Absolutely love this. I recently came across the Japanese concept of Ikigai, which is simply defined as the balance between what you love, what the world needs, what you can get paid for and what you’re good at.
I too have a few different seemingly siloed endeavours, and it’s been on my mind how or whether to unify!! Thanks for this, great read. 😀
That's exactly the concept I'm working with at the moment! Thank you for giving me the word for it, and thank you for this remark. We like to keep things neatly separated and compartmentalized, it seems. I'm sure that in some instances this is necessary, and in other circumstances potentially inhibiting.
Taking back your own life is completely outrageous! I mean it's your life in the first place and you should never have left it in the hands of others.
This is not only a problem in the USA, but also in Europe. We call it affirming the norms of society. I also struggle with that a lot. Iit's not easy to get it out of your system.
But transforming, emerging as the ‘new you’ like a butterfly from its cocoon, is a journey worth embarking on. I’m eager to witness your metamorphosis.
That's kind of it thought, its not, not in this paradigm. I can have a job, which is conducive to being an alive person (especially since I'm my entire support system), or I can be myself and do what I want with my time. That's why I brought up how I don't think many people realize how much of their identity is a result of fitting into the marketplace planet.
It's always interesting to hear other's point of view who live outside of the US. The school systems and culture vary so much from country to country, or even within school systems in neighboring towns.
Thank you for this! It will take a lot of financial help I'm afraid, which I can do a lot to try and secure but it's largely out of my hands. We shall see 👀.
This piece resonated deeply. The idea that we need to "Make an Instagram account...and then a separate one for writing, and then another one...Do the same on YouTube. Develop your brand"...etc. In other words, we need to be expert techies and marketers and excellent writers just to stand a chance on this platform. It all stands in direct opposition to the idea of just being ourselves, warts and all. It typecasts our creativity, our viewpoints, our potential and ultimately our contribution to the world.
After being advised by a Substack marketing guru to "find a niche and stick with it," I recently expressed myself to my readers thusly:
"'Boring'"! I thought. It's not in my writer-nature to restrict myself. At least not when wearing my essayist/columnist hat.
Yet that’s the standard template. Choose a niche. Find your tribe. Conquer the world. And remember: online surfers and shoppers give websites about 2 seconds before clicking away if it’s not the “product” or “answer” they want.
But I'm not selling widgets or answers here.
As one friend told me, I'm really selling myself. I am the niche."
I went on to compare my Substack to the old legacy media columnists who (while having hobby horses) manage to cast their “topic nets” widely because it's their "take" and "style" that attracts readers.
Here's to bucking trends come what may! Btw - I like how you have a separate tab for On Writing. Maybe separate tabs help those of us whose topics vary widely.
Exactly. I’m all for developing a strategy and spending time engaging on social media so that my work is able to reach someone out there. In fact, that’s what I’m doing now on Threads. However, I will not compromise what I choose to write about, how I write it, and time spent writing versus time spent marketing, which is what marketers advise you dismantle. Don’t listen to the marketing advice, in fact I think I wrote a post in my On Writing section somewhere about writing for yourself versus writing for the market. I get that we need to make aggressive moves sometimes to get our work out there but it completely defeats the purpose of writing in the first place if we let that be the driving force behind our content creation.
Also, thank you! That felt pretty mandatory for what I’m doing here, because sometimes a post is my current fictional WIP, and then sometimes it is like a blog post, or a poem, and then sometimes I’m purely writing to other Substackers here about writing. In fact, I’m planning on making a Numerology section soon, which is predominantly what I do on Youtube. When the time comes, I’ll send out an email to everyone explaining how to turn off emails to certain sections, as those topics do not intersect, so that my readers can have the experience they want to have.
I think it takes a lot of time to create a space where this is possible. I've been in survival mode my entire adult life and wonder what the alternative is like. Thank you for the support and for being here!
I have some disparate interests that made playing the obligatory author social media a burdensome juggling act. On substack it's been nice because I feel more free to just write about what I want, where I can have fiction writing, video games, and mythology all in one place.
Do you mean by merging your fractured selves that they'll all get unified into one consistent self? And you act like that same self in every circumstance? Or by saying that this mix is your self?
