Write!

My favorite line in Jersey Boys was when the one guy was explaining why he left the band, and he said “It just came out of my mouth!”

I know over the last series of posts about the graphic novel it may have been hard to tell if the focus was about writing, or about myself, or about My Chemical Romance. These are just things that I think about, then I have the urge to write them, because it gets them out. There was a lot of thinking about the writing process though, and it may be helpful for other writers, or they may end up having completely different methods.

If this series has any importance, though, I hope it is that you will be encouraged to write because of what it will do for you, and the way it will help you.

It may feel weird to start, but go with what you feel. If that means writing a journal entry, do that. If it means writing a letter to someone you care about, even if it is not something you will send, that’s a great start. Maybe it’s someone you can’t send it to, and those letters can be really helpful. It can even start out as writing a list of things you want to do. That’s kind of how the three-part ten-year plan started.

Your specific talents and tendencies may make it come out in different ways. So maybe you will start by writing in prose how you feel about something, and then the form becomes more abstract and it is poetry, or it becomes musical and it is song. Perfect. If it ends up being a story, great. Sometimes the process of having characters encounter and overcome obstacles can be very empowering for your own life. Go with it. Just building a narrative can be hugely helpful for sorting things out.

And this is where I need to give due credit to scrapbooks, because they tell a story too, and for someone who is kind of tactile, that 3-D effect may really enrich the whole experience.

Maybe you will end up drawing how you feel. That’s fine too. Every year I get one of those big At-A-Glance calendars, and I do that so I have plenty of space to write, but also I will illustrate it at times—mainly for vacations.

This is probably a good time to reference my old post on creation, back when I started the comic book. I know so many people who feel that they are not creative at all, because we have gotten this narrow idea of what being creative means, when really it just means that you made something.

Let me go back to the Comic-Con movie. The one aspiring artist ended up needing to keep working at it. He had potential, but he wasn’t there yet. There were interesting things in his feedback though. First of all, he had a portfolio of different standard characters, but the one that really caught the one person’s eye was a portrait of H. L. Lovecraft. And what he was told about the other stuff was, “I don’t think this is really you.”

Now obviously if you get hired by a major comic house, you are going to be drawing characters that aren’t yours, but somehow with that you still need to be you.

Here’s the other part that was interesting. Someone else asked him how he usually drew, and he said he worked from pictures. I totally relate to that actually, because I will often use pictures for guides when I want something to look right. What the other person pointed out though, is that he needed to get over that because often he would need to draw things for which he would not be able to get pictures.

So what I was thinking from that is maybe the reason he had not really developed his own style of drawing, where he would be himself no matter what he was drawing, was that he was trying to copy pictures instead of just letting things flow out of his mind. Maybe he really needed to just let loose.

It can be scary, like dancing without a net upon the wire, but there needs to be some freedom. Also,  you totally have a net. If the words don’t seem write, go back and edit. They usually don’t come out the best way the first time. That’s what rewriting it for.

If you write something you hate, there is deleting and shredding and burning. If you find that you hate it because it reflects a part of you, know that you can change it if you need to, or learn to accept it if it is not something that should be changed. Maybe it is just something you need to learn to understand. There needs to be some trust in yourself, that whatever ugly or scary things there are inside you, that there are bright and beautiful things too.

I keep coming back to this quote:

“Our deepest fear is not that we are inadequate. Our deepest fear is that we are powerful beyond measure. It is our light, not our darkness that most frightens us. We ask ourselves, Who am I to be brilliant, gorgeous, talented, fabulous? Actually, who are you not to be? You are a child of God. Your playing small does not serve the world. There is nothing enlightened about shrinking so that other people won't feel insecure around you. We are all meant to shine, as children do. We were born to make manifest the glory of God that is within us. It's not just in some of us; it's in everyone. And as we let our own light shine, we unconsciously give other people permission to do the same. As we are liberated from our own fear, our presence automatically liberates others.”
-- by Marianne Williamson from A Return To Love: Reflections on the Principles of A Course in Miracles

This quote still scares me, but it scares me less than it used to, and maybe that’s because of everything that I have been pouring out and putting into words over these past few months.

I saw a movie, Pina, based on the choreography of Pina Bausch, and the quote they started with was “Dance, dance, otherwise we are lost.” For a dancer, that makes sense. There are probably lost of people who don’t need to dance to be found, but there’s something they need to do. What’s yours? I’m biased, but writing is the easiest way to start.

Now, one more thought for the aspiring professionals. Do not do it to get rich and famous. The odds of either are pretty low, and both at once, well, it’s a long shot. If you need to write, and always have more to write, to where your day job feels like it is in the way, then it makes sense to try, and yes, this has periods of derangement.

That’s not a reason not to start. Yes, sometimes I get anxious and frustrated with the writing, but it’s way better than when I’m not doing it. If you have that inside you, don’t even try to suppress.

http://sporkful.blogspot.com/2012/04/creation.html