Writing for a living seems like a dream job to anyone who isn’t one. No clock to punch, pants are seldom required and no boss asking about TPS reports.
Professional writers scoff at this. Sure, their “office” may not be in a cubicle farm, but that doesn’t mean the act of writing is any simpler. Letters are typed, words are formed and sentences are crafted in the same way whether you’re in a mountain cabin or downtown apartment.
Unlike their corporate brethren, many writers never have a clear career path. There’s no real opportunity for advancement when you’re on your own, nor is there a guaranteed wage increase over time.
Then there’s the self doubt. Crippling, mind-numbing self doubt. Most aspiring writers are never able to overcome this and even if they do, they think it will be easier the second time.
It never, ever is. That same self doubt, or resistance, will ALWAYS be there. Whether you’re on your second novel or 50th, first blog post or 1000th, a writer’s mind is never really at ease. Unless they’re writing, that is.
Or maybe it’s time to change pants. Instead of being one of those aspiring writers that complains about how hard things are, try writing about them. First-person confessions are likely to make you feel a ton better AND garner support from tons of people still wearing their but-it’s-really-hard pants.
The fear will never go away. The self doubt, the cringe-worthy sentence structure and the feeling of failure lurk, every day, in the back of any writer’s head. It is only through the act of writing, every day, that this little voice of can’t will be muted.
But only temporarily. Tomorrow, it will come back. And again the next day.
Suck it up and get those words out. You’ll thank me later.