I personally think we don't have one unified, permanent self with a constant personality. Instead, all these different selves are different versions of who we are. But they're all you.
I think I'm hinting at blending the pieces together so that there isn't a constant polarized way of existing when you show up for your day job versus when it is a Sunday morning and you are pursuing a hobby. I call this world the marketplace planet, and I think it is a strange animal that has instilled in us to also be strange animals. I think something is lost as we get older and have to survive grade school, then college, then a job, and living authentically might be getting back to that. It is acknowledging our own conditioning and understanding that there are so many other ways of being aside from the one we've taken on to survive the marketplace planet. I think it would be great if we didn't need a corporate mask to wear over our art, thoughts, passion, etc. Of course, for some it's not a mask but their entire identity. Many of us have more than one side to ourselves, and living in a world where specialization is favored, you walk through life never truly getting the chance to be yourself.
Anyway, just some thoughts for the day. Thank you for this comment and thank you for being here.
Ah okay, Mhm yeah makes sense. So there isn't such an extreme split between these different versions. If there is, I guess, for some people that split might appear like lying.
Your idea of the marketplace planet and that it's a kind of strange animal sounds fascinating. I think I've heard that general message elsewhere too, but never phrased in such a way. Do you specifically refer to capitalism there?
Sorry for answering several months later, but thank you for the reply!
I think authenticity is when you have mastered the ability to remain anchored to yourself no matter the circumstance you find yourself in. It takes a lot of courage, not just to be different, but to trust yourself enough to know what your needs actually are and what is important.
That is really cool. Thank you so much for taking the time to stumble upon this post and share in the similarity of where we are. You are actually not the first person to tell me this. Somewhere on Substack, someone was also writing about Authenticity. It is indeed a synchronicity, perhaps a sign that we're on track (that's how I've always seen them anyway). We are all going through very similar things and I get the feeling we're ready to take authority over our own becoming in a whole new way now.
Yes, it’s a collective awakening taking place as we speak, something truly beautiful. Agreed, it seems that synchronicity is the universe’s equivalent of a ‘thumbs up’. 😂
I suspect I've lived a lot longer than you have. So I'm sharing my authentic take on this (which of course is just how I deal with it). Competition can be good if it prompts us to strive for more. Sports is probably the place this manifests itself the most. But I spent a lot of time thinking about Emily Dickenson and publication. You are right that you can't be authentic if you worry about pleasing publishers (especially if you aren't liberal--I'm a libertarian stuck in a world dominated by political liberals). And I spent years telling my kids to push the edges of their own envelope and not compare themselves to others. But the truth is that you have to do your best work and let go of outcomes completely. That is beyond our control in every endeavor in life and the only way to measure success is by monitoring our process.
My dad, who really wasn't a bad parent, asked me once what was more important, the process or the result and I said the process. He said I was wrong. I knew even then that I wasn't. Everything is process. But it depends. You can write ad nauseum and never consider anyone else. But You can't play card games or pool or ping pong without competing with someone else. And that isn't all bad. There was a girl on our company softball team when I was working in California years ago. She was awful. Just awful. I couldn't imagine why she didn't quit, it was so humiliating, but she said all she wanted was to get better. And she did! It wasn't much but it WAS better! She couldn't even connect with the ball when she started, but by the end, he did. It went nowhere, but she improved. And she didn't have to withdraw from the game in order to accomplish it. She learned from us. I never forgot her.
I've wrestled with this concept all my life. If you aren't authentic, you'll never be successful anyway, but that doesn't have to stop you from having heroes, mentors, and from celebrating the success of others. We don't have to withdraw from the game to be authentic. But living in a world without any competition isn't realistic or desirable either. We just have to realize and truly believe that outcomes have nothing to do with our process. And life is ALL process. Every moment of it.
So basically, be authentic, still compete so you can grow, but with the internal security that your worth is unchangeable.
I always try to remind myself to focus on the work and not the results, but that's awfully hard. I need that feedback loop to find out wether I am truly good at something or just delusional. But I'm always secretly hoping for the former.
Did you get better at wrestling with that concept?
