Dr Rachel Knightley is a fiction and non-fiction author, presenter, lecturer and writing and confidence coach.
Every week at the Writers’ Gym, we have Wednesday Questions. This is a weekly ritual where writers ask me anything on their minds about creativity, confidence, careers, work-in-progress, writing and life. By making it a ‘Creative I-Dare-You’, even when people don’t have a burning question this encourages them to bring up something they wouldn’t have otherwise – something they might otherwise have discounted as ‘unimportant’ or ‘maybe it’s just me’ – and never asked. The questions are shared privately with me or in our group chat and I answer (or, more likely, ask questions back to support the writer’s unique thoughts and feelings form their true answer) wherever I’m asked.
This week, one of the members shared this question, and I asked if I could share with you:
‘How do you talk to the guilty feeling when it feels like you haven’t done enough?’
Of course, you don’t have to be a writer to relate to this. It can apply to anything and everything in our lives.
But if – like me, and like every member of the Writers’ Gym – you’re already deeply aware of the part creative confidence (or lack of it) plays in how we approach not just our art but the choices we make in work and life, you know it’s a significant conversation.
A conversation we’re having with ourselves every day, whether we notice it or not.
What does ‘enough’ look like anyway?
As I discussed in my interview with Brainz Magazine, the more our curiosity leads, the clearer and stronger our focus and ability become to start, and finish, a story. On the other hand, the more our self-esteem falters, when we put how we’re perceived ahead of what we want to say – “Will it be good?” “Will it be enough?” – the spotlight moves away from the writing we want to create and focuses instead on what we think about ourselves as the writer. The emotional software moves from creativity, to anxiety.
“Don't look at your feet to see if you are doing it right. Just dance.” ― Anne Lamott, Bird by Bird
It's not about changing the feelings. The answer is not to press them down, lock them away, and sweat over keeping that lid down. It’s releasing all that energy. Listening to the thoughts our minds want to communicate. Then, we give them a comfortable seat next to us and do the writing anyway.
“Perhaps I write for no one. Perhaps for the same person children are writing for when they scrawl their names in the snow.” – Margaret Atwood On Writing
You can’t bring your writing to the emotional table without bringing the rest of yourself too. The more of yourself you feel free to bring to the table, the truer those first drafts get and the better the editing that follows them can be. Nancy Kline tells us "The quality of your attention determines the quality of other people's thinking." So why not apply it to our emotions, and listen to the answers?
So, here’s what I offered that writer – and what I’m offering you.
An Interview with a Writer’s Guilt
Part 1:
I invited the writer who asked the question to answer on behalf of her sense of writing guilt, as if that feeling were a character answering the questions.
Here it is, if you’d like to give it a go: jus let yourself answer these journalist questions as if you’re your sense of guilt…
Thank you for giving me these fifteen minutes, Guilt. I appreciate your time as your work is prolific. You collaborate regularly with every writer I’ve ever met, both for what they’ve achieved and what they haven’t, how they compare and how they contrast to everyone they know, and everyone they don’t know.
My first question is, what would be your definition of doing ‘enough’?
How would you differentiate between healthy time off and procrastination? Do you find it easier to see them as the same thing?
And finally, what is it you really want to tell me as a writer? Would it help if I let you tell me right now for as long as it takes?
Part 2:
Or, if your guilt has a different focus you want to explore rewrite the questions to be more specific to you and your life and interests, then answer those!
Dr Rachel Knightley builds Creative Confidence for professional and personal life, work and art. Book a free discovery call here. To explore Writers’ Gym membership, click here.
Dr Rachel Knightley is a fiction and non-fiction author, presenter, lecturer and writing and confidence coach. Her background in directing and performing for theatre formed her fascination with the power of the stories we tell ourselves to shape our identity. She writes and presents for magazines, YouTube channels and Blu-ray extras, lectures in creative writing and works with private clients online and in southwest London.
