The confidence key
If you want creativity, you have to be able to unlock it
Dear Writer,
I’ve been thinking a lot about confidence with regard to writing lately. It’s like I have this well of creativity that only confidence can unlock, but how to unlock the confidence… that’s really the thing, isn’t it?
American culture has developed this toxic appreciation of being tough, and I’ve witnessed a lot of writers taking that to an extreme in pursuit of perfectionism, which is—as I’ve previously discussed—really just a desperate flight from vulnerability. We want our “friends” to beat the shit out of us so the general public won’t, and we often see both the beating, in the name of friendship and support, and the ability to take said beating as some kind of badge of honor.
A while back, on a podcast, I talked about realizing the difference between “tough” and “strong.” Tough is the ability to take a beating and keep going; strong is creating an environment in which you don’t get beaten. I had always thought of myself as a strong person, but I realized that in reality, I wasn’t strong; I was tough. I had taken a lot of beatings and kept on going, but it was nothing to be particularly proud of, because it was wholly unnecesary.
Upon that realization, I worked to develop my strength so I wouldn’t have to rely on my toughness to survive. I started setting boundaries (which Prentis Hemphill defines as “the distance at which I can love both you and me simultaneously,” a definition which lights up my brain) and I stopped inviting people to beat the shit out of me to test how much I can take.
As I (finally) get back into writing full-time, I’m wondering how this switch in perspective might affect my confidence.
I think the value of the “beat the shit out of me” mindset for writers is highly specious, and as author Felicia Rose Chavez says in The Anti-Racist Writing Workshop: How to Decolonize the Creative Classroom, it has a particularly destructive and silencing effect on writers from marginalized backgrounds, who are already taking a beating in other areas. I’m not gonna rephrase Chavez’s illuminating arguments here, because it’s only part of what I’m talking about here, but I will give you the link again, because I think every writer (and especially anyone teaching writing workshops) can benefit from that book: The Anti-Racist Writing Workshop: How to Decolonize the Creative Classroom.
Chavez’s book was the first time I’d heard the “beat the shit out of me” critiquing model questioned, but because I was hearing it in the context of race, I tucked it under the “stop doing harm” part of my brain, rather than the “hey, this is bad for everyone” part of my brain. So while I believe Chavez’s story, and I agree with her conclusions, those are hers to talk about. I’m just saying….
The Anti-Racist Writing Workshop: How to Decolonize the Creative Classroom
But back to the “this is bad for everyone” part, and how the brutality-for-your-own-good model is counter-productive to creativity:
Creativity requires confidence. I would argue that most cases of writers’ block are not a “block” so much as in a person can’t write, but a crisis of confidence, as in, they cannot access their creativity because they don’t have the confidence key to unlock it. Part of what makes Elizabeth Gilbert’s externalizing and anthropomorphizing of “genius” such… well… genius… is that it takes our creativity out of our personal identity, thus making it much more resilient to crises of personal confidence.
Writer’s block often happens because writers participated in a workshop1 or worked with a well-meaning critique partner friend who beat the shit out of them “for their own good,” and all it did was kill their confidence, which meant that the door to their creativity was locked. And hey… I’ve been that friend, who was asked to wield the bat and I wielded it hard, out of love. I thought I was helping.
I was not.
Just because something is done with love doesn’t mean it’s actually good for anyone. It wasn’t good for me to critique in that manner, and it wasn’t good for me to receive critique in that manner.
All that said… I mean, when you write something, you want to know what needs fixing… right?
Absolutely. I’m not saying don’t get the feedback. I’m saying that those giving the feedback need to bolster strengths first, and then shore up weaknesses, while also realizing that what you as a critiquer see as weaknesses might not be weaknesses at all.
Also, I feel it’s important to let y’all know that I’ve violated every single one of my new rules for both writers and critiques.
Every. Single. One.
I’m not hypocritical; I’m evolving.
For writers looking for feedback:
When you send your work out, ask specifically for what kind of critique you want. (And remember that “What’s your favorite part?” is an absolutely fair request in any critique, and WYFP is the ONLY critique you should be asking for while you’re still drafting.) “I’m concerned about the pacing in the first act,” is a nice, specific thing to ask about. “I think I might have a motivation problem with my protagonist,” is another great option. You can ask for as much specific feedback as you want; that’s fine.
You know what’s not specific? “Beat the shit out of me.”
But what about the stuff that’s broken that you don’t know to ask about? Isn’t the very purpose of a critique to find out about things that you didn’t see because you were too close to the work?
Yes. Yes, it is. And that’s where you copy-paste the following and send it to your critique partner along with your request.
For critiquers giving feedback:
Your job as a critique partner is to help your writer improve their work, and you do that by doing no harm to their confidence.
This does not mean saying everything is perfect when it’s not; this means that you think carefully and consciously about every bit of feedback you provide, and you always keep in mind that you might be wrong.
Step One: The one thing that most writers are least aware of are their strengths, so that’s what you lead with. Genuinely. There is no writer out there, no matter how green, who doesn’t have something going for them. Your number one job is to find all the strengths and make sure your writer knows about them.
Step Two: When you see something that seems off, ask yourself first if it’s a craft problem or a magic problem.
(If you’re not sure of the difference, you can listen to this or read this.)
If it’s a craft problem, you’re on pretty solid ground. Craft—things like protagonist motivation, or structural pacing issues—are pretty nuts and bolts. You can say, “I don’t see a clear central narrative conflict until pretty late in the first act,” and that’s helpful. What you don’t want to say is, “I don’t give a damn about any of this until page 57.” Do the work. If something is hitting you wrong, figure out why before you give your response.
Also, don’t suggest a fix unless your writer has specifically asked you for a suggestion to help them out of that problem. Don’t hop into anyone’s sandbox until you’ve been invited in, and a critique request is not an invitation into the sandbox.
If it’s a magic problem, that’s much more subjective. Anything that falls into “magic” territory (tone, humor, setting, genre) you want to put under the category of “not working for me.” Let them know, but with the caveat that maybe you just don’t get it. Because you know what? Maybe you don’t.
And that’s okay.
Step Three: Examine your responses. Are you angry at some point in the story? That’s on you. If one of the characters makes you want to smack them in the head, definitely examine that, because it will tell you valuable things about where you are emotionally. But if you decide to tell your writer about it, you don’t frame it as, “I hate this character, they’re such an asshole, change everything about them.” You know how in a relationship you’re supposed to use “I feel” language? This is where you can also employ that skill. “When Catherine told Joel that she thought he was a bad father, I had a strong emotional response to that. I felt really angry with her. I don’t know if that’s the response you’re looking to evoke, so I thought I’d let you know, but it might just be me.”
Generally, I’m not a huge fan of qualifying language but because writing feedback is such vulnerable territory for your writer, I give it a pass in this specific situation.
Also, don’t write your critique if you’re still feeling emotions evoked from the piece. Fiction is supposed to make you feel, but emotions can compromise the usefulness of your response. You can take notes while you’re emotional, fine. But don’t write anything intended to be read by your writer until the emotion has abated.
Step Four: Give it a day or two, then review your response one more time before you send it along. Open with strengths, close with your favorite part, and write everything out in between with intent to provide honest feedback while protecting confidence. The stronger your writer’s confidence, the better equipped they will be to rock a second draft.
And that’s the goal, right?
Everything,
L
Or read their own reviews; I’ll talk about why I think creative people should look at reviews the way the medical establishment looks at smoking unfiltered cigarettes at some future date.