I intuitively knew the answer all along even when I was young and talking with my dad. But I would have to remind myself at writer's workshops or with people whose focus for me was just publication. I got published quite a bit doing it my way, but again, I needed to let go of that as the goal and refocus on the process. I did learn some things from a mentor. You have to be careful who you take advice from, of course. I really only had one reader/mentor I heeded at all. Or a couple. There came a time I knew I didn't really need readers anymore to accomplish my goals. You might need the "feedback loop" to improve, but you don't need it to tell you if you're good or not. Maybe that's the point--does it matter if you're "good?" And who decides that? It only matters if you have a passion for what you're doing and if you are getting better at it. Writing is so subjective, can one ever really know some of this and can publication ever be the true measurement? Or do you know it deep down inside?
I think we all write for an "ideal" reader who can be a real person, but usually is some sort of muse fantasy person we make up in our heads. Most writers are kidding themselves if they claim they aren't writing for anyone at all. Then write a diary. But I guess my point is that even Emily Dickenson wanted to know from somebody if her work "breathed." (She claimed to not want publication).
So the only answer is to focus on that process all the time, read writers you admire, experiment with point of view, language. Just never give up. You won't be able to if it's truly your passion.
But if being authentic comes at the price of never hearing criticism, you're in the wrong business. Write a diary. Over time, you learn if a particular criticism is something you want to incorporate into your work. Or not.
Sorry for only replying now to your comment but thank you for the thorough answer!
I will try your advice/musings out :) Really cool that you knew from an early age!
I guess, yeah, it is hard to determine whether a piece of writing is good in an objective sense. I'd say, a text is well written when it moves or influences you, emotionally or intellectually, ideally in both aspects.
I'd say I'm partially writing for an audience, but also for my future self. I want to get into a trance, fully immersed in the present. Once I'm out of this state, ideally, I'd reread my work and be surprised and moved by my own words.
Did you ask that question to make me think? Or do you yourself hold the opinion that judging a piece of writing is purely subjective?
There are a few technical things that are somewhat objective. Like avoiding adjectives, like writing more visually, avoiding abstractions, show don't tell (though it's really a combination). But I think writing is also subjective. It has to be. So it's about your commitment to process and your belief in yourself, your work, and the more you can leave publication out of that mix and concentrate on that process, the better things go overall. We only have control over process. Be careful who you listen to--limit readers and only take advice from writers you really admire. Oh, and never let rejections influence you much. You might get rejected 30 times on a piece. It's possible to send things out too soon, but rejection really doesn't tell you much about how good that piece is. So those are my thoughts. What kind of writing to you do? I suspect you are on the right track.
Mhm yeah there are some helpful guidelines you can use to improve your writing.
Hmm makes sense. I've noticed that posts where I just wrote from my heart, and focused more on the writing itself, tended to perform better too. Your comment gives me some motivation to try to hone in on this process. Thanks for that!
Mhm like the saying I've heard once. That you should only take criticism from people that you'd also turn to for advice. Which authors do you personally admire, if I may ask?
Thanks for the encouragement. Getting rejected 30 times is probably demotivating. This didn't happen to me so far, but I'll keep your thought in mind.
Thanks for asking! Well, I'm writing a substack newsletter, so far with more emotional, introspective, self-reflection posts that are sprinkled with philosophy, some self-help and hopefully humor. Though I'm also thinking about publishing some short stories on there.
Other than that, I've written two short stories, but they're unpublished. And I'm working on a book, which is technically labelled as fanfiction. The only similarity between the original work and my writing are some of the character names though. I've just used that classification so it might get more exposure, and I could receive some feedback.
I don't know if I asked you that already, sorry if I did, but what writing do you do?
ps I also write blogs on Substack and Wordpress, but I also haven't been focused enough on that. I write about politics and diet and dreams and many things. I keep thinking I'm going to get focused again. I hope so. Happy writing.
Well, rejection is part of the deal unless you self publish and since what is good writing is a subjective thing, so is rejection, of course. Fanfiction sounds kind of interesting. Never done that, but I have written metafiction where the main character is a writer and referenced a book I loved. My mentor made me change it. I'm sorry I did, though his advice was usually great.
