Doing It For Fun?

It's sometimes hard to explain, to a non-writer, why I write. The confusion generally comes when the non-writer discovers I am not a full-time writer. "So it's a hobby," they say. "You do it for fun."

I can't explain that it's not a hobby - more a need. And most of the time, it's not fun. It's not fun to experience the crushing self-doubt that arrives on a regular basis and convinces me that every word I've ever written is complete rubbish. Or that feeling of rejection that comes with every email beginning, "thank you for sending us your manuscript. We regret to inform you that it will not fit our list at this time." Or, for me, getting up at 5:20am to write before work when really I'd much rather have an extra hour in bed.

Generally when such conversations come up I have to start by explaining that much as I would love to write full time, it's not economically feasible. It doesn't help that these conversations are generally with people who are not only non-writers but pretty much non-readers. They might have read Harry Potter, or Fifty Shades of Grey. So they think 'writer' and JK Rowlings and EL James spring to mind. And they're rolling in it, so all writers must be loaded, right?

My last royalty statement was for all of £5, and that represented a year's worth of sales. I am so far away from being able to make money from the writing that it seems an unobtainable goal. Giving up the day job is simply not an option because I have no other form of income.

At times I get completely overwhelmed. I leave the house at 6:20am so I can write before work. I generally don't get home before 7pm. I have French lessons and bass guitar lessons and admin stuff to deal with like emails and blog posts. And this is before we get to household stuff - laundry and remembering to pay the credit card bill and so on. Sometimes I get to a point when I feel I just can't cope with it all any more.

Logically, the thing to give up is the writing, because I kill myself trying to do it for no apparent reason. But even the mere thought of doing so makes me die inside.

And that's really why I write. Because I need to do it to keep on living. Not writing is as unthinkable to me as not breathing.

It may be I never manage to make enough money from the writing to give up the day job. But I will, somehow find a way to fit it into my life because there's just no other option.

Hibernation

My dislike of January is well known - I do a post like this about this time every year.

I don't like the cold. I seem to have the blood of a lizard. And I really don't like snow. When you can sit at home all day by the fire, and don't have to be anyplace, it probably looks pretty, but when you have to go to work in it - particularly on public transport - it's a pain in the backside. At least in London our snow fall is generally fairly short lived. If I liked snow I'd still be living in Canada, where it covers the ground for nearly six months of the year.

I spend January bundled up in thick jumpers and thermal vests and socks, shivering on the station platform waiting for a delayed train, arguing with my office mates about how hot we can have the central heating (I want it at 'tropical' mode - they don't), and generally feeling tired and run down. I seem to go into a kind of hibernation. Getting out of bed in the morning is a supreme effort and I drag through each day feeling half asleep, not being able to focus my brain on anything. Moving becomes an effort. I don't go to the gym, I don't do much writing, and I spend as much time as possible in bed. But it doesn't really matter because no matter how much or little sleep I get, I still struggle to stay awake during the day. And I crave sugar and carbs even more than usual, because I feel I need the energy.

When I'm not at work, I spend my time playing video games, because they don't require too much mental energy and distract me from how tired I'm feeling. Now, I am aware of my weaknesses. I would be quite capable of spending all day, every day playing video games if I didn't have to go to work. And there are many weekends in January when I do pretty much do that, leaving the sofa only to use the bathroom, go to bed, or get myself more chocolate. But the price you pay for being a grown-up is having to do stuff you don't really want to do a lot of the time, like go to work every day.

So far I've not had a terribly productive January. I've eaten a lot of biscuits, and made progress in 'Dragon Age', but not done much else. Come to think of it, I was in the same situation last year.

Roll on Spring, when I can wake up and emerge from my hibernation...

Crisis of Confidence

In the last three years, I've had three books published. I had two unpublished novels doing the rounds when Lyrical Press picked up SUFFER THE CHILDREN, and so DEATH SCENE was already finished when my editor asked me if I had anything else she could take a look at. And the short stories in SOUL SCREAMS were also written - it was just a case of compiling them.

