Hey writer, are you still caressing every consonant and vacuuming your vowels so your writing is perfect before you publish? Stop that! People are not looking for perfect prose, they want something that punches through the mist and grabs their heart.
Writing is not about the words on the page, it’s about spilling your life into someone else’s brain. Don’t sterilize your story! Don’t douse your fire just because you aren’t perfected.
As writers we grow into great, we don’t arrive there without traversing thousands of words that don’t quite hit the mark. But we have one awesome privilege, if we have guts enough to take it – we can share the journey.
Seriously, the best way to grow in your art is to practice on purpose, and practice in public. Don’t stress out because what you write today is not what you envisage. Today’s words on the page are footfalls toward tomorrow, and with each inky step you inch ever closer to something that will impact the world.
The Journey Is The Destination
Understand that when we make the journey our destination, we’ll always be in the right place, and now will always be the best time to share what we have discovered.
As a creative writer and content creator, your best course of action is always to act. Don’t hide or procrastinate.
Share your value lavishly and freely, understanding that the payoff is the opportunity to practice in public. Knowing that you are practicing lessens the grip of perfectionism. Instead of thinking you have to polish everything before you publish you accept that this is note sharing, scribbles in your ongoing and growing artistic history.
It is amazing how liberating this mindset can be, and how it guards against waiting for permission.
You don’t need anyone’s permission to produce. It’s you and you alone who carries the value God has placed inside, and you are the only one who can open the floodgates and pour it out.
You’ll always miss 100% of the shots you do not take, so shoot forth your arrows until something hits, and then keep shooting. Success or failure are beside the point, because our target is one we carry on the inside. It moves as we move.
The words may be wrestled from your mind or flow from your heart. The important thing is that they happen. Ideas may be strained to the page or they may gush like golden rivers. The key is to make sure today’s tracks are left in the snow, ready for tomorrow to follow.
Don’t hold your imagination precious. Don’t bury your light under a bucket. Climb, even if kicking and screaming, and set your own personal city on a hill. Let your little light shine today, and tomorrow and the next day, until all those inner streams blaze like a furnace that no one can ignore.
The key point, in conclusion…
Practice
in
public.
for all to see and criticise.
Practice
in
public.
Until it becomes easy to open.
Practice
in
public.
And watch as your words take wings, and find an audience you never expected.