I mostly wrote literary fiction, published at universities and literary journals. But I also wrote some nostalgia early on that was published in women's magazines and a piece even in a men's sporting journal. I wrote well from a man's pov, so I always used my initials so men wouldn't reject me out of hand.
And I've published creative nonfiction, which is really interesting.
Most of my publishing happened before I even finished my bachelor's degree. My last story collection was after I got my MFA and was teaching for a while at a university in Michigan. But this experience has taught me that you need to be careful who you listen to, even if they have great reputations or seem to be in the role of "teachers."
And unfortunately my more libertarian politics cost me both my publisher and my teaching job, since I was adjuncting.
I have been working on a more commercial dream/time travel thing for about five years. Finishing got derailed when my youngest son got testicular cancer and I cared for my dad for three years with Parkinson's. I have an adult son with Down Syndrome who lives with me and my husband is having neurological issues now. And my best friend died this week. So I swore I'd never be a nurse or a teacher, and I've done both. Ha, I wouldn't have it any other way now.
Since I had a handicapped child, I didn't finish my degree and I was self taught in my writing for many years. Getting published did validate me, I can't deny that, but I really yearn for the days when I didn't know some of what I know and wrote totally authentically. How would I feel if I'd never been published? I'm not sure, of course, but either way, the key is to focus on the process. Be careful with language, write the best you can. I tended to write a bit too much from the head rather than the heart, and my style was to SHOW scenes and let the reader feel. He/she doesn't need to be told what to feel from the characters, though the truth is you mostly show, but tell some, too. I think this will be my last novel, so I am looking to write more from the heart.
I'm interested in Time, Faith, Physics (as in Einstein), Jung influences me with synchronicity, and I want to play more with that in my last book. I may still write short pieces and creative nonfiction after this. I see you are interested in philosophy. I had some in college and consider myself a mixed philosopher in terms of determinism/indeterminism which I write about quite a bit.
But it's all process, no matter what. The publishing or not publishing is out of your hands.
But I AM finally working on this revision. I'm also self publishing a memoir/woodfire cookbook thing. I think I'll do that one that way. But I'll try to get an agent for my time/dream thingy. Quite the wordsmith aren't I?
You probably know, but the term "literary fiction" throws people a lot. It's more classical, serious fiction, that is slightly more language and character-driven, though I like to have a lot of plot. My writing had been nonlinear often, but less of that in my time novel, because moving around in time and universes is nonlinear enough!
Wow, did you really want to know all that? Have a great day yourself. I can already tell you are a good writer.
Kerry Jane: With Kiwiwriter47 and You, I stare cluelessly at the logarithmic equation, while I take wonder and joy in your own column on All arising from Nothing, and Kiwiwriter47, not at least with his four-part series on the Holocaust (NEVER FORGET, NEVER AGAIN!!).
I like the idea of recognizing the “games” there are to play. The ones we are told to play and the ones we can CHOOSE to play. The ones we make up our own rules. I’d love a follow up post to see how you manage this merging in a few months. And I think???? The answer to the math question is option 4. Don’t quote me :)
Oh it will take about a year for me to know the result. My current position lasts until July, so I don't have to worry about income until then and in the meantime I'm mostly doing small things to help the transition of being unemployed. If all goes well, I should have at least 6 months where I don't have to worry about burning through my savings, can rest after a long time of constant work, can put more time into my online platform, write my book, feel like a person again. That's the plan. Thank you so much for taking the time to read, comment and subscribe. You might like some other posts I wrote in my journal entries section as well. I will hopefully have an updated between July and November of this year (as well as overall growth for Metanoia).
Absolutely love this. I recently came across the Japanese concept of Ikigai, which is simply defined as the balance between what you love, what the world needs, what you can get paid for and what you’re good at.
I too have a few different seemingly siloed endeavours, and it’s been on my mind how or whether to unify!! Thanks for this, great read. 😀
That's exactly the concept I'm working with at the moment! Thank you for giving me the word for it, and thank you for this remark. We like to keep things neatly separated and compartmentalized, it seems. I'm sure that in some instances this is necessary, and in other circumstances potentially inhibiting.