Since I finished writing DEATH SCENE in 2004 I've started four novels. None of them I've managed to finish. The original sequel to DEATH SCENE was an homage to Agatha Christie's TEN LITTLE INDIANS, but halfway through the first draft I decided it wasn't working and I shelved it. Then I started work on my urban fantasy novel. I did manage to finish draft 1, but after giving the first half of it to beta readers, I decided that one wasn't working either and I never finished the second draft.

Then I started working on another Shara Summers book - this one with Shara investigating the case of the defenestrated rock star. I have managed to get to the end of draft 2, and then I sent it out to beta readers. Once more the message I'm getting back is that there is so much wrong with this book I should scrap it and start over with a new idea.

I'm also working on a new horror novel. I am about a third of the way through draft 2 of this one. To be fair, I have not let anyone else read it yet, so I have had no third party comments. But as far as I'm concerned, it still needs a lot of work. So much so that I'm getting discouraged.

Now I'm getting quite depressed. What if my writing really is rubbish and I'm never going to write anything again of publishable quality? What if I'm deluding myself that I can write at all? It's not as if my published books are selling in huge quantities. I've had some very nice comments from a few readers who have really enjoyed one or more of my books, and they've all had a handful of good reviews. But the vast majority of readers out there either don't know about my books or don't think they're worth bothering with.

It's times like this that I think no one who's sane would choose to be a writer and put themselves through this heartache, and life would be a whole lot simpler if I could not be a writer anymore. The problem is, it's not that simple. Writing is not something you can turn off when you get bored with it. And I also know that this the 'down' phase of the ups and downs of the writer's life, and it will pass in time.

That doesn't make me feel any better right now, though, when I just want to finish the damn book. Any damn book...

Ups & Downs

The statistics say that one in four people has some kind of mental illness. I have a feeling that if you just include writers in the equation, the figure would be a lot higher than that.

It's not too surprising, really, if you think about it. What other profession has your emotions riding high and low more often than a roller coaster? Actors, artists and musicians ride the same roller coaster, but it's unique to the more creative vocations.

When a WIP is going well, I am jubilant. This is the best thing I've ever written. I finish it off, send it out for critique, and it gets soundly ripped to shreds. Then all of a sudden it becomes a piece of crap, and how could I ever have thought what I was writing was any good? If it's had a particularly harsh flaying, I might go crawling into a corner thinking I'm a completely rubbish writer and I should stop pretending I'm a writer and focus on the day job instead.

However, maybe I get through all that, and eventually the book gets accepted somewhere. Celebrations ensue. But then after it gets published, the royalty statements arrive and it's not selling. Or there aren't any reviews. Since a lot of online reviewers will only publish favourable reviews, not getting reviews is amost as bad as getting an unfavourable review - since I then start to assume no reviews means everyone hates the book. And I'm depressed again.

Then suddenly something appears online, out of the blue, from someone saying how much they enjoyed reading my work, and I'm riding high once more.

Sometimes I feel I'm on the brink of something really exciting. Life-changing exciting. Other times I feel as a writer I'm making barely a ripple in an enormous pond, and really no one will notice or care if I remove myself completely.

Even the most well-balanced person can't help but be affected by all these constant ups and downs. No wonder so many writers feel like they're going a bit mad.

But. Here's the thing. We're all on the same roller coaster. Every single writer I know, without exception, from the beginner writer to the one with several best-selling novels under their belt, goes through the same ups and downs.

All you can do when the ride gets rough is hold on tight and wait for the calmer bit to come along. Because it invariably will, and when it does, you are reminded why it's all worth it.

A Farewell and a NaNoWriMo Update

I don't consider myself an empath, but something happened recently that's made me wonder.

For those of you who read my last blog post here, I indicated I'd given up writing. That also included my NaNoWriMo WIP. What I neglected to mention was the overwhelming sense of grief and loss I felt Monday and Tuesday, a pain so acute I seriously considered slashing my wrists and ending it all.

Wednesday I was fine. Whatever miasma of despair had lingered over me had lifted. Gone. Like it never existed.

