Tuesday, 27 January 2015

Losing Faith

Yesterday, I lost faith.  Over three years into the writing of my novel, and it all felt useless.  Why was I doing it?  Would it ever amount to anything?  Why waste my time?

Early on, I lost faith every couple of minutes.  Who was I to write a novel?  What did I know about that?  Did I have anything worthwhile to say?  Would anything I wrote be worth some poor reader spending his precious time on it?  (I must confess, as I write these questions, I still feel that way sometimes.  Then I try to put all the negativity away and begin again.)

I think I was having a bad day yesterday.  I cut my morning walk short, because I didn't feel up to doing it.  All I wanted was get home, sit down, and rest a bit.  And, even once I got home, I felt out of sorts.  I wasn't myself, I knew that for sure, because, among other things, I didn't want to sit down to write.  I didn't see the point.  Taking the day off sounded more pleasant than trying to make sense out of all the words I'd written.  Hell, maybe I'd take the whole week off. 

Then I went to the mailbox, where I found the February 2015 edition of Writer's Digest.  I opened to the table of contents and read this, about an interview with Garth Stein (whom I'd never heard of):  "Six years later, with his long-awaited follow-up, A Sudden Light, Garth Stein reminds us what's at the root of any book worth reading: A lot of hard work, and a heck of a good story [p. 3]."

Already, I felt insecure about my novel.  Then I read Garth Stein talk about needing to tell "a heck of a good story," and I began to wonder if that's what I was doing.  After I'd spent so much time and effort on my novel, was I telling a heck of a good story?  Would it be a story anyone else would be interested in, or would I end up writing it just for me?  Not a good feeling.  Not at all.

Today, I felt much better, as I continued work on edits of chapters 5, 9, and 14.  The writing went well.  I felt like I was doing something worthwhile, like my time and effort were well spent.  I considered myself back on track, and that's always a good place to be.

As writers, we lose faith on our projects constantly.  When you shoot that arrow in the dark, all you have is faith that it'll hit the bull's eye.  But you never know for sure.  Sometimes, all you have is faith–not just in writing, but in life. 

Faith is a powerful thing.  And, if you give yourself over to it completely, I have to believe anything is possible.  I'm going on that assumption as I continue to write my novel.  As I know I have at least a year or two more of work on it before it's finished.  

Take it one writing session at a time.  Never second guess yourself.  Believe.  And when you lose faith, know it won't last forever.

Who better to invest faith in than you?      

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