The other day, my real life writer friend Sarah blogged something brilliant about “Playing Writer”:

Even now, I feel sometimes that I’m “Playing Writer” and while I have the knowledge and the skills, I’m not going to get over my insecurities until I work through them and tell myself that I am capable of doing this task I have set for myself. Sometimes when I’m talking about my book, I start to laugh or I apologize for my story. I’m scared I’m not going to live up to the things I’m saying about writing. I’m worried how someone will react to the words I have placed together — I mean, I want to be taken seriously. And I’m really good at talking the talk. I’m friggin awesome at talking the talk, if only that were the only thing I had to do! But, I have to walk the walk. Write the writing I’m always talking the talk about.

Right on!

I often feel like I don’t have the “right” to call myself a writer yet — like I’m just a kid playing make-believe — until I get some publishing creds to my name.

At the same time, calling myself a writer is a big part of getting myself in the right (write?) mindset. Telling other people “This is my goal, this is what I’m doing, and I will succeed” is a huge motivator to follow through. It’s accountability, you know?

It’s not that I write for other people — I don’t. But knowing that other people are watching me, and rooting for me, makes it a lot harder to watch TV instead of meeting my daily quota. (Of course, ideally I can fit in both…)

Anyway, that’s a big part of why I blog about my process. You guys keep me on track. Thanks, guys!

And with that in mind…

WIP update: 22,600 words, and 5 chapters done. I’m in the middle of Chapter 6 and definitely feeling better about what I’m producing. I’ve finally gotten a handle on the two main characters, AND the action has stepped up. So Chapters 1-3 will need a lot of revision to catch up to the rest.

But who am I kidding? The whole ms will need a lot of revision once the first draft is done!

Is it weird that I’m looking forward to that? (Or is it just walking the walk?)

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