I wrote those words in my journal back in high school. At that
time, I was struggling with writing and deciding what major to choose in
college. I knew I loved writing, English was my best subject in school.
But I wasn't sure if there was a career in it for me. (That's still to
be determined.)
Back then, I think I had an image in my mind of a writer. I
imagined all well-known or published authors must write full-time and
couldn't fathom that a writer wouldn't be able to support himself on
writing alone after having a book published. I imagined a writer might
wake up at one's leisure each morning, sit down at the desk and write
beautiful prose for a few hours, break for lunch, then effortlessly
write some more. Each day would continue in the same manner until a
novel was written and completed. At which point the writer would pop it
into an envelope, send it to their agent then sit back and wait for
inspiration to strike again.
I can look back now at those words in my journal and laugh. I now
know that writing isn't easy. In fact, if you're not terrified of it at
least part of the time then you're probably not doing it right.
In her book Writing Down the Bones, (more on that later)
Natalie Goldberg says, "If every time you sat down, you expected
something great, writing would always be a great disappointment. Plus
that expectation would also keep you from writing."
Don't let the expectation of greatness stop you from writing. Not
everything we write is going to be good enough for publication. All
writers struggle. Even nobel prize winning and best selling writers
doubt themselves. What separates writers from wanna-be writers, is that
writers keep writing. Despite all their self-doubts, despite their busy
lives pulling them to do everything but write.
Stephen King said, "Sometimes you have to go on when you don't feel
like it, and sometimes you're doing good work when it feels like all
you're managing is to shovel shit from a sitting position." So write
anyway. Even if you feel like all you're doing is shoveling shit, shovel
on.
