starting is not as good as finishing
Apr. 1st, 2014 02:25 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
respectorcistI need to stop being a failure. In order to do that, I need to convince myself I am not a failure.
I know that I have critical but wide-ranging eyes, and that this is one of the better features of me. But more often than I turn that critical eye on the world, I turn it in on myself. It doesn't communicate well in my messy and chaotic presentation but inwardly, I'm a perfectionist, where I am concerned. I passionately and relentlessly measure myself directly up against what is realistically unachievable. The ideal.
I have four novels partially written on my desktop, one even above 100,000 words. I've abandoned all of them. They just weren't good enough, not interesting enough, not as good as some of the other stuff I've read produced by others. I'm mired in my own possibilities and haunted by my own inaqequate creative efforts. My ideas are just not good enough. None of them are 'the' idea. But why can't I get them there? Surely I'm capable.
I at once believe my own hype and passionlessly condemn myself. I want others to read my stuff and tell me my ideas are good, because that's the only way I can measure them up. Yet at the same time, I won't accept garlands of praise. I've already judged myself against perfection and came out sorely wanting. Even being told that something is good by a trusted source, I still stubbornly refuse to believe it. What seems like bravado and arrogance on the outside is really wry, sarcastic self-mortification.
My internal critic is nothing if not perniciously accurate.
I'm stupid and lazy and a failure.
No, Lysandra, that's not true. You're just not perfect. And your procrastination is due to your own fear.
So tonight, instead of working on finishing your novels, you're going to spend the time to write a stupid but cathartic blog post more about your own insecurities than the act of writing itself and hide it on your pointless Dreamwidth account.
And tomorrow you're going to get the fuck over yourself and work on your shit.
I know that I have critical but wide-ranging eyes, and that this is one of the better features of me. But more often than I turn that critical eye on the world, I turn it in on myself. It doesn't communicate well in my messy and chaotic presentation but inwardly, I'm a perfectionist, where I am concerned. I passionately and relentlessly measure myself directly up against what is realistically unachievable. The ideal.
I have four novels partially written on my desktop, one even above 100,000 words. I've abandoned all of them. They just weren't good enough, not interesting enough, not as good as some of the other stuff I've read produced by others. I'm mired in my own possibilities and haunted by my own inaqequate creative efforts. My ideas are just not good enough. None of them are 'the' idea. But why can't I get them there? Surely I'm capable.
I at once believe my own hype and passionlessly condemn myself. I want others to read my stuff and tell me my ideas are good, because that's the only way I can measure them up. Yet at the same time, I won't accept garlands of praise. I've already judged myself against perfection and came out sorely wanting. Even being told that something is good by a trusted source, I still stubbornly refuse to believe it. What seems like bravado and arrogance on the outside is really wry, sarcastic self-mortification.
My internal critic is nothing if not perniciously accurate.
I'm stupid and lazy and a failure.
No, Lysandra, that's not true. You're just not perfect. And your procrastination is due to your own fear.
So tonight, instead of working on finishing your novels, you're going to spend the time to write a stupid but cathartic blog post more about your own insecurities than the act of writing itself and hide it on your pointless Dreamwidth account.
And tomorrow you're going to get the fuck over yourself and work on your shit.
