The Solitariness of Writing
I have a confession – I never really saw the point in involving anyone else in my writing process, I just didn’t get it. I was happy to sit down and work in a world of my own imagining. I read a good deal from published authors and found just enough authors that didn’t have writing groups that I felt justified in my desire to keep to myself.
Honestly my beef was never in showing my work to someone else and getting criticism, it was in sharing my ideas with someone that might not have my best interests at heart. (Did I mention that I’m perhaps a touch cynical?) Then came my friend Lisa…
Lisa and I met through a mutual friend right before she was moving out of State, but we shared the bond of books and thanks to Facebook, we kept in touch quite a good bit. I was struggling with my writing, scribbling away in my journal, but not getting any really good momentum. Lisa had joined a writing group where she was living and I confess I was a little jealous. She was so positive about the experience and it was the first time I got the sense that I might be missing out on something.
It was probably a full year later before Lisa and I started working together. I was getting ready to enter a writing contest and I really needed someone to read and review my entry, so I asked her if she would look it over for me.
The long and short of it is that I didn’t enter the contest (I needed a full manuscript behind it, which I didn’t have) but I still won – Lisa and I worked really well together and I finally *got* why people would want to be involved in a writing group.
The relationship with Lisa challenges me to answer the “why” questions and encourages me to be ready to answer “what happens next.” She points out those place where I have used a wrong word, but a real word. (My favorite trick, like using “loose” when I mean “lose.”) I’ve made more progress working with Lisa for two weeks than I have on my own for the past two years.
Of course, I’ve also realized I have alot of work left to do!
2 Responses to “The Solitariness of Writing”
there’s no “like” button. You didn’t tell me you started blogging again.
It’s okay. Hope you don’t mind I found you anyways 
LOL! I thought I had told you about this blog – I massacred it because it had turned into non-stop Tumblr feed, and really I only need one Tumblr, LOL!
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