If you missed last week’s blog, I talked about four of the voices writers will hear in their career. I promised that I would talk about each voice in more detail, so today I’d like to approach, with caution, the I Can’t Do This Voice.
This voice has many different manifestations. Sometimes it’s the voice that says we’re not actually equipped to do this, for whatever reason (probably several). It is the voice that tells us we don’t have enough experience, or we don’t know enough about what we’re trying to write. Sometimes it likes to remind us that we have never actually finished a manuscript or, really, anything of note.
Regardless of which manifestation you hear, this voice boils down to I Can’t Do This.
When this voice visits me, it can most often be traced to the doubt within me. Sometimes it comes from other people in my life—like a creative writing professor I had in college who took an instant dislike to me as soon as I walked in the door, and I him. He did not say encouraging things while I was in his class, and some of those things have stuck with me. I daresay many of us have stories that go about the same—whether or not it was a writing professor who first planted in our heads that we might not be able to do this.
Sometimes, in my most unguarded moments, this voice rises up from my past. I come from very humble beginnings. My family was poor. I should not have gone to college, because my parents couldn’t afford it. I went on scholarships, but I constantly battled the voice that told me I would never be anything more than poor. Passed over. Forgotten.
The I Can’t Do This voice, as you can see, is powerful.
This voice typically comes out to visit in three different scenarios.
Scenario 1: When we are doing something new.
Most often, I Can’t Do This visits me when I am writing in a genre or a style that is completely new and unknown to me. As writers, we need to have permission to experiment. This voice doesn’t like to let me.
I encountered it most recently when my email subscribers, after a poll, told me that they would like to see a thriller written by me. I had never written a thriller before. I didn’t really have much interest in writing a thriller. I don’t really even read thrillers. But because they asked, I did. As soon as I got started, the I Can’t Do This voice started shouting.
How to slay the voice in this scenario: Give yourself permission to be bad.
The first draft of my thriller was terrible. The second draft isn’t much better. It’s now sitting in a file on my computer, waiting for probably four to five more drafts before it will even start taking any kind of logical shape.
No one has to read that first draft. No one has the rest the next two or three or four. We don’t have to let anyone read what we’re writing until we’re ready. So we can write badly. In fact, it’s good for us to write badly. Give yourself permission to.
[Tweet “Give yourself permission to write badly the first go round. Take a little pressure off.”]
Scenario 2: When we’re smack dab in the middle of a really involved project.
Typically these really involved projects have about a thousand steps to them. I look at all those steps, and I shake my head and say, Nope. I don’t think I can do this, thus inviting the voice to agree with me
How to slay the voice in this scenario: Chip away at one step at a time.
If it’s too much to plan on brainstorming all the characters and the plot on the same day, do one character a day. Chipping away at a story sometimes allows for the deeper story to unfold.
I encounter this voice often when I am working on my middle grade series, Fairendale. This is a very involved series with a cast of characters that’s about as long as George R.R. Martin’s Song of Ice and Fire series. It’s massive. Sometimes it feels like I can’t do it. But I chip away, one thing at a time.
[Tweet “Break involved projects into little steps to keep the I Can’t Do This voice at bay.”]
Scenario 3: The instances when we find ourselves completely overwhelmed with everything.
And I mean everything—home, kids, work, people depending on me, deadlines, you name it. There’s a whole lot in our lives, every single day. We’re not going to get at it all.
How to slay the voice in this scenario: Re-evaluate and give yourself permission to cut away all the unnecessary.
If something is taking up mental and emotional space that you don’t need, get rid of it. If you think you need to do everything and do everything well, change your perception. We will never be able to do everything. We have to let some things slide or that voice will win. We won’t be able to do it all.
[Tweet “We won’t be able to do it all as parents who write. So re-evaluate and cut out the unnecessary.”]
Next week I’ll talk about the Who Would Even Read This voice. For now, give yourself permission to write a bad story, chip away one step at a time and re-evaluate what’s really important in your life so you don’t feel the need to do it all.
Week’s Prompt
A picture is one of my favorite ways to generate inspiration. Look at the picture below. Write whatever you want for as long as you can.
Photo by Joshua K. Jackson.