But then came the rumors on Facebook someone I knew had committed suicide that past Monday. Yes, the same Monday. November 14. Sadly, the rumor was confirmed by a newspaper obituary.

While I knew this person, I didn't know him well enough to call him a friend, but he was a friend to many of my other friends. This is not a slight at him. I live in a different area of town than they do, so they hung out together more. But when I did meet him, I found him to be funny, kind, and a nice guy. Cliched but true.

Last night I attended a memorial to celebrate his life. The turnout was remarkable, easily a hundred people had come to pay their respects. The service ended up being moved from the chapel to the sanctuary.

I wonder now if my depression those two days had not been a psychic response to his death, something I was unaware of at the time and thus unable to control. I felt a similar grief when my grandmother died, but had no idea until I came home and my husband told me.

Again, I'm not claiming to be an empath. Only questioning a possibility.

Anyway, I'm back to writing. Finished my vampire Victorian paranormal mystery NaNo project this past Sunday. I've been thinking of returning to a neglected short novel and writing a couple of Christmas stories to post free online.

Because, when I think about it, I know he would want me to be the best damn writer I could be.

RIP.

The Angst of the Writer

I was re-reading some of my old short stories the other day. During the 1990s, I had reasonable success in getting some of them published. The small press was booming in the UK in those days, and there were a lot of markets for short horror fiction. Most of them were 'semi pro' magazines - paying half a pence a word if you were lucky, and a free copy of the magazine if you weren't. But still, if you were a horror writer there were a lot of places to submit your work.

A lot of the stories I had published were early works - things I wrote in my late teens and early twenties. Only when I look back in retrospect do I realise how horribly depressing they were.

The thing is, though, I've always used writing as a way of working through my issues. And I guess I've had a lot of issues. Certain themes recurred frequently in my writing: betrayal; loss; loneliness; isolation; a fatalistic outlook that we're all doomed to die miserable and alone. A lot of my early horror is more about psychological despair than a Big Bad - and it almost always ends with someone dying in pain and alone.

There are times when I sink into what feels like a deep dark pit, often for no apparent reason, and I wallow there a while. Sometimes it's days, sometimes it's weeks. During these times I get out of bed and carry on with my life but I often feel like I'm just going through the motions. And I try to avoid blogging at these times, because no one likes a whinger and it's not fair to inflict my misery on everyone else. The thing is, though, these feelings always pass, usually disappearing as quickly as they come. So I just ride it out and listen to Muse very loudly on my MP3 player until I feel like I've crawled out of the pit.

Sometimes I think writing is my salvation, because I've always used it to try and deal with these feelings. My grandmother, disapproving of what I wrote, used to ask me why I couldn't write any "happy" stories. I replied that there was no point. Happy feelings I want to hold onto. It's the feelings of misery and despair I try to exorcise, and that's why they end up in my stories.

The writing has kept me sane. If I didn't have it to help me work through these feelings of despair, I probably would have thrown myself under a bus years ago. On the other hand, if I didn't have these angsty periods I probably wouldn't be a writer, since just about all writers I know also experience these feelings, to a greater or lesser degree.

Is it better to have the angst and be a writer, or be completely sane and not be? That's an impossible question to answer, because I've never known life as anything other than an angsty writer.

On a slightly more positive note, I think I've worked through many of my issues, and that might be why I don't write such depressing short stories anymore. There's still plenty of death and despair in my writing, but my recently-published novels have at least featured some semblance of a happy ending in the sense that the main characters work through their issues and move on. It's one thing to be angsty when you're 18. It's another to still be angsty at 40. There are some lessons about life that should have been learned by the time you enter your fourth decade, and one of them is that there are some things you just have to let go.

"Rules" of Engagement

Like many writers, I have common enemies I regularly engage in combat with. More often than not they’re Depression and Envy.

Oh, no, you may be thinking as you roll your eyes. Not another whiny, woe-is-me, I’m-a-failure-as-a-writer self-pitying rant.

It’s okay. Really. Because that’s not what this post is about.

What I want to explore is acknowledging such feelings without letting them control us and even look at how they can affect us in a positive manner.

