On Why Writing Is So Hard
Last week, I wrote about what I think might be one of the greatest challenges we face in this life: honouring what is within us despite everything happening outside of us.
For many of us reading this newsletter, one of those things is writing.
There's a story we want to tell. A book we want to finish. Maybe we've dreamed about seeing our name on the cover of a novel or holding our memoir in our hands. Or maybe we don't know what this thing will become yet. We just know that, for whatever reason, we feel called to write.
And I think pursuing that calling can be doubly challenging.
First, writing asks us to do something incredibly uncertain.
Think about how much of the creative process is outside of our control. We can sit down at our desks, but we don't know if the words will come. We can write a scene, but we don't know if it will work. We can spend months or years on a manuscript without knowing exactly what it will become. And even if we eventually create something we're proud of, we have no idea whether anyone else will want to read it.
There's no formula we can follow that guarantees the outcome. We have to begin without knowing exactly where we're going.
To do that, we have to place our trust in something beyond what we can control. Call it the creative process. The Muse. Creativity. God. Whatever language makes sense to you, there's an act of faith involved in making something that doesn't exist yet.
We have to trust that if we continue showing up, something will eventually meet us there.
But writing asks for another kind of trust too.
It asks us to trust ourselves.
Because when we create a story, what exactly are we creating it with?
Our experiences. Our memories. Our perspectives. Our feelings. Our thoughts. Our beliefs. Our imaginations. The strange collection of things we've noticed and remembered and wondered about throughout our lives.
Even when we're writing about people and places that have never existed, we're painting them with colours we've collected from our own internal world.
Writing is deeply personal.
And then, after we've taken all of that and put it onto a page, we're supposed to do something that might be even more frightening.
We're supposed to let someone read it.
We're asked to take something that came from within us and make it available for another person to experience, interpret and, yes, judge.
That's a vulnerable thing to do. Many of us struggle to share parts of ourselves with the people closest to us, never mind putting them into words and handing them to someone else.
No wonder we resist.
No wonder we suddenly find something else that needs doing when it's time to write. No wonder the inner critic gets louder as we get closer to something that matters. No wonder we can spend years saying that we're going to write that book someday.
Writing asks a lot of us.
But if this is something within us that we want to honour, then eventually we have to take the risk.
We have to trust the creative process enough to begin without knowing where it will take us. We have to trust ourselves enough to believe that what we have to say is worth putting on the page. And eventually, we have to trust our readers enough to let our words leave our hands and become something they can experience for themselves.
Maybe that's part of the power of creating art.
Every time we sit down to write, every time we keep going when we don't know whether it's working, every time we allow another person to read what we've created, we're pushing our chips a little further forward.
We're saying:
My dream matters.
My words matter.
I matter.
And maybe that's why writing can feel like one of the hardest things in the world to do.
Because for those of us who feel called to it, it might also be one of the most important.
So keep going.
Keep trusting.
Keep honouring what's within you.
Wishing you and your stories all the best,
Trevor
P.S. If you're in the Brandon, Manitoba area, I'm hosting a one-day Writing Workshop! If you're already a writerā€”or you're ready to take a step toward becoming oneā€”I'd love to have you join us for a day dedicated to writing, creativity and your stories.
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