dancingsinging

Rachel Swirsky recently pointed out to me that you do not have to be a CW graduate to do the write-a-thon. And that it helps CW to do it. Plus, I've been thinking how I really have to find an alternative to nanowrimo, because November is always going to be crazy stressful busy for me even without a huge writing challenge. So, CW w-a-t seems like an obviously good idea.

The problem is, I'm freaking out about the idea a little, because w-a-t participants seem to actually be trying to write something good. As opposed to nanowrimo, which seems largely to be people trying to write something at all, which they hope might be incidentally good. (At least, that's historically how I've done it. Except the year I tried to write something good, freaked out, and didn't finish.)

Which brings me to a conversation I want to relate. I was talking to a good friend of mine and kind of running in circles about how my life feels generally worthless and meaningless and that, actually, I suck in an essential way. She observed that the whole thing seemed to actually center on my writing, and how it seemed threaten me in a very profound way. She noted that whenever I got too close to actually starting to make progress on my writing, I would kind of generate a loud and furious crisis in my life (like a politician bringing up abortion when they don't want to talk about something else). This observation really struck me, in the sense of something I thought I understood but was seeing in a whole different light.

Having heard pretty much every writer talk about getting around their inner critic in order to write, I had assumed that everyone contended with nearly debilitating feelings of worthlessness and self-doubt every time they sat down to write. But in the course of my conversation with my friend, it occurred to me that maybe for some people it was more like the inner critic I have to deal with when I'm cleaning my house or something--annoying and hurtful, but manageable with some consciousness about it. So I said, "I'm wondering if maybe it's possible to write without going through excruciating pain." And she was like, "That's a good thought. And maybe without having to write badly on purpose."

I had just explained to her how, the day before, I had made myself write 2000 words of smut as a warm up, to kind of force myself to break through the self-silencing and to give myself permission to be bad. And the story was bad. Like, the characters and plot seemed as if they had been invented by an adolescent who had read too much Twilight. Except without the werewolf and vampire and creepy stalking. Anyway, it was just horrible. And it was painful writing something that bad. But here's the crazy thing--it hadn't occurred to me to try to make it easier by just writing something good. So weird.

My friend talked about "permission to fail" in a radically different way than I had understood it. Not that it's okay to be as sucky as you secretly think you probably are, because we should lovingly accept ourselves even if we do fundamentally suck. But rather that failing is a part of the process of succeeding. Because we don't fundamentally suck; actually, we have the power to do amazing things. By actively trying lots of things and learning each time when it doesn't turn out. She related the story of the development of methyl-B as a treatment for autism. She said that this highly effective treatment came about by hundreds of researchers showing up every day for fifteen years and failing. And each failure led them one step closer to finding the treatment.

This friend that I was talking to is a fellow Buddhist. In the course of our conversation, we discussed the Dragon King's Daughter*, a character in the Lotus Sutra whom everyone thought could never attain enlightenment because (1) she was female, (2) she was a child, (3) she was an animal, and (4) she was the daughter of this evil dude. But she was all, "I can attain enlightenment right now, just as I am. SUCKAS!" And then she did. And everyone else realized that they had been dumbasses, and that their previous understanding was very shallow.

So, as our conversation was winding up, I was all thinking about how maybe someday I wouldn't have to torture myself to write something. You know, in the future, when I wasn't all fucked-up anymore. I asked my friend whether she thought I should even bother to write for the last hour that I had that day, since clearly I had to go home and chant for hours to fix being so messed up. And she was like, "What a ridiculous question! Of course you should write. Chant in your car for five minutes to activate your Buddha nature, and then go write! You're the dragon king's daughter!"

And you know what? That shit worked. I went back to my story that I had been agonizing over and the solution was totally right there. And it was juicy! And easy! And I felt good, the way you feel good when you're doing something you know you're good at. I couldn't believe it. And then I was pretty sure it was a fluke, but I tried it the next day and it worked again.

Which all leads me to think that I should totally do the Clarion West write-a-thon. But I'm still nervous about it.


*I know it seems all sexist that she only has a title that names her in relation to her father. But that's actually, I think, the point. Everything that made it seem to others that she couldn't attain enlightenment was this incorrect, deluded social stuff. But the reality is that none of it mattered, none of it had to change for her to be enlightened. Because we don't essentially suck.