Saturday, May 18, 2013

Writing Through The Fear Of Embarassment

Geek to Author has become a running joke of the opposite of what the name states. The Geek is not becoming an author very fast. I write, not as much as I like, I definitely read more broad genres and I have shelves full of writing books. Yet I can't crack that barrier of perfection the first time. Perfection is really in the reader's opinion because like any art there is no formula to determine what's "perfect" or "good".

You can easily judge based on a foundational structure, word usage, format but when it comes to the art of the story, dialogue, settings, emotional aspects of a piece of work that's where it becomes subjective. Take the latest Dan Brown novel Inferno for example. I personally will not read it. Why? Because Dan Brown has a story formula wrapped around the same story structure in each of his books. They are highly popular for his controversial plot points and fiction twists not because he's a good structural author. His books are not perfect, but they don't need to be.

So to strive for that perfection you need to put aside the fear of being told your story sucks, full of flaws, ridiculous realism, bad characters, etc... and usually that criticism comes from people who don't know a noun from an adverb. Work through that.

There are plenty of resources out there to help you mold your craft but unless you get over the emotional barriers you will never get the art made. It's not that hard! I just saw there's an "Artist" in New York that has a collection of photographs of people in their apartments. The "artist" sat in his apartment and took pictures of people in the building across the street. He made big prints and called it art... selling them for $7,500 each.

What is art? Whatever someone thinks it is. I can guarantee you that artist doesn't worry about embarrassment or bad feedback, why should you? At least you are expanding your mind by creating something.

Time to turn the page.

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