Taking back your own life is completely outrageous! I mean it's your life in the first place and you should never have left it in the hands of others.
This is not only a problem in the USA, but also in Europe. We call it affirming the norms of society. I also struggle with that a lot. Iit's not easy to get it out of your system.
But transforming, emerging as the ‘new you’ like a butterfly from its cocoon, is a journey worth embarking on. I’m eager to witness your metamorphosis.
That's kind of it thought, its not, not in this paradigm. I can have a job, which is conducive to being an alive person (especially since I'm my entire support system), or I can be myself and do what I want with my time. That's why I brought up how I don't think many people realize how much of their identity is a result of fitting into the marketplace planet.
It's always interesting to hear other's point of view who live outside of the US. The school systems and culture vary so much from country to country, or even within school systems in neighboring towns.
Thank you for this! It will take a lot of financial help I'm afraid, which I can do a lot to try and secure but it's largely out of my hands. We shall see 👀.
Good luck Kerry with your plans. Take it easy and steady, you’ll get where you want to get or get elsewhere where it’s even better!
This piece resonated deeply. The idea that we need to "Make an Instagram account...and then a separate one for writing, and then another one...Do the same on YouTube. Develop your brand"...etc. In other words, we need to be expert techies and marketers and excellent writers just to stand a chance on this platform. It all stands in direct opposition to the idea of just being ourselves, warts and all. It typecasts our creativity, our viewpoints, our potential and ultimately our contribution to the world.
After being advised by a Substack marketing guru to "find a niche and stick with it," I recently expressed myself to my readers thusly:
"'Boring'"! I thought. It's not in my writer-nature to restrict myself. At least not when wearing my essayist/columnist hat.
Yet that’s the standard template. Choose a niche. Find your tribe. Conquer the world. And remember: online surfers and shoppers give websites about 2 seconds before clicking away if it’s not the “product” or “answer” they want.
But I'm not selling widgets or answers here.
As one friend told me, I'm really selling myself. I am the niche."
I went on to compare my Substack to the old legacy media columnists who (while having hobby horses) manage to cast their “topic nets” widely because it's their "take" and "style" that attracts readers.
Here's to bucking trends come what may! Btw - I like how you have a separate tab for On Writing. Maybe separate tabs help those of us whose topics vary widely.
Exactly. I’m all for developing a strategy and spending time engaging on social media so that my work is able to reach someone out there. In fact, that’s what I’m doing now on Threads. However, I will not compromise what I choose to write about, how I write it, and time spent writing versus time spent marketing, which is what marketers advise you dismantle. Don’t listen to the marketing advice, in fact I think I wrote a post in my On Writing section somewhere about writing for yourself versus writing for the market. I get that we need to make aggressive moves sometimes to get our work out there but it completely defeats the purpose of writing in the first place if we let that be the driving force behind our content creation.
Also, thank you! That felt pretty mandatory for what I’m doing here, because sometimes a post is my current fictional WIP, and then sometimes it is like a blog post, or a poem, and then sometimes I’m purely writing to other Substackers here about writing. In fact, I’m planning on making a Numerology section soon, which is predominantly what I do on Youtube. When the time comes, I’ll send out an email to everyone explaining how to turn off emails to certain sections, as those topics do not intersect, so that my readers can have the experience they want to have.
You arrange truth rather beautifully.
This is the most simplistic, heartwarming feedback I’ve ever received. Thank you.
I love this and feel the struggle and am excited to see you experiment!
I think it takes a lot of time to create a space where this is possible. I've been in survival mode my entire adult life and wonder what the alternative is like. Thank you for the support and for being here!
I have some disparate interests that made playing the obligatory author social media a burdensome juggling act. On substack it's been nice because I feel more free to just write about what I want, where I can have fiction writing, video games, and mythology all in one place.
Yes, creative freedom is possible here. It's quite liberating. Thank you for being here, William.
Do you mean by merging your fractured selves that they'll all get unified into one consistent self? And you act like that same self in every circumstance? Or by saying that this mix is your self?
