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Mar. 30th, 2004

  • 9:40 AM
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[info]the_red_shoes on editing (the external rather than the internal sort)

[info]kijjohnson on writerly self-sabotage ("If I only had the perfect desk--")

[info]the_red_shoes on kijjohnson on writerly self-sabotage.

Actually, what they're talking about is not so much writerly self-sabotage (that would be my term, and it's a little broad for the topic at hand) as what John Varley (In his esssay/joke/short story "The Unprocessed Word") calls Type A and Type B writers. Type A writers will starve to death or possibly die of a deep-vein thrombosis because they forget to get out of their chairs for weeks on end while writing. (I'm a Type A). Type Bs, in which group Varley classes himself, would rather do anything except write, or they need certain specific situations in which to write.

In an odd connection of username to reality, writing, for me, can be a little like the red shoes. (Cue Kate Bush). Sometimes I can't stop even when I should. (Although I'm training myself to be better about that.) I was in a similar situation to redredshoes about two and a half years ago, and when I was all-but-laid-off-from-my-previously-full-time-job, I moped around the house for about a month and then I got so incredibly bored that I started writing obsessively. Every second that I wasn't actively involved in doing something else.

That ain't healthy either.

The corrective process is the same for both of us, I think. Set rules, set limits, and stick to them.
  • Mood:all about the emmy lou
  • Music:"Red Dirt Girl" by Emmylou Harris

Comments

( 16 comments — Leave a comment )
[info]jandersoncoats wrote:
Mar. 30th, 2004 07:45 am (UTC)
when I was all-but-laid-off-from-my-previously-full-time-job, I moped around the house for about a month and then I got so incredibly bored that I started writing obsessively.

When I graduated from grad school, I thought I'd get a job right away, but here I am nine months later without even an interview.

In the beginning, I wrote, researched, or edited every second because if I didn't, I was a stupid housewife who might as well get a cell phone, a manicure and an SUV.

Now, I've mellowed. I have "office hours" for writing and don't get worked up if I don't get to five pages each day. It's actually more conducive to productivity than my old manic drive to fill every minute with writing in a lame attempt to give meaning to my days of unemployment. I've realized purpose comes from within. And it comes out on the page.
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[info]kimberlycreates wrote:
Mar. 30th, 2004 08:03 am (UTC)
Talk about seredipity. Maybe not entirely in the same vein as kij and redredshoes, but similar. I think I'm definitely Type B. I used to be Type A though. Of course I was an angsty teenager, writing bad poetry and worse prose, but I was writing. I would neglect everything to write - may father even threatened to burn all of my notebooks because my writing was interfering with school. I wrote poems in my school notebooks, on my text books, on my desks. Nothing could stop me. Now, nothing can start me. I wonder if all Type Bs have the same 'writer's block' that I have, or if mine is just one of the many ways we stop ourselves from writing?
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[info]kriz1818 wrote:
Mar. 30th, 2004 08:19 am (UTC)
The desk thing ...
Unless I have an urgent deadline or happen to be temporarily inspired, I can't get anything productive done without clearing off my desk first. Two-foot-high stacks of books/papers/godknowswhat and piles of half-finished paperwork that should've been done last week just ruin my concentration.

As a result, I can sometimes avoid clearing off my desk *and* avoid writing at the same time! How's that for efficiency?
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[info]retrobabble wrote:
Mar. 30th, 2004 09:58 am (UTC)
"...writerly self-sabotage..."

'Tis a good term, and another aspect of the whole writer business. Looking over your shoulder, comparing your work, doubting anything you write is any good at all. I've seen people who write very well throw it all away, not from any outer influences, but from their own internal self-destruction.

Maybe they should apply one of your other sayings, "Suck it up." The first time you told me that, I nearly fell off my chair laughing. *g* I use it often.
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[info]harlequinaide wrote:
Mar. 30th, 2004 10:32 am (UTC)
I'm definitely Type B. I write from about midnight to four am, because I've done everything else I can possibly do. Of course, this often makes me question whether or not writing is something I should really spend my time on. Since I go nuts when I'm not writing, the answer is probably yes, but I figure I needed another neurosis, anyway.
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[info]rysmiel wrote:
Mar. 30th, 2004 11:21 am (UTC)
Consequent on living with people, and organising food a few days in advance, and having a nine-to-five-ish job, and being very much a night person, I end up writing mostly Friday nights, from when I get home into the small hours. I'm not quite so productive as I was when I lived on my own and ate food from packets, but I've been able to arrange for more time when something is being energetic, as for example now. Have been experimenting with Thursday and Friday nights, but tending to come to the end of a chapter and realise it's 4 am is easier to deal with when you can wake up the next day at noon rather than 8.15.

