“Nobody tells this to people who are beginners, I wish someone told me. All of us who do creative work, we get into it because we have good taste. But there is this gap. For the first couple years you make stuff, it’s just not that good. It’s trying to be good, it has potential, but it’s not. But your taste, the thing that got you into the game, is still killer. And your taste is why your work disappoints you. A lot of people never get past this phase, they quit. Most people I know who do interesting, creative work went through years of this. We know our work doesn’t have this special thing that we want it to have. We all go through this. And if you are just starting out or you are still in this phase, you gotta know its normal and the most important thing you can do is do a lot of work. Put yourself on a deadline so that every week you will finish one story. It is only by going through a volume of work that you will close that gap, and your work will be as good as your ambitions. And I took longer to figure out how to do this than anyone I’ve ever met. It’s gonna take awhile. It’s normal to take awhile. You’ve just gotta fight your way through.”
I love this quote from Ira Glass about creating (see video below). I am in this place about which he speaks. I have a book that people told me I was writing. It is mostly written. Now I could leave it there and quit, or go deeper and let it become something else. Maybe it will become something helpful to others. Maybe it won’t. Maybe it will entertain. I hope it does more than that. Maybe no one will read it. Whatever happens with the final product, I will have discovered something deeper within myself.
I know, from other experiences in my life, that I am not a quitter. I have always been able to find that part within me that can complete whatever I set out to complete. Or, if I choose to be done before completing, then I chose from a place of realizing that that particular pursuit was not taking me in the direction I truly wanted to go. I have chosen to change directions before. I thought I would be one of those music educators that spent their entire career teaching in public schools, receive the retirement plan and move on to do more work in the field. I chose to change that direction. I thought that I would be growing old with the man that I married and had two beautiful daughters with. Changed that direction, too. I know I can always change direction which somehow makes me feel like I can keep with something a little bit longer–past that place of not quite good enough.
As far as the creation of this book, I am not done exploring the depths of this thing called writing. I will use the experience of transforming my life through cancer as a way to clarify my message to the world. There were times during that healing journey through cancer when I was ready to quit. But that meant quitting life. Nope, I didn’t choose to quit that. I had my moments as a mom, especially now as a single mom of teenagers with challenges, when I thought I didn’t have anything else to give. Nope, not going to quit that ever. There were times while going through college when I thought I didn’t have it in me to complete the program and get a degree. I didn’t quit. And times when I was getting my teaching credential that I thought maybe that wasn’t the career for me. I didn’t quit that either (until 25 years later). I’m glad I chose to continue on with life, to continue on with being a mom, and to continue on with my pursuits.
Now I have the opportunity to go beyond this place of feeling like my work isn’t all that good. And do it until it is. Are you creating something? Have you gotten to that place of which Ira Glass speaks? What are you choosing? Tell me about it in the comments.
If you haven’t seen the video, you can watch it Here