I personally think we don't have one unified, permanent self with a constant personality. Instead, all these different selves are different versions of who we are. But they're all you.
I think I'm hinting at blending the pieces together so that there isn't a constant polarized way of existing when you show up for your day job versus when it is a Sunday morning and you are pursuing a hobby. I call this world the marketplace planet, and I think it is a strange animal that has instilled in us to also be strange animals. I think something is lost as we get older and have to survive grade school, then college, then a job, and living authentically might be getting back to that. It is acknowledging our own conditioning and understanding that there are so many other ways of being aside from the one we've taken on to survive the marketplace planet. I think it would be great if we didn't need a corporate mask to wear over our art, thoughts, passion, etc. Of course, for some it's not a mask but their entire identity. Many of us have more than one side to ourselves, and living in a world where specialization is favored, you walk through life never truly getting the chance to be yourself.
Anyway, just some thoughts for the day. Thank you for this comment and thank you for being here.
Ah okay, Mhm yeah makes sense. So there isn't such an extreme split between these different versions. If there is, I guess, for some people that split might appear like lying.
Your idea of the marketplace planet and that it's a kind of strange animal sounds fascinating. I think I've heard that general message elsewhere too, but never phrased in such a way. Do you specifically refer to capitalism there?
Sorry for answering several months later, but thank you for the reply!
I think authenticity is when you have mastered the ability to remain anchored to yourself no matter the circumstance you find yourself in. It takes a lot of courage, not just to be different, but to trust yourself enough to know what your needs actually are and what is important.
Worth reading twice
More good and wise advice! And worth reminding oneself of on a regular basis...
I’m totally with you. Funny synchronicity, this theme was so intense for me this past month that I wrote about it as well: https://poetx.substack.com/p/authenticity-reigns-supreme
That is really cool. Thank you so much for taking the time to stumble upon this post and share in the similarity of where we are. You are actually not the first person to tell me this. Somewhere on Substack, someone was also writing about Authenticity. It is indeed a synchronicity, perhaps a sign that we're on track (that's how I've always seen them anyway). We are all going through very similar things and I get the feeling we're ready to take authority over our own becoming in a whole new way now.
Yes, it’s a collective awakening taking place as we speak, something truly beautiful. Agreed, it seems that synchronicity is the universe’s equivalent of a ‘thumbs up’. 😂
Authenticity is worth fighting for. The picture about marketing and quality says a lot!
What a great concept! Ikigai!
I suspect I've lived a lot longer than you have. So I'm sharing my authentic take on this (which of course is just how I deal with it). Competition can be good if it prompts us to strive for more. Sports is probably the place this manifests itself the most. But I spent a lot of time thinking about Emily Dickenson and publication. You are right that you can't be authentic if you worry about pleasing publishers (especially if you aren't liberal--I'm a libertarian stuck in a world dominated by political liberals). And I spent years telling my kids to push the edges of their own envelope and not compare themselves to others. But the truth is that you have to do your best work and let go of outcomes completely. That is beyond our control in every endeavor in life and the only way to measure success is by monitoring our process.
My dad, who really wasn't a bad parent, asked me once what was more important, the process or the result and I said the process. He said I was wrong. I knew even then that I wasn't. Everything is process. But it depends. You can write ad nauseum and never consider anyone else. But You can't play card games or pool or ping pong without competing with someone else. And that isn't all bad. There was a girl on our company softball team when I was working in California years ago. She was awful. Just awful. I couldn't imagine why she didn't quit, it was so humiliating, but she said all she wanted was to get better. And she did! It wasn't much but it WAS better! She couldn't even connect with the ball when she started, but by the end, he did. It went nowhere, but she improved. And she didn't have to withdraw from the game in order to accomplish it. She learned from us. I never forgot her.
I've wrestled with this concept all my life. If you aren't authentic, you'll never be successful anyway, but that doesn't have to stop you from having heroes, mentors, and from celebrating the success of others. We don't have to withdraw from the game to be authentic. But living in a world without any competition isn't realistic or desirable either. We just have to realize and truly believe that outcomes have nothing to do with our process. And life is ALL process. Every moment of it.
Beautifully put.
