The creator and the critic. Like any good partners, they need time apart
OMG first draft dread - procrastination, despair days when nothing flows, idea vacuums.....you know these stories well.
Last month, discussing 'First Draft Fear and Loathing' I wrote about some First Draft First Aid strategies that have been energising my writer clients.
And I mentioned then that I'd be back to talk about why, in the early stages of writing, the inner (or outer) critic just really needs to step aside and wait its turn.
Before I go on, I have an important distinction to make. If you're concerned that I'm peddling some advice to dumb down your work, or accept a lower level of quality, forget it. I want the standard of writing going out into the world to be high: outstanding, in fact. Rest assured that I believe when the time comes, the critic in you should take centre stage. It's vital to great writing – but it’s all about employing the critic at the right time, and for many writers, that time is not in the earliest stages.
There is also an important distinction to make about the style of mental critic that is useful – and it is not the nark critic, the sneering critic. The critic who’s welcome when the time is right is the confident one, who wants your writing to express your full potential, not the one who wants to humiliate you into submission.
The first step in the process is really the big one, I think. Here's how it reads:
1) Identify and clearly delineate in your mind each stage of writing, even if you have no idea of the story yet. This may seem obvious, but lack of clarity is linked to many writerly problems including inertia, a sense of hopelessness and chronic distractibility.
By separating the stages I mean separating the emerging story (especially the early first draft) from the shaping re-write (second draft), from the third, fourth and subsequent drafts. But how? And what's important about this anyway?
Many writers have told me it can be helpful to see each stage as having a particular purpose, and that in each stage, the writer has a specific set of roles. Trouble is, too often the critic is there, dominating everything, right from the start. In fact, even before the start. And as you may already know, not much is as paralysing as premature criticism. Especially of the sneering kind.
When I wrote in February, I was just about to interview the beautiful, best-selling author, psychiatrist and brain nut, Dan Siegel (whose latest book, Brainstorm, was destined for the rubbish bin at one point - when published it took just four weeks to get to the NYT best-seller list in February 2014).
Because Dan specialises in brain health and mental well-being, I asked him to explain what's going on in a writer's brain when she brings in the critic too early, during the creating part of the creative process. His response was fascinating. In essence, he said that a creative process is like any complex system. And complex systems, whether they be in the form of an individual, a family, a society, an ecosystem or a creative process, share common properties.
The ultimate aim, and also the expression, of a complex system is harmony. This is an integration of the elements - for example, if the complex system is a work of fiction, when all the elements work well, the story is crafted into a coherent narrative. For harmony in a complex system, each of the elements of the whole needs to function well independently; only once the elements are differentiated and well-functioning separate entities can the harmonious integration occur.
It may sound strange to talk about a book in progress in these terms, and it won’t work for all writers. But it certainly is working beautifully for some, as my clients and I have discovered. The message that’s so freeing for them is ‘first, differentiate the elements’ – and for a start, this means a clear, conscious separation of the creator and the critic.
And then later, when the creative heart of your work, your early drafts, are ready, bring in that professional and respectful critic and let it do its work.
Alison Manning
A Mind of One's Own
March 2014
Click here to check our the services at A Mind of One's Own
Click here to book a confidential, free conversation about any of the services on offer.
Last month, discussing 'First Draft Fear and Loathing' I wrote about some First Draft First Aid strategies that have been energising my writer clients.
And I mentioned then that I'd be back to talk about why, in the early stages of writing, the inner (or outer) critic just really needs to step aside and wait its turn.
Before I go on, I have an important distinction to make. If you're concerned that I'm peddling some advice to dumb down your work, or accept a lower level of quality, forget it. I want the standard of writing going out into the world to be high: outstanding, in fact. Rest assured that I believe when the time comes, the critic in you should take centre stage. It's vital to great writing – but it’s all about employing the critic at the right time, and for many writers, that time is not in the earliest stages.
There is also an important distinction to make about the style of mental critic that is useful – and it is not the nark critic, the sneering critic. The critic who’s welcome when the time is right is the confident one, who wants your writing to express your full potential, not the one who wants to humiliate you into submission.
The first step in the process is really the big one, I think. Here's how it reads:
1) Identify and clearly delineate in your mind each stage of writing, even if you have no idea of the story yet. This may seem obvious, but lack of clarity is linked to many writerly problems including inertia, a sense of hopelessness and chronic distractibility.
By separating the stages I mean separating the emerging story (especially the early first draft) from the shaping re-write (second draft), from the third, fourth and subsequent drafts. But how? And what's important about this anyway?
Many writers have told me it can be helpful to see each stage as having a particular purpose, and that in each stage, the writer has a specific set of roles. Trouble is, too often the critic is there, dominating everything, right from the start. In fact, even before the start. And as you may already know, not much is as paralysing as premature criticism. Especially of the sneering kind.
When I wrote in February, I was just about to interview the beautiful, best-selling author, psychiatrist and brain nut, Dan Siegel (whose latest book, Brainstorm, was destined for the rubbish bin at one point - when published it took just four weeks to get to the NYT best-seller list in February 2014).
Because Dan specialises in brain health and mental well-being, I asked him to explain what's going on in a writer's brain when she brings in the critic too early, during the creating part of the creative process. His response was fascinating. In essence, he said that a creative process is like any complex system. And complex systems, whether they be in the form of an individual, a family, a society, an ecosystem or a creative process, share common properties.
The ultimate aim, and also the expression, of a complex system is harmony. This is an integration of the elements - for example, if the complex system is a work of fiction, when all the elements work well, the story is crafted into a coherent narrative. For harmony in a complex system, each of the elements of the whole needs to function well independently; only once the elements are differentiated and well-functioning separate entities can the harmonious integration occur.
It may sound strange to talk about a book in progress in these terms, and it won’t work for all writers. But it certainly is working beautifully for some, as my clients and I have discovered. The message that’s so freeing for them is ‘first, differentiate the elements’ – and for a start, this means a clear, conscious separation of the creator and the critic.
And then later, when the creative heart of your work, your early drafts, are ready, bring in that professional and respectful critic and let it do its work.
Alison Manning
A Mind of One's Own
March 2014
Click here to check our the services at A Mind of One's Own
Click here to book a confidential, free conversation about any of the services on offer.
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