Writer Fears

If you've read the description for this blog, you know that my intention was (and sort of still is) to use it to talk about research I'm doing for books I'm currently writing, as well as keep you sort of up to date on what I'm writing - just in case you are interested. Well, if you check this blog on any sort of regular basis (highly doubtful), you know I've been doing a smashing job! Or not.

It's time to admit it. Unless my posts affect me personally somehow and I am emotionally invested in it, it is hard to write them. I wanted to keep this blog away from more personal stuff because - well. A couple reasons.

1: I don't like talking about my writing, particularly when I know the people reading my talking. It is incredibly personal for me. When I talk about my writing, I feel like I am opening my heart and laying it out for people to stomp on. So I thought if I only talked about research, I could fulfill the requisite "must have online writing presence to get published" without showing people I know who I am.

2: I am linking to this blog on my social media, which means that friends and family might actually click on that someday and read this. I am fearful that if they find out about my true love - writing - and that even though I've loved it since I was 8 I still haven't had anything real published, they will think of me as a failure.

3.: Everyone thinks they are a writer. Anytime someone mentions that they have written/are writing/want to write a book, everyone else in hearing distance pipes up, eager to talk about how they, too, want to write a book and be a writer. And somehow, it gets frustrating for me to hear everyone around me talk about it as though they understand what it is to actually be a writer. Most people who "want to write a book" have no idea of the constant emotional turmoil people who are wired as writers suffer. Of the struggle through lack of inspiration, the simultaneous hatred and love of every sentence put down. The fear of doing it and inability not to. Of actually being a writer. Not just writing. And I want to explain it to them, but again, I don't. Because I'm afraid.

Overall - it is just fear. My closer friends know that fear - and especially fear of failure - is my old enemy. I like getting things right on the first try. And if I don't think I will, I am less likely to even try. Except when it comes to writing itself.

So, anyway. All this to say, I'm going to try (once again) to overcome my constant fear of failure and update this blog based not just on research, but my personal life in writing.  Because, published or not - open heart or not - it is who I am.  And I would write even if I knew I would never be published. So it's time for me to get over it.