So basically, be authentic, still compete so you can grow, but with the internal security that your worth is unchangeable.
I always try to remind myself to focus on the work and not the results, but that's awfully hard. I need that feedback loop to find out wether I am truly good at something or just delusional. But I'm always secretly hoping for the former.
Did you get better at wrestling with that concept?
I intuitively knew the answer all along even when I was young and talking with my dad. But I would have to remind myself at writer's workshops or with people whose focus for me was just publication. I got published quite a bit doing it my way, but again, I needed to let go of that as the goal and refocus on the process. I did learn some things from a mentor. You have to be careful who you take advice from, of course. I really only had one reader/mentor I heeded at all. Or a couple. There came a time I knew I didn't really need readers anymore to accomplish my goals. You might need the "feedback loop" to improve, but you don't need it to tell you if you're good or not. Maybe that's the point--does it matter if you're "good?" And who decides that? It only matters if you have a passion for what you're doing and if you are getting better at it. Writing is so subjective, can one ever really know some of this and can publication ever be the true measurement? Or do you know it deep down inside?
I think we all write for an "ideal" reader who can be a real person, but usually is some sort of muse fantasy person we make up in our heads. Most writers are kidding themselves if they claim they aren't writing for anyone at all. Then write a diary. But I guess my point is that even Emily Dickenson wanted to know from somebody if her work "breathed." (She claimed to not want publication).
So the only answer is to focus on that process all the time, read writers you admire, experiment with point of view, language. Just never give up. You won't be able to if it's truly your passion.
But if being authentic comes at the price of never hearing criticism, you're in the wrong business. Write a diary. Over time, you learn if a particular criticism is something you want to incorporate into your work. Or not.
So yes, I got better at it!
Sorry for only replying now to your comment but thank you for the thorough answer!
I will try your advice/musings out :) Really cool that you knew from an early age!
I guess, yeah, it is hard to determine whether a piece of writing is good in an objective sense. I'd say, a text is well written when it moves or influences you, emotionally or intellectually, ideally in both aspects.
I'd say I'm partially writing for an audience, but also for my future self. I want to get into a trance, fully immersed in the present. Once I'm out of this state, ideally, I'd reread my work and be surprised and moved by my own words.
Did you ask that question to make me think? Or do you yourself hold the opinion that judging a piece of writing is purely subjective?
Wish you a good day!
There are a few technical things that are somewhat objective. Like avoiding adjectives, like writing more visually, avoiding abstractions, show don't tell (though it's really a combination). But I think writing is also subjective. It has to be. So it's about your commitment to process and your belief in yourself, your work, and the more you can leave publication out of that mix and concentrate on that process, the better things go overall. We only have control over process. Be careful who you listen to--limit readers and only take advice from writers you really admire. Oh, and never let rejections influence you much. You might get rejected 30 times on a piece. It's possible to send things out too soon, but rejection really doesn't tell you much about how good that piece is. So those are my thoughts. What kind of writing to you do? I suspect you are on the right track.
Mhm yeah there are some helpful guidelines you can use to improve your writing.
Hmm makes sense. I've noticed that posts where I just wrote from my heart, and focused more on the writing itself, tended to perform better too. Your comment gives me some motivation to try to hone in on this process. Thanks for that!
Mhm like the saying I've heard once. That you should only take criticism from people that you'd also turn to for advice. Which authors do you personally admire, if I may ask?
Thanks for the encouragement. Getting rejected 30 times is probably demotivating. This didn't happen to me so far, but I'll keep your thought in mind.
Thanks for asking! Well, I'm writing a substack newsletter, so far with more emotional, introspective, self-reflection posts that are sprinkled with philosophy, some self-help and hopefully humor. Though I'm also thinking about publishing some short stories on there.
Other than that, I've written two short stories, but they're unpublished. And I'm working on a book, which is technically labelled as fanfiction. The only similarity between the original work and my writing are some of the character names though. I've just used that classification so it might get more exposure, and I could receive some feedback.
I don't know if I asked you that already, sorry if I did, but what writing do you do?
Wish you a good day!
ps I also write blogs on Substack and Wordpress, but I also haven't been focused enough on that. I write about politics and diet and dreams and many things. I keep thinking I'm going to get focused again. I hope so. Happy writing.
