Writing is Hard

But it gets easier (and then hard again probably)

This time last year, I was down in the trenches of a second draft of my memoir and deeply jealous of another writer who I was certain was about to get a book deal.

“I’m pretty sure she is going to announce it any day…and I will have a mental breakdown when she does,” I said, in tears, to my boyfriend, who looked at me with the kind of bewilderment and concern that you give a dog who has begun limping around on three legs.

I was getting up early to write before work every day and obsessively checking Publisher’s Weekly for news of a forthcoming book from my writing nemisis.

I was pushing myself because I had signed up for a writing conference in May where I planned to pitch my book to agents. This was a self-imposed deadline that I hoped would motivate me to make literary breakthroughs, but I was getting nowhere. And as the winter crept on, I hit a wall of creativity.

Eventually, I let my Publisher’s Weekly subscription expire, vowing for the millionth time to stop letting my life be consumed by secret, one-sided competitions. I let the writing conference be a learning experience, instead of a defining moment. I took a creative writing class and worked my way through the Artist’s Way (slowly and imperfectly!)

And I kept working on the draft, with less pressure and more flow. In the spring, I started trying to write 1,000 words a day. Which is sometimes easy, and sometimes impossible. Some days, I would get to 500 words and call it good, others, only 300. Some days I still didn’t write at all. But it jogged me out of the loop I had fallen into over the winter, of endlessly editing the same three chapters over and over, and never making the rest of the draft exist.

The story that I had held in my brain for so long began to appear on the page, the scenes and details that I had always told myself I would “get to later,” were finally gotten to.

Then, just a few weeks ago, I finished it.

It was right before I was scheduled to join a video call with two long distances friends. I had about twenty minutes to spare and I decided to write as much as I could. About twenty-five minutes later I realized I was late for my call and that I had somehow reached the end of what I wanted to say.

This can’t be right, I thought. This is too anti-climactic. Surely this is supposed to be a Whole Thing.

I didn’t have time to think about it then, but when I returned to the draft later I found myself at a loss for what else to do, except start editing. I don’t know exactly what constitutes a “complete” draft, but I imagine that a desire to start editing is part of it.

They say that a first draft is just to make the thing exist. You won’t ever have the chance to make it good if you don’t make it exist first.

It doesn’t matter that this draft is too long and rambly, that it focuses too much on the things that happened, instead of drawing conclusions about what they meant and how they changed me. It’s ok that there are gaps still (and there are gaps still).

There are sections that read:

“Yeah, we were talking about XXXXX and I said “why XXXXX?” and everyone looked at each other and shifted in their seats.”
(come back to this and try to remember what he said in that convo)

But I realized that if I kept trying to fill in every little hole, to find all the perfect words to describe images I couldn’t quite refocus yet, then I would never manage to write down words about the images that were in focus. It’s ok that it is still clunky, and melodramatic, and dull right now…because it EXISTS.

What a difference a year can make.

(And if you are wondering whether that other writer ever announced a book deal—she did not. But I really have to stop relying on other people NOT getting what I want to stave off complete mental collapse, don’t you think?)

This Substack—with its now 67?! subscribers—has evolved since I created it last year as a way to share updates about my memoir-in-progress. At first, I focused my writing on leaving the Evangelical church and getting divorced, which is the backdrop of said memoir. But some wellspring of hope and humor in me balked at “niching down” on something so fucking heavy.

This has since become a broader outlet for stories from my life, which are often reflections on love, identity, and self-devotion. I plan to keep writing and sharing those stories here.

However—because I am trying to get better at not splitting my energy between multiple endeavors—at the end of the year I will be taking a break from regular posting for the next three-ish months while I focus on revising this newly finished draft. As much as I want to be able to do it all, I can’t (UGH).

I also have some exciting writing news that I will be sharing more on in the spring when the details are finalized! So, stay tuned :)

Ok LOVE YOU bye for now!