
10, 20, 30, 40 or more rejections before their manuscript found a home.
And yet, my writing brain is frozen.
What I can’t figure out is how to jump start it
again—how to turn off the “fear of rejection” sensors so that creative messages
can start flowing freely again.
(pause)
Now hold on a second, I just re-read what I wrote
and realized that I specifically said that I was “a little bit paralyzed.” But, that’s not really paralysis then, is it? If it’s just a
little bit, then isn’t it technically paresis?
(Can’t turn off the Speech Pathologist’s brain) Paresis is a reduced ability to activate those neurons,
rather than the complete inability to
do so. So, that means that I can
move. I can begin. I can take the
first steps to strengthening those writing muscles that have begun to atrophy
under the influence of fear. (Pretty sure I’m mixing neurological metaphors all
over the place. Please forgive me.)
There is a fantastic book out there, which
actually gave me the mental and emotional freedom to begin my writing journey
in the first place. It is called, Write
for Your Lives: Inspire Your Creative Writing with Buddhist Wisdom by
Joseph Sestito. I don’t remember a lot of the details from the book, but I do
remember that it taught me about applying mindfulness practice to writing. It
finally hit home to me, two years ago, that I cannot live in any moment but
this one, and I cannot write any page, scene, or chapter than the one I am in.
Instead of thinking about the end of the book, or about agents and publishing
houses, success and failure . . . this book taught me to stay with what my
characters are doing, feeling, and experiencing NOW. Then walk with them into
the next moment, and the next . . .
What you’re really doing is staying present with
yourself, RIGHT NOW.
So, what I’m starting to realize is that maybe my
intellect and my emotional self need slightly different things at this time. .
. .
For the purposes of feeding that intellectual
beast who knows that sometimes getting published really is a numbers game, I
will continue to post each rejection on my corkboard like a badge of honor. I
will also turn right around and send my manuscript out again each time I’m
rejected, to reassure that “thinker” that I’m not giving up.
But, for the purposes of that fragile being that lives
inside my chest, taking rejection much to heart, I will find a way to purge
every moment but this one, and I will write something new to make her sing—I
will put words on paper that make her fly to other worlds and see through
different eyes until there is nothing to do but to remember that, for me,
writing is everything.
