Writing Wednesdays
A Writer’s Journal, Day #1056
By Steven Pressfield | Published: August 18, 2010
I’m going to try something different this week. Instead of one full-length post that stays up for seven days, I’m gonna do short, one-a-day “journal entries.” A new one will go up Wednesday, Thursday, Friday, all week. The reason I’m trying this this week is that, in my real writing life, I’m just now plunging in on the last ten or twelve pages of the novel I’ve been working on for the past three years. I’m thinking that a real-time, “under the helmet” look at one writer’s process might be of interest.
Steinbeck's "Journal of a Novel," a fascinating look at a writer's process
To implement this, I’m going to borrow the concept from John Steinbeck’s Journal of a Novel (an early-AM diary he kept while writing East of Eden) and do these short posts as warmups each morning. When I’m ready to work, I’ll stop the post and sign off till tomorrow.
Okay. Here’s what’s going on inside me right now re finishing this book:
Resistance is monumental; I feel it like a massive brick of fear. But I have three things, at least, working in my favor.
1) I know from experience that Resistance always puts on a full-court press when the finish line heaves into view. So I’m ready for it. I’m not surprised. I know that those voices in my head that say, “What if you screw this up … what if you can’t pull off this climax, etc.” are pure Resistance. They are not thoughts, they are “thoughts.”
I dismiss them. They are lies and bullshit.
2) I also know from experience that the alternative to doing my work is a hundred times worse than the pain or fear of doing it. I remember vividly the seven years when I did yield to fear and Resistance—and the hell it was for me and for people I loved. I can hear the whip crack. The fear of not doing it is stronger than the fear of doing it.
It’s kind of like finding yourself a thousand feet below the summit of Everest, with a 26,000-foot sheer drop-off beneath you. There’s no real option. It’s climb or die.
3) I’m a professional who has faced this stuff down a thousand times. I will plunge in and give it my all.
That’s the warmup for today. See you tomorrow.
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What a great news, Steven!;-) Now, we gonna have more Wednesdays in our weeks! Yay!;-)
I am totally with you on: that fear of not doing my art is much stronger, than the fear of doing=shipping it.
Knowing on which word, emotion, thought we ought to put ” “, can save us loads of trouble;-)
I cannot wait till tomorrow.
Till then keep on shipping.
cheers,
i.
What a gift for us, Steven! I look forward to this week’s instalments (and thanks for the Steinbeck recommendation).
That capital R heckler doesn’t stand a chance …
I find it fascinating that you hit your biggest resistance at the end of a book. Mine comes much earlier, after the proposal, as I head into the middle section of the book. Doubts rise up. I’m convinced I can’t write and never have been able to, I’m positive I have no plot and the whole thing is going to fall apart. I struggle for each word. Sometimes have to I go back and read one of my own books to convince myself I actually can write, even a little.
But the end…By then, I know precisely where I’m going and what needs to be written, and I charge toward the gigantic relief of finishing. I hit the legendary Flow, and can do several thousand words a day. The last 4 or 5 chapters come out all in a piece, and typically with little revision. It stuns me every time. Fortunately, the excitement also leaves me ready to start the next book — and carries me through those dark moments when, once more, I’m convinced the magic will never come again.
One has to wonder if starting the day by writing a journal rather than getting on with finishing the novel is not a Resistance delay tactic, but I guess we’ll find out this week.
Ah, yes Mart, very clever, could be. Maybe more like giving R a little something to nibble on while you break left – HARD! Sounds like a promising strategy. I have faith in you Steven! Plus, what a treat for the rest of us! Thanks!
I’ll look forward to these short posts.
Though she doesn’t address resistance directly, Margaret Wheatley writes on fear in her new book “Perseverance”. She writes that the fact of fear isn’t important; what’s important is what we do with it. “It is our curiosity that transforms fear,” she says. Of failure, she writes, “It takes a lot of contributions from many different sources to create” it. It seems you’ve engaged your demons in some of the ways Wheatley recommends and are exercising the choice she says we all have to succeed.
I share your feelings. I have two projects that are nearing completion. I can feel the tug of wanting to pull back, the thoughts of what if this sucks, and the fear of finishing and than an empty feeling of “now what.”
Ugh. Keep plugging.
It’s always good to hear what’s on your mind, Steve. Very generous of you to share your insights.
#2 is the one that bugs me. My friends and family do not understand me. When I voice my “fear of not doing it,” this fight I am trying to win, they wonder out loud, “why do you need to write?” Because I question myself, they question me too. When I see that look on their faces, Resistance smiles.
Loved your words: “It’s kind of like finding yourself a thousand feet below the summit of Everest, with a 26,000-foot sheer drop-off beneath you. There’s no real option. It’s climb or die.” Yup!
Maybe if I explain it that way, they will understand…or perhaps not. Agh, who cares? I am writing, PERIOD.
Thank you!
Just make sure this blog doesn’t become a form of Resistance. As much as I like reading it, I know that finishing your book is more important.
This is absolutely fascinating, and so helpful, as always. I’m at the end of my first book (draft is done, but working on major revisions). I have an agent but no publisher yet, meaning that I’m free to blow my self-set deadlines. The Resistance is indescribable. Like you say in the War of Art, it hits me with something new every day.
I’m leaving this comment during scheduled writing time, so I guess I’d better stop and get back to it.