Why are writers (and other creative types) more prone to major depression and/or bipolar disorder?  This article, originally published in Psychology Today (April 1987) explores the correlation between major depression/bipolar disorder and creativity, especially when it comes to writers.

http://www.pendulum.org/articles/articles_bipolar_troubled.html

Many writers living with depression or bipolar disorder live in silence, believing they’ll be ostracized by their friends, family, perhaps even readers. But they should realize they’re not alone. Well-known writers who dealt with or are believed to have dealt with depression or bipolar disorder include Sylvia Path, Virginia Woolf, Jack London, T. S. Eliot, William Faulkner, Raymond Chandler and Agatha Christie, among others.

What’s the point of my post? This. Those of us who deal with depression or bipolar disorder need to acknowledge this is who we are. Too often we’re expected to curtail our emotions. Get a rejection letter? Don’t be upset or depressed. Friend land an agent and a three-book deal while you’re only garnering rejection slips? Don’t be envious.

But while taking the higher road is a noble idea, it’s not always realistic. Writers run the gamut of emotions from euphoric to depressive. We’re passionate about what we write, it’s who we are. And so we’re probably going to have these strong emotions which can affect how we react to situations, depending on our circumstances.

It’s when we allow jealousy and depression to rule us that we lose sight of who we are as writers, as creative people.

I may complain on Twitter about feeling like a writing failure. But those who know me know there’s one adage I always adhere to:

NEVER GIVE IN. NEVER GIVE UP.

No matter what, I fight back. Friend who got that three-book deal? Sure, I’ll admit to being envious. But don’t think for one moment I’m not happy for her. My jealousy is merely self-criticism. In other words, a part of me faults myself for not submitting work that could possibly lead to a similar deal. But instead of admitting that initially, I allowed envy to alter my perception.

What’s so positive about jealousy and depression? For me, they drive me to work harder to improve my writing. Complacency isn’t allowed. They also force me to acknowledge I’m not perfect and I’ll have those moments of negative thinking.

Am I alone? I don’t think so. But perhaps it’s easier for people to deny the truth about themselves rather than admit to what are perceived by many as faults.

Faults or merely human nature? Depends on your POV. But I urge you to keep an open mind even if you don’t believe you have a jealous bone in your body. :-)

When you lose your groove

I’m not going to lie about it. I lose my groove during winter. Granted there’s a part of me that absolutely loves the cold season. Who doesn’t like a nice, toasty warm bed, preferably with a hot man in it to lie in on the weekends? Especially with rain drumming down on a tin roof.

Those are dreams. I rarely if ever get to lie in and I’m seriously fiending after some sunshine. Perhaps what gets me down the most is leaving and arriving home in the dark.

But I slow down, am prone to depression. Problems seem insurmountable. Yeah, yeah, I can already hear some choice comments centred around Goths supposedly loving the dark, but I *do* need to feel the sun on my face a little. The only consolation I have at the moment is the beautiful sunrises I see while I wait for the train at Kalk Bay Station. I’m sure there are few as lovely as this station, which is next to a harbour in False Bay. I’ve watched dolphins, Cape fur seals and southern right whales cavorting. Massive flocks of cormorants heading south to feed in great V-shaped clouds, so close I can hear their wings slice through the air. That peculiar gulping cry of the kelp gull sends shivers down my spine as I breathe in salt-sweet air.

But I’ve lost my groove. I admit it freely. I just don’t have the energy to go beyond the call of duty like I normally do. My friends know what I’m talking about. I don’t feel like I’m getting anything done; just don’t have the energy to push myself harder.

It’s an effort to create, an effort to dash through those pages of edits. God forbid actually *write* new words.

You know what? I’m not going to beat myself up about this. I’ll work when and where I can. I’ll look after my health. I’ll eat well. Get enough rest. There are days when simple pleasures, like meeting friends for tea during lunch are a better option than trying to force the words.

I’m letting my muse recharge. I’m hibernating. I’m gestating ideas. Because by the time we’ve passed Longest Night and the days start warming and growing longer, I know I’ll have rekindled that magic that gives me a reason to keep writing.

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