Well, rejection is part of the deal unless you self publish and since what is good writing is a subjective thing, so is rejection, of course. Fanfiction sounds kind of interesting. Never done that, but I have written metafiction where the main character is a writer and referenced a book I loved. My mentor made me change it. I'm sorry I did, though his advice was usually great.
I mostly wrote literary fiction, published at universities and literary journals. But I also wrote some nostalgia early on that was published in women's magazines and a piece even in a men's sporting journal. I wrote well from a man's pov, so I always used my initials so men wouldn't reject me out of hand.
And I've published creative nonfiction, which is really interesting.
Most of my publishing happened before I even finished my bachelor's degree. My last story collection was after I got my MFA and was teaching for a while at a university in Michigan. But this experience has taught me that you need to be careful who you listen to, even if they have great reputations or seem to be in the role of "teachers."
And unfortunately my more libertarian politics cost me both my publisher and my teaching job, since I was adjuncting.
I have been working on a more commercial dream/time travel thing for about five years. Finishing got derailed when my youngest son got testicular cancer and I cared for my dad for three years with Parkinson's. I have an adult son with Down Syndrome who lives with me and my husband is having neurological issues now. And my best friend died this week. So I swore I'd never be a nurse or a teacher, and I've done both. Ha, I wouldn't have it any other way now.
Since I had a handicapped child, I didn't finish my degree and I was self taught in my writing for many years. Getting published did validate me, I can't deny that, but I really yearn for the days when I didn't know some of what I know and wrote totally authentically. How would I feel if I'd never been published? I'm not sure, of course, but either way, the key is to focus on the process. Be careful with language, write the best you can. I tended to write a bit too much from the head rather than the heart, and my style was to SHOW scenes and let the reader feel. He/she doesn't need to be told what to feel from the characters, though the truth is you mostly show, but tell some, too. I think this will be my last novel, so I am looking to write more from the heart.
I'm interested in Time, Faith, Physics (as in Einstein), Jung influences me with synchronicity, and I want to play more with that in my last book. I may still write short pieces and creative nonfiction after this. I see you are interested in philosophy. I had some in college and consider myself a mixed philosopher in terms of determinism/indeterminism which I write about quite a bit.
But it's all process, no matter what. The publishing or not publishing is out of your hands.
But I AM finally working on this revision. I'm also self publishing a memoir/woodfire cookbook thing. I think I'll do that one that way. But I'll try to get an agent for my time/dream thingy. Quite the wordsmith aren't I?
You probably know, but the term "literary fiction" throws people a lot. It's more classical, serious fiction, that is slightly more language and character-driven, though I like to have a lot of plot. My writing had been nonlinear often, but less of that in my time novel, because moving around in time and universes is nonlinear enough!
Wow, did you really want to know all that? Have a great day yourself. I can already tell you are a good writer.
L.E.
Does that even exist?
Kerry Jane: With Kiwiwriter47 and You, I stare cluelessly at the logarithmic equation, while I take wonder and joy in your own column on All arising from Nothing, and Kiwiwriter47, not at least with his four-part series on the Holocaust (NEVER FORGET, NEVER AGAIN!!).
I like the idea of recognizing the “games” there are to play. The ones we are told to play and the ones we can CHOOSE to play. The ones we make up our own rules. I’d love a follow up post to see how you manage this merging in a few months. And I think???? The answer to the math question is option 4. Don’t quote me :)
Oh it will take about a year for me to know the result. My current position lasts until July, so I don't have to worry about income until then and in the meantime I'm mostly doing small things to help the transition of being unemployed. If all goes well, I should have at least 6 months where I don't have to worry about burning through my savings, can rest after a long time of constant work, can put more time into my online platform, write my book, feel like a person again. That's the plan. Thank you so much for taking the time to read, comment and subscribe. You might like some other posts I wrote in my journal entries section as well. I will hopefully have an updated between July and November of this year (as well as overall growth for Metanoia).
Awesome! Looking forward to reading them. Definitely in a similar position. Just navigating it all one day at a time