First Resolution, 2010: More blog posts! I know, you're excited. I can feel your anticipation pulsing over the wi-fi and into my fingers. Thank you, thank you, thank you! Your validation, love, and adoration means everything to me (as I don't get nearly enough of it in my day-to-day life so I must seek it out from anonymous people on the Web). My goal is to write once a week which would be, at the very least, fifty-two posts. (Unless I'm confusing the number of weeks in a year with the number of cards in a deck, which does happen to me sometimes. I've luckily stopped confusing the number of cards in a deck with the number of states in my country. *Ahem.*) And as fortune would have it, my first resolution ties very nicely into my second resolution which is:
Second Resolution, 2010: Write more! As my unpaid therapist/life coach, Andie, put it to me recently, "I hate to break it to you, you're going to have to write if you want to be a writer." You see, I'm a perfectionist who stupidly thought that if she got involved in the editing process she would perfect her writing process. This did not happen. What did happen, however, was she became really good at critiquing her own writing...while she was writing. This is not good. (1) Because writers don't -- nor should they -- have an editor standing over their shoulders while they create. It kills the buzz, man. "Is that the word you're going to use?" "I don't think that action makes sense relative to the character you've developed." "What are you trying to achieve in this scene?" BAH! Shut up! (2) Because editors see all grades of writing quality. Sometimes this is good. As when a ridiculously redundant, un-paced, flat piece of writing comes through...and it gets bought. "Criminy, if that can get sold...." the writer thinks. But sometimes, it can be bad. Like when a manuscript comes in and it sweeps the editor into a another realm and can basically be published with just a light copyedit. The writer then thinks that she's a charlatan that has no business writing -- ever! -- and debates whether she should call the Library of Congress and get back the few books she did publish because -- really -- her books should not be stored anywhere near this stunning paragon of literature. (3) Because her ego and self worth are tied up in her writing and what if another editor (especially one that is a friend and former work colleague) gets his/her hands on it and knows the truth. "She's an idiot! But she speaks so well!" As my paid therapist tells me, "You know that's not true. You're too modest." Um, no, I'm just a really good fraud who can talk a good game. "That's not true either." Yeah? Prove it. Well, there's only one way to know for sure, right? And that's for me to write something and submit it. (Now go back and read one through three again. It's a loop, I tell ya.) Which brings me to:
Third Resolution, 2010: Believe in my self. This is hooky and completely new age-y in that Oprah Winfrey/bourgeoisie/The Secret-way. And I sigh in heavy defeat just writing it. But if I'm to be forthright, self doubt has crippled me in numerous ways from the time I was a small girl. (Honestly? I secretly have always believed that people don't like me. That they think I'm loud, crass, and obnoxious. I know, right?! Who doesn't love me? And yet...) But this "modesty" has stopped me from a lot of things. Like writing that book. Or finishing that screenplay. Or even going for that guy who is really cute, charming, smart, but maybe five years younger than me or too cute, charming or smart to want to be with loud, crass, obnoxious me. So, no more of that! I banish you, self doubt, to 2009 where you may wither and die along with my 401K and MySpace.
Fourth Resolution, 2010: Re-learn percentiles. As I know from past resolutions one or two of them will never occur, and as I would like one through three to happen, I figure if I throw in one that I should want, but am fairly certain I won't accomplish, then I'm padding the chances that the others will. However, if you come back to this blog in 2011, and I'm posting pie charts and using advance calculus equations to illustrate my writing productivity, you can safely assume that I did not finish the screenplay.
So. To 2010. And resolution for all of us.
Cheers!
No comments:
Post a Comment