Failure and First Drafts

Dear Internauts,
 
I spent most of November trying to "win" NaNoWriMo. Like so many other years, I didn't reach the word count goal of 50,000 words by the end of the month. Not even close. However, in striving toward that far off ambition, I did manage to write far more and far more often than I have in years. I'd finally pushed this one novel idea to the point where I know the story and its characters more clearly than I ever have before. Most importantly, though, beyond any arbitrary goal, the practice of regularly sitting down to write has improved my ability to push words out of my head and onto the page no matter how I may be feeling at the time.

Yes, my mood can still often feel colossal in size and strength, far out of my control. Now, though, even in the worst of times, I know it's possible to create anyway. Not only that, but I feel more free to create than before, and I even enjoy writing more than I used to.

Before I could do any of this though, I had to face up to the biggest block in my way.

I've written to you before about trying to overcome the daunting sense that every word or note or moment must be perfect or at least exceptional from the start. I'll sit down at my computer or with my guitar and whatever whiff of inspiration or fervor I'd previously felt vanishes in the face of a vast sea of empty silence or the barren cold of the blank page.

So long as I wrapped my brain up in the chains of the notion that good writing for any medium only comes out of some genius, or some miraculous, muse-inspired transcendent reception, I'd be bound in a state of useless, strangling despair.

Truth is, first drafts are about raw honesty, as messy, unbalanced, and nonsensical as it may at first appear.

First drafts should be imperfect.

This fear of imperfection, of not meeting impossible expectations on the first try, is like a cop car hiding off the side of the road at the end of the month. It's a speed trap. It does not have my best interests in mind. The fear renders me unable to see myself as a whole, complex individual under a mountain of mitigating circumstances.

The expectations are impossible not just because they’re hard, but also because they are vague and, possibly because of that, they are intangible and threatening. Their threat grows the more I try to think about what reaching and beating them must necessarily look like. I’m imposing restrictions on a state which doesn’t exist yet, and I’m fighting for and against a possible future with tools I don’t even have yet. 

It feels like what I’m afraid of is an actual, rational, comprehensible failure to reach my goals, but that’s only because I’m reaching into my past experiences of failure and pulling out only the negative.

See, I like to carry my failures in a burlap sack. Slung over my shoulder, it weighs me down, trips me up, and wears me out. Every time I fail or think I’ve failed at something, I add more anecdotal evidence to this smelly old bag of pain.  Since I so rarely take stock and try to clean out the bag, everything is jumbled and covered in the sour, fetid grease of the most self-deprecating bias. All the solid wisdom trinkets picked up along the way tend to get lost like a handful of marbles in a sandbox.

Whatever I pull out of my bag of past failures, I use it to sculpt an impression of the unknowable future. Instead of searching out the bits of lessons learned and applying them to the creation of something new, I tend to cover my view with the daunting veil of everything that’s ever gone wrong and how utterly miserable it made me. I can’t even begin to imagine what might be possible, because from my point of view, there’s no possibility except for heartbreaking catastrophe.

While a fear may be irrational, that doesn’t mean it’s effects any less real.

Between the nightmares and the hyper-aware sense of being crushed I feel in crowds, there are plenty of unhealthy and unhelpful ways my mind and body respond to outside stimuli because of an unnecessary sense of danger. Medication, therapy, mindfulness, and time—as well as the support of loving, patient family and friends—have all helped me be able to relax some, or at least know how to breathe and navigate life a little more each day.

As far as writing and music go, if I wait for only the good days, full of inspiration and the joyful appreciation of flowing creativity, I will never write another story or another song again in my life. If I can only mark that blank page with the most perfect words, the page will stay blank.

Instead of trying to start out with something amazing, maybe I should start out with something. Just tell the story, just get the idea or the themes down in some form. Only then do I really have anything to work with. Only then can I take what I have and turn it into something better. Spiraling in self-doubt is only a hindrance. 

Despite the fact that so many creative people in history have struggled with depression, it doesn't actually help with the creative process. Sure, maybe emotional pain can offer a kind of insight into the human condition, make a few words in verse 2 a shade more relatable, but during the worst swings and crushing moods, depression is far more debilitating than it is useful.

Fear of imperfection is the same. Being stuck with nothing until I think of the perfect phrase or chord or whatever just means that I've got nothing. This fear won't inspire actual perfection any more than stabbing myself in the foot would make me run faster. Spend my life waiting for the perfect traveling weather, and if it ever comes along, I'll simply have delayed my trip and be no closer to my destination for all that lost time. 

After returning to Pennsylvania from Nashville, I was here a few months when my best friend told me she thought I surely would have gotten better by now.

Believe me when I tell you I've spent every day since then unsure of what in the world this "better" thing is even supposed to look like. Though, I have wasted plenty of time beating myself up for not having reached it yet.

Back to my old self? Well, that's probably not ever gonna happen.

Completely emotionally stable, mentally proficient, and fully self-sufficient? Maybe someday, but doubtfully anything that looks like however close to that I might have been at some point in the past.

For now, this is what better means:

Better is not perfection.
Better won’t solve me.
Better won’t fix the past.
Better won’t sand down all the edges of life.
Better won’t offer sufficient apology or satisfactory explanation.
Better is a process in which I daily choose to take a chance on myself—

A chance to be brave enough to try.
A chance to fall.
A chance to fail.
A chance to learn.
A chance to improve.
A chance to acknowledge both the irrationality of some of my fears and the reality of their effects.

And finally, a chance to make a habit of creating without the limitations of expecting perfection.

I write the words in my head.

I sing the tune as it comes.

I take each day for itself.

I give myself and others the benefit of the doubt.

And I practice making mistakes—which is to say living a genuine life—and applying the lessons I learn from them, chipping away at the bounds of my fear.

I can't see a way forward if my view is cluttered with self-hate based on past failure, but I can be legitimately inspired when I realize how far I've come and how much I can take each failure and learn from it.

Well, that's where I'm at anyway.

Thank you for reading,
Odist