The Greatest Thing about Total Self-Doubt, is Not Caring at All if You Fail

I sit in an empty lounge, hunched over a small notebook, finishing off a glass of the driest wine I have ever had, and facing that timeless struggle.

I've got two hundred or so pages of my first attempt at a novel sitting next to me. Staring me down. It's been there for the better part of this year, stagnant and hopeless. It doesn't know what it is, and neither do I. I could finish it. I could whip up another couple hundred pages, whittle it down to a cool two-fifty, and call it a day. I could.

But I don't.

Instead, I write entry after entry here, in my online toilet. Senseless musings of an ill-informed bottom rung twenty-nothing.

Last year, I wrote short story after short story. Endless amounts of fictional universe seemed to stream out of me at will. Now, I drip them out, only to have to mix them into my real life. Change some names, some places. Add a dash of fantasy and hope for the best.

I'll never get any where like this. I have to finish that fucking novel. It has to be good. No, no no, it has to be great. It has to be a staggering work of genius. But, who the fuck am I to assume I could write such majesty? Who am I to assume that because I can read brilliant work, I can create it?

Am I a narcissist to think I am capable? To feel like I can? Or, am I just too down on myself to think I can't? I know I will never get anywhere if I don't try. If I don't finish that fucking novel, then it stands absolutely no chance of being anything. But what if I do? What if I do finish it, and to me, it is brilliant. But I try to sell it. To get it out, and it comes back across the board as pure garbage. Then what have I earned? The accomplishment of finishing a novel, I suppose, but at the same time I have also lost some credibility with myself. Some confidence, right?

Well, are these things that all writers go through? All creators? Everyone?

Oh this struggle. This fear. Do I, don't I?

You know what?

I'm going to finish this book. It may turn out completely different from what it used to be, and it may be a pile of shit, but I am going to go for it, and if you don't like it, you can suck my dick.

Waiter! More wine!


(Audio version: The Greatest Thing about Total Self-Doubt, is Not Caring at All if You Fail by AsaMorris )