What I'd like is eighty days or so with no need to work, eat, or sleep.
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[info]faithhopetricks wrote:
Mar. 30th, 2004 03:41 pm (UTC)
and when I was all-but-laid-off-from-my-previously-full-time-job, I moped around the house for about a month and then I got so incredibly bored that I started writing obsessively

I suspect this is about to me, and it's probably not going to be all that healthy, either. The bizarre thing is I was a type A writer when young, very much like what [info]kimberlycreates describes -- writing to the exclusion of ALL else. (And this was back in the evil days of IBM typewriters when we didn't know about RSI or ergonomics, so you can imagine what that did to my wrists....) I'd love to have something other than the binge-purge method. I suspect setting rules, limits and schedules is indeed key. (Like it was to playing the piano when I was on fire about that in adolescence -- except I never bit the bullet and practiced 4 hours a day then, either. The shameful thing is I nearly got away with never practicing, too.)

Shoot, I can't find "The Unprocessed Word" online -- is it in a paperback collection?

moi
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[info]faithhopetricks wrote:
Mar. 30th, 2004 03:41 pm (UTC)
"about to BE me," argh....
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[info]matociquala wrote:
Mar. 30th, 2004 10:50 pm (UTC)
It's in Blue Champagne
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[info]faithhopetricks wrote:
Mar. 30th, 2004 11:30 pm (UTC)
Rock! I know shamefully little about Varley except The Persistence of Vision, which I read as a teenager, and "Press ENTER" (ditto). No, wait, I remember "Tango Charlie and Foxtrot Romeo," though not til I saw the title....((googles)) "frequent prominence of female characters, unusual in science fiction, and especially so among male authors of hard science fiction...." Hot damn! Why do I keep discovering soo many good writers as my reading time shrinks?
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[info]matociquala wrote:
Mar. 31st, 2004 06:55 am (UTC)
Why do I keep discovering soo many good writers as my reading time shrinks?

Finagle's Constant*. *g*

* "The perversity of the universe tends toward a maximum."
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[info]faithhopetricks wrote:
Mar. 31st, 2004 09:04 am (UTC)
Ha, that does explain a lot....
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[info]dendrophilous wrote:
Mar. 30th, 2004 08:25 pm (UTC)
I'm type B. Lately I have been writing at night, only after I have done everything else that could possibly be done. At one point I could write first thing in the morning, but now there are too many distractions then too.
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(Anonymous) wrote:
Mar. 30th, 2004 10:55 pm (UTC)
Oh sure
And it's good to know there are other type B writers out there like myself who obsess about their writer's space and unless the stars align properly can't, or won't, write. I fantasized about my writing desk, exulted over the big leather executive's chair and decorated the tablespace with mental fetishes and toys and CDs. It was supposed to be a way to prod myself into writing - a seperate space not connected to the internet and not within eyeline of the television, and I was to get up and write there every day. I was not a Writer (capital W) unless I was There (capital T).

Unfotunately for me (and the money I spent) it turns out I write best at work. Never mind the new policy of immediately firing me if they catch me on the laptop - for some reason I think most clearly there and write better there and it irritates me because i'm not supposed to write there. I'm supposed to write in the special space with the big leather chair. The one I put so much time and effort into. So, despite the fact that I'd probably get more done at work, I forbid myself to write at work, and on off days just end up watching tv.

Good to know it's not just me.
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[info]maggiemotley wrote:
Mar. 31st, 2004 12:26 am (UTC)
I'm Type B at home, Type A at work, unfortunately. At home I stall, avoid and otherwise cat-wax until there's no possible choice but sit down and do what I know I wanted to do all along.

At work, I go into productivity mode when I walk through the door. If they'd stop tossing that damned for-pay at me, I could write happily all day.

Tara
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[info]jenstclair wrote:
Mar. 31st, 2004 05:50 am (UTC)
Type C
Well, since I don't fit into either type, I'm claiming Type C.

I have a day job, full-time. I write on my lunch half hour, and very occasionally at work if it's really slow and I have everything caught up. I also write every night, averaging about 1500 words a day (on weekdays.) Which isn't a lot, but it's enough to get a half dozen or so novels written a year.

This is mostly possible because I write anywhere and everywhere. I have an AlphaSmart Dana, which has no games, internet, or distractions on it, and I've been writing long enough to know when I'm procrastinating to just sit down and do it.

When I was a young writer *g* I did write to exclusion of almost everything else, even homework. That's probably the reason why I still have trouble with fractions.

Last January, when I was between jobs for three weeks, I was also moving back home, so I didn't get as much done as I wanted to, but I wrote. With everything I have on my plate at the moment, not writing is really not an option. Which is okay with me. :)
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( 16 comments — Leave a comment )

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