It’s always so petty, that moment.
“I don’t have any good ideas.”
“I don’t have anything interesting to say.”
“I will misspell a word and people will judge me for not
being the best at never making a mistake in my writing, all of the time,
always.”
“I will incorrectly use effect/affect as I may have done
above. Wait, did I incorrectly use effect/affect?”
“People will just rip whatever I say apart and hurt my
feelings.”
Look, writing is supposed to be fun. It’s supposed to be
“because.” It’s important not to lose track of how much greatness happens when
you hit keys or write words on paper that are out-of-control feelings you’re
dying to share with someone.
There’s some huge misconception about writing—that the
people who call themselves writers have any idea what they’re doing. Like
everyone thinks they’re Jane Austen or J.K. Rowling or whoever your “whoever” is.
I think people should always write.
It’s easy to overthink it. To think that any piece of
writing that you do has to have a point, some giant bigger meaning.
But it should be enough to know that when you write
something, anything, it’s like a lottery ticket. Someone could read it and
could laugh uncontrollably for the best of reasons. Someone could read it and
become violently angry at your view on something (or your “non-view” for that
matter). Someone could read it and feel absolutely nothing.
And any one of those things is spectacular.
Because, that’s the “because.” Write just to write. It’s
healthy and there is always an amazing off chance that it affects someone more
than you had any idea it ever could.
So people might hate what you say. They might really love
it. They might feel nothing. Any one of those things is oddly terrifying.
But they will read it.
There’s always the off chance of that, and that’s the whole
reason you wrote in the first place.
To make some tiny little piece of you available to anyone
who may want it.
It may not be a handwritten calligraphy note, but it’s
enough.
It’s more than enough.
I agree with you. Especially in high school, our motivation for writing is usually towards an assignment or a class day. I hope we can all go back to the days where we wrote poems and short stories without regard for a critiquing audience.
ReplyDeleteHmmm... some interesting ideas... perhaps the best and most pure writing has no purpose; it just is. That would explain why people enjoy reading and writing fiction.
ReplyDeleteI love writing so much, and I constantly enjoy the thrill of posting my stories online. Often, when I go back and re-read what I've written, I will notice a mistake or two, but it's always easy to fix. No one has ever judged me or been a grammar Nazi about this before (except my sister, but she doesn't count), and I have made many friends this way. I think the best part of writing is when I get comments saying "This made my day!" or "Oh my gosh! Can't wait for more!!" To me, you can't get a better feeling than that!
ReplyDeleteI love seeing you guys bond over your love of writing!
ReplyDelete