Self doubt....

I do like to share good music. So before I get into this weeks blog, I want to make sure I share a song that has been on repeat since February. There are songs I like musically or lyrically and this song has the beauty of appealing on both levels. It's a song called Southern Sun by a group called Boy and Bear. Anyway, I am rambling when really I should get on with the blog: There is a purpose behind utilising this song in my introduction and it is the opening lines:

In all you've seen
Was it that came down on me that night
A conjuring, I held on to that moment and lie
Just to make it alive

I've been struggling this week; predominantly I have had writers block, I am having a week where I keep reading the last section I have written and then thinking 'this is no good, nobody is going to want to read it and really the only person this story matters to is me.' I am going through a phase of self doubt; which is pretty frustrating when you have written just over 80,000 words, and suddenly all those hours of writing seem to be a bit pointless.

My friend Tilly eloquently said that writing is a very personal thing to share and that you are very brave if you embark on that journey. I have made the realisation that I have laid out my ideas for other people to read, I am starting to get a little paranoid that one day people will read my book and judge me. Although the book is fiction, you do share emotions and you tap into your own memory in an attempt to access your senses and how things felt. Although writing is creative, you take a seed of experience and let it grow into something you hope others enjoy and relate to.

The opening line to this song always makes me think of the conjuring of an idea, taking some moments and then breathing life into it. I was hoping to write something that takes the reader on a journey and that they can relate to parts of the story. So my writing process is very much to think about the people reading the story and whether they will like it.

I like real situations and I like real stories based around people that bare all and really put themselves out there for great reward. Living and loving is about risk, you can live safely and have a good life or you can take risks and reap great rewards. My writers block and self doubt is coming from a place of thinking that I am not writing about something that is real. It is fiction, so it's not meant to be real but it needs to come from a place that is. My ideas were starting to feel like they were based upon false sensory information and didn't feel as powerful or as poignant as they once did.

This was starting to get me down but today I have had a revelation (well, I wouldn't go that far but it has inspired me to blog again and also to return to editing the book). The story did feel powerful and poignant when I initially had the idea 12 years ago. The idea has kept me motivated to keep attempting to write the story over and over again during the last 12 years, so although right now it feels pointless; it is a temporary state of mind. You can't turn a good idea on and off; just like you can't turn real emotions on and off, they will continue to grow, evolve and develop. The protagonist was unable to turn her emotions off, she thought she knew how and she thought she had life all figured out but then love showed her who was the boss.

So it is time to dust off my pen and in the words of the song.... "Come on, come on I'm ready now."