I want to suggest a new discipline. I am of course not saying that getting yourself to the desk is not an important part of being a writer. But many of us, for many reasons—including being unsupported in a society that instills competition as a way to art and creativity—have the idea or are somehow involved in the practice of discipline as a kind of self-punishment, a daily dose of affirming some kind of deficiency, or insufficiency, that can make the work of writing feel somehow futile or pointless. A validation of a lack of worth or talent.
So, I want to suggest a new discipline as a writer, not to exclude the “sitting-at-desk-working” aspect of things. But to remind you and me, that this is what we actually want to do. Love to do!
The discipline, then, is simply this:
You are there at that desk to do your work. No one else can do your work. No one. No one else can tell the story, in the voice, that you can, that you have. No one.
So, be nice to yourself. I don’t mean, don’t be rigorous in your work, don’t work hard, don’t revise till you…well, you fill that in. Just know that you are writing what no one else can or will. And I assure you, the more you take this leap of faith, the more you believe there is an astonishment of riches within you, there is language you never knew you had, there is a vision forming every moment of your life, there are interconnected levels of truth and of artistry within you that you can bring forward, the more you affirm all this, the more you want to get to that desk, the more pleasure is there along with the terribly hard and sometimes terribly painful work, work that is yours and no one else’s.
There is no censor standing around, no critic, no big meanie, no disconnected academic, no supreme measure of good and bad. This is a profound and urgent and lovely and terrible and satisfying work and process. You all can and do make, and have made, story.
If you are looking for a place to push your work to the next step, do it online with me. My newest course The Disobedient Writer: Break the Rules and Free Your Story is online now.
For full descriptions and registration, please go to (INSERT LINK).
For questions about content or the workings of the class, email me at thedisobedientwriter@gmail.com.
I will also be accepting clients for one-to-one work, long distance and in-person, on full-length projects in progress, short works, and craftwork and coaching to bring your writing forward, whether prose or poetry, fiction or nonfiction. Contact me soon to schedule our work together.
Let’s work. Let’s write.
More soon,
Anya Achtenberg
Anya Achtenberg 