Getting Over Myself

Ok! All right, already!

Yes, I feel better and I'm over myself again. Yeesh. I should really just relax, you know. The comments on the story pieces turned out to be all good after all. A little meh in some places, but that's ok. I knew some of that would be coming, because my characters are making big life decisions, which they should, and not every reader can agree with them. I need to have a little respect for that, and then get over it already. And myself!

Meantime, I am thinking a lot about craft, not because I enjoy it so much -- well, not strictly true. I enjoy it per se, but having to think about areas of my craft that need developing makes me think that all my craft needs a lot more developing than I like to admit and starts that cascade of "If I'm not perfect, then I clearly must stink" line of thinking I'm so prone to. I loathe having to admit I might be a beginner in any area and I really loathe falling on my rear in public, either figuratively or literally.

But I have a dear friend who's an editor, who very gently sprinkles suggestions through some of our conversations. She does this not because she thinks I'm awful at this, but because she really believes in me. She is a dear, dear friend, who instinctively knows how to handle an under-confident, eggshell ego like mine, and I can't say enough good about her. She cares, and I'm slowly realizing I'm getting hints that I need to go read up on a few things to improve my game even more.

Ugh.

I think I better do it after I finish the practice story. I'm afraid I will end up reading all these things, having a sudden burst of insight...and then I will see everything going wrong right now in the practice story and want to rip it to shreds and start over. I don't want to go down that rabbit hole, bluntly. I'm so close to the end of the practice story -- and so much of it is already being read by friends in serial form -- that I think it's better to just finish it up and then educate myself. At least, that's today's thinking. This way I don't distract myself from the work that might actually count as part of a career; it makes no sense for me to endlessly polish a work I can't even publish.

And meantime-meantime, Happy Fourth of July, America!