Nothing Left to Lose

I’d like to get to where I have nothing left to lose with my writing. Not to stop writing, but to write without an external reason. Not for readers, not for recognition, not for money, not to see my name in print. Just for the sheer joy of writing (when it is joy; sometimes it’s tedium).

I’m not there yet. I don’t care so much about the money, having probably earned only a couple hundred dollars so far. But I want people to read my books, comment about my books, and like my books. I have books with five reviews or fewer (and I have no way of knowing how many copies they’ve sold).

My dream is to have people want to write fanfic about my books, which I would let them do, keeping in mind the restrictions of the world I’ve built. I’d like to be a non-evil version of Marion Zimmer Bradley. This is far from the desire listed above.

Maybe the desire not to care is because there’s such a gap between where I am and where I’d like to be. Like I shot for the stars and ended up in the neighbor’s backyard. On the other hand, the freedom of not caring is exhilarating.

The Woman Syndrome

Note: To the Ukrainian bot that hit this blog 18 times from three different operating systems and without hitting a single post, I have one thing to say: I have no information about Joe Biden.

That said, I continue to write and to try to get published. Writing has become part of who I am, even if I started at it late. Let me correct that — I never took myself seriously before. If someone liked what I wrote, I said, “Oh, that little thing? It’s nothing.”

This sort of self-deprecation disguised as modesty is part of the baggage women are taught from an early age. We’re told — at least women in my generation were told — that we shouldn’t upstage the men in our life, so if we excelled at something, we should play it down. We should deny it. Women were taught not to brag; “to brag” meaning “to assert any talent, quality, or achievement; to tell the truth about their accomplishments”.

Inwardly, however, women were taught to castigate themselves for not being perfect. The grades are never high enough, the job performance never good enough, the house never clean enough.

What a dilemma — women must be inwardly perfect while preserving the illusion of mediocrity. So women hide the 98% they got on the exam while beating themselves up about the other 2%. In this schema, women not only can’t win but shouldn’t win.

I don’t know if women are still brought up this way, but when I discuss this with my students, the women nod knowingly. I’ve had several female students say, “I don’t want to brag”.

I wonder if this gets in the way of my getting published. I send things out to journals and publishers with the thought “I don’t know if this is good enough,” and when I get rejected, I think “It probably wasn’t good enough.” I wonder if this attitude of mine is reflected in my cover letters and pitches. I wonder if my attitude causes good things to be reflected from me in some sort of reverse “The Secret” (a new-agey book about how we can attract good to us; a lot of bunk).

But that is part of the syndrome. Not only do I hold myself responsible for rejections, but I hold myself responsible for not attracting success to myself.

I really think I should cure myself of the syndrome.

Still I write

This is one of those days I have to force myself to write.

It’s Friday, I don’t have anything I have to leave the house for today, it’s going to be 94 degrees (F; 34.5 degrees C) out, I’m wrestling with Gaia’s Hands, have no ideas for a new short story …

And I’m feeling a little down. I’m wondering if there’s such a thing as micromood swings, or if it’s just the heat getting to me. I’m not depressed or anything; just not feeling like I’m on the verge of something wonderful happening.

But still I write. And that’s the important thing, to write even when it feels like the last thing I want to do. Just a small amount will do — just a blog post, just an hour. Just a submission. Just a moment of creation.

Neither my feelings of defeat nor my feelings of impending success actually presage the future; they are simply extrapolations of feelings that may be influenced by my strange chemistry. My actions, however, are what’s important. Without stepping forward, I have no chance of success.

Dream or Let Go?

Sometimes I still dream of success.

To me, success in writing looks like:

Finding an agent
Getting a publishing contract
Having a readership and modest sales
Interacting with others on my blog

Given that I haven’t achieved the first yet, and given that the other goals are probably dependent on that first goal. I don’t know if I’m ever going to get there.

This is why I’m considering self-publishing, but I have so many questions about it, such as:

If you self-publish, will people always put a figurative asterisk by the word “author” after your name?
How do you get the word out about your novel?
If my novel doesn’t get accepted by agents, is there really a chance that readers will gravitate to it in self-published format?
Can one get famous (ok, somewhat well-known) self-publishing?
Will I have to spend all my time promoting my book instead of writing?

These questions may be proof that I’m still dreaming and doing a lot of assuming. I’m assuming that my books are good enough to find a following rather than languishing on a virtual shelf somewhere, which is a lot to assume even if I get traditionally published.

My affirmation cards keep saying that I have great ideas, the time is not right, let go of expectations, to the point that the same cards keep showing up in readings.

Our American society says that we should hold on to our dreams. Buddhism, on the other hand, suggests attachment — even to a dream — causes unhappiness. Which shall I do — hold on or let go?