Yelling into the Abyss: on Writer's Insecurity

Photo by Adrian Jozefowicz from Pexels

"If a tree falls in the forest but no-one is around to hear it, does it make a sound?"

An age-old quote, with an almost cheesy tinge to it to most who hear it. Interpreted in thousands of different ways. The classical question it raises is whether things exist only when they are perceived. But a much more important question is whether things that happen without a witness truly have meaning. Who cares about a random unknown tree falling in god-knows-where? If it truly was important, more people would care about it. Thus the quote above is important also regarding the meaning and significance of events. And so, we get to writing.

Lately I've been feeling somewhat insecure on my own writing, which has affected on the pace - and somewhat the quality - of the work that I've been producing. Of course this is also the sum of many events. I recently switched to another POV in my novel from my main character. My MC is a character I feel largely confident writing, because she is a young woman just like I am, facing the same kinds of issues: relationships, insecurity, rebellion and so on. My current POV character however is quite different. He is an enigmatic and largely secretive character who rarely reveals his inner thoughts and mostly focuses on larger patterns and events happening in the world than his insignificant little problems. Such a character considers his every thought and movement very carefully and thus is much slower to write. I have struggled somewhat with this POV and finding the "individual voice" for this character without him sounding like an impersonal Obi Wane Kenobi-type wise teacher. He is definitely the character that I will be most focusing on during the re-writes, since his character arc has changed the most during my writing process.

Now, back to insecurity. Everyone, even most experts feel insecure at times. Recently I read an online post on Neil Armstrong who had been struggling on imposter syndrome - feeling like an outsider among experts or talented people due to a perceived meagerness of one's own talent. We are often blind to the fact on how good we are in many things, simply because we do not perceive them as an outsider. Writers especially struggle on this. We know everything that is happening in our text which is why it might seem bland or even boring to ourselves. An outsider, however, will think very differently. They do not share the experiences and knowledge that you, as a writer have. These experiences or feelings of insecurity also have the tendency of feeding themselves and often what we believe will become eventually the reality in our minds if we cannot convince ourselves otherwise.

How is the tree linked to all of this? Here we come back to perception. Critique is essential for a writer, especially constructive one. This is because through critique it is that a writer starts to feel significant - thus, to exist. If all critique that a writer gets is only likes / dislikes without further comments, or worse - no critique at all, they will start to feel insignificant. They will feel that their work is so boring that no-one has anything to say about it. Perhaps they did not even read the thing at all but dropped it on the first page. 

"If I write something but no-one reads it, does it have any significance at all?"

This has somewhat been an issue for me recently too. I've sent my story out for many friends to read during the summer, but so far I have received little to no comments. Of course I know that most of my friends are busy or slow readers, or they prefer not to read electronic text. Still, the lack of comments has made me feel insecure and doubt whether I am doing this all in vain. I've sacrificed such a huge chunk of time for this project. Imagine spending several months or years with a project, and once you're done, no-one has the interest to even look at it. This poses the question whether projects or the things we work on only have meaning when someone else gives them meaning. Is their meaning as themselves insignificant? Are they only wasted time? On times like these most start comparing their work to the work of others and even further feeding their insecurity. My text is boring, uninteresting, meaningless. Is there any reason to even try?

On situations like these I try to remind myself of three things:

1. Even experts feel imposter syndrome.
2. Everything has a worth in itself. Things cannot be valued solely economically or based on their effect on society.
3. Everyone has a story to tell. Only I can tell mine.

If even Neil Armstrong, the first man on the moon has felt insecure despite all he has accomplished, anyone can. Insecurity is an integral part of humanity and builds character. It challenges us to ponder on important questions and to not be so hard on ourselves.

The value of things is not always visible to the outside. Especially in the capitalistic society of today we often value our work through numerics. How many hours was spent on this work? How much profit has is generated? How many people have been affected by it? These are important numbers, but they are not the whole worth of the work itself. Everything has hidden value. The "horrible" drawing you drew yesterday - although you might hate it, drawing it helped you to channel your anxiety instead of hurting yourself or the people you care about. The "boring" novel you wrote helped you to understand yourself, to manage your time, and to plan better. The time you wasted on doing this and that unimportant tinkering was actually important to you because it meant something to you personally. Art and self-expression are key characteristics of being human and we should focus more on the act of self-expression itself than the outcome it generates. Art is not only property of experts but of every human being. Like everything that happens in the world, success is not only hard work or skill, but also luck. Sometimes someone makes a breakthrough, sometimes someone doesn't. It can simply come down to the people you've randomly met on the streets or an individual discussion you had on an online message board. Sometimes the effects of our work are not visible to us at all: someone who reads / sees your work might think of it as one of their favorites but never share their feelings to anyone, or the repercussions will not be evident until years and years of the actual work.

No-one can tell your story the way you can. It may feel unoriginal, boring, bland, whatever. Still, it is your story. Something you have personally poured your heart and soul into. It is work, a passion. Much like a doctor or scientist may take pride in their work despite the results, writers should take pride in their writing. We should not constantly compare ourselves to others, since no story in the world is completely original. Every story is based on another, and even if it is a popular, over-used work, they may still break through. The Witcher saga is a re-telling of old European and Slavic fairy-tales. The Mortal Instruments by Cassandra Clare is a crazy mash-up of a Harry Potter fanfic, the Bible and basically every fairy-tale known to man. Heck, even 50 Shades of Gray was originally a Twilight fanfiction. The thing these works have in common despite their unoriginal origins is that they retold an old story in a new way. We are constantly drawn towards old stories and are looking for new ways to read them. Although what you are writing might have much in common with previous works it most definitely has something personal that might just be the most important thing of all.

And above all we should always keep on trying despite the insecurity. Instead of letting it stop us we should push through. Keep writing that bad novel. Keep drawing those embarassing comics. Keep singing out of tune. You will develop and although you may not gain the recognition you wish for you must remember how important this work has been for you and how it has made you feel. Everything we do has some meaning, although it might be hidden from us.