They say that the life of an author is lonely, but, to an extent, I disagree. I have lots of friends who know all of my writing-problems, and, when we're gathered, we spend much of our time groaning over commas and rewrites and word choices.
At the same time, sometimes, I feel like every true creative genius is suffused with occasional pangs of solitude. No matter what we do, we can never honestly calm our nerves before the velvet curtains are pulled back, we can never truly ignore the slashes of the red pen, and we can never really get over a toxic critique. Our solitude exists merely because we're exposed more frequently to the crowd's booing.
We are our work, and we sometimes we feel varying degrees of sorrow or fear when uncovering ourselves.
The funny thing is...individually, we're ruthless with our own work. We'll tear out chapters; we'll rip up drafts; we'll keep marking until the first copy looks like an entirely different book when compared to the final copy. Even then, even after published, we look back at the printed novel, read it, and find things we'd like to change.
We always improve.
Now here's the catch of my muse:
Some people are more prone to critiquing others as they critique themselves while some people are too sensitive towards others' feelings and shower praises without any pruning tips. Sure, if you happen to have an editor who can tightrope walk between both worlds, you've got a very nice thing on your hands, but if you can change yourself to accept both worlds...you have become the miracle.
Write on!
Clove
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