Any time you attempt to do something outside of your comfort zone, something that could potentially be of gran importance, your inner critical self starts to murmur in your head, second-guessing and causing you to doubt your ability to do it. Leaving you to say, I tried to write a book followed by as many reasons that it takes to make you drop it and return to your “normal” or safe life.
Endless Excuses
Here are some of the excuses that we’ve heard, such as
I tried to write a book
- every day but just couldn’t
- and get it published, but got turned down
- and get it published, but didn’t have the money
- in 30 days and failed
- but just end up being disappointed
- and I’ll never do that again
- of poetry and couldn’t even do that
- proposal and that’s where it ended
Or,
I tried to write a book but
- I’m not a writer
- I can’t write it
- I don’t know how
- it felt like I forced it
- people told me it was not a good idea
- I don’t have the money to do it
- I can’t seem to get started
- can’t and I don’t know why
- I started writing it and stopped
- just wrote it anyway and I’m embarrassed
- know nothing about how to do it
- my grammar is bad
- nothing ever came of it
- now I can’t seem to write at all
- I need help
- I never did
- need someone to do it for me
- I ran out of ideas
- got pregnant
- I quit even though I still want to
- regret it
- the pages are blank
- I’m unable to write
- it’s very hard to write
- I don’t know where to start
- The topic is too raw and sensitive
Does any of that sound familiar? If it does, you are not alone. Almost every author, if not all authors, has experienced this prior to completing their first book. Sometimes your burning desire to write a book is so powerful that these kinds of thoughts are quickly pushed aside, otherwise, they will continue until you’ve given up or completed your book.
Note there is a lot of “trying” in those statements as if the call to write was there, but the commitment, dedication, persistence, channeling, or whatever is not there to carry you through the process.
When I work with people on their writing projects, I chunk it down to, “Just write 500 words a day” and doing so can end up in you’re writing your book in 90 days, more or less. Nonetheless, there is still the “doing” of the writing in contrast to the trying.
It’s about building one piece upon the other until the project is complete, and while you’re doing it, don’t tell anyone. I often tell the story of my friend who bought a vacant piece of land out in the woods and began working on his property on weekends that he had off when it wasn’t raining too hard. We live in the Pacific Northwest and rainless days are found to be fewer than in other parts of the USA.
In the beginning, he made the mistake of telling a few people about the project and some of his friends talked him into letting them see his work in progress. Though he was proud of his efforts, the friends could only see what little had been done with little foresight of what the possibilities might be. Some even made fun of him. Yet, he persisted in silence.
Years, later, that property is worth hundreds of times hi initial investment. What did it take? Chunking into small pieces continued investment of time and money and diligently building one chunk upon the other until his masterpiece was completed.
This can be likened unto your book.
Maybe working within a deadline is too much of a commitment for you. If so, forget the deadline. Just write a few words when you can and add more words when you’re able. As long as you don’t stop, your book will be complete.
And if, God forbid, you pass before the completion of your book, at least you’ve left something, the words you have written behind. Who knows? Maybe your offspring will pick up where you left off as Christopher Tolkien did after his father, J.R.R. Tolkien, passed away.
And if you have written your work and not met with the acceptance and good fortune as you might have hoped for, you may be honored posthumously as did Henry David Thoreau, Emily Dickinson, Edgar Allan Poe, and H.P. Lovecraft whose writings have been enjoyed and inspired many millions.
But you must write the words.