This is the second part of a five-part series. Here is Part One.

The Red Devil and the White Slug

You know this guy, don't you?

No, not the actual guy, the character he's modelling. Look at him. He doesn't look like he's had a day of fun in his life. He looks angry, worn-out, sour...

In short, he looks a bit like your inner critic.

Now, before we continue, I must state that I do not know any royalty-free stock-photo models, and that even if I did, I probably wouldn't pay them. But we all have an intimate knowledge of someone who acts just like that, an inner critic of our very own, and that someone is...

Me. Yes, I said it. For myself, at least, that someone is me.

Another thing. You've tried to write a few times, haven't you? You've given it a shot. Once or twice, maybe even more. You might be actually trying to make a serious go of this. But every time you sit down at the computer, ready to let those words drip from your fingers, a human potato rises from the MSG-dusted couch in your head and says: 'Yeah, this writing stuff is all very well and good, but you're a bit tired today, aren't you? I mean, it's been a long day. Why not just Netflix and chill? A few episodes won't hurt.'

And so you end up binging every single episode of Daredevil again, and the night is gone. Netflix, sure. No chill.

If this isn't you, congratulations. You are much farther ahead on the road to success than I am. But I have to say, honestly, that guy in my head? That guy who keeps whispering things about how doing anything other than writing would be great?

Yeah, that's me too. I'm also that guy. My own personal me. Whoop-dee-doo.

How is it that we writers tend to be both the angry, dissatisfied voices in our own heads, and the lazy layabouts which advocate anything except work? How can we want so badly to be read, and yet so badly not to write? It seems so... silly. So paradoxical. You can't write a word without feeling sick at it, and you can't not write without feeling sick at yourself.

_{Kinda like this, except the rock and the hill are in your head too. And that jerk at the top. Wow. Lots of space in there.}

I'm glad to tell you that there is a way out, but it might not be the one you think it is. Now, I'm not advocating a personal transformation method or anything. I still nitpick over my own words sometimes. I'm still lazier than I'd like to be a lot of the time. Sometimes, I don't even feel like I can write. But it used to feel a lot worse, and everything took a turn for the better when I realised one simple thing.

Honestly. What's good writing, anyway?

You see, if you're anything like I was, you're questing for the perfect short story, the perfect blog post, the perfect novel. You want to place words so perfectly that your editor - or you, pick one or both - would commit seppuku at the very thought of changing a jot or tittle. You want perfection.

Unfortunately, there does happen to be that little issue of taste in the way. For a writer, there will never, ever be such a thing as perfection, simply because every work of fiction is always re-interpreted through the mind of the reader. This is an idea I first came across in the work of Dorothy L. Sayers, who in The Mind of the Maker posited a trinity of creative aspects in both writer and reader.

For every work [or act] of creation is threefold, an earthly trinity to match the heavenly.

First, [not in time, but merely in order of enumeration] there is the Creative Idea, passionless, timeless, beholding the whole work complete at once, the end in the beginning: and this is the image of the Father.

Second, there is the Creative Energy [or Activity] begotten of that idea, working in time from the beginning to the end, with sweat and passion, being incarnate in the bonds of matter: and this is the image of the Word.

Third, there is the Creative Power, the meaning of the work and its response in the lively soul: and this is the image of the indwelling Spirit.

And these three are one, each equally in itself the whole work, whereof none can exist without other: and this is the image of the Trinity.

~Dorothy L. Sayers, The Mind of the Maker, Chapter Three

Like the Christian God, who is Father, Son and Holy Spirit, the creative mind can be likened to a consubstantial Trinity, consisting of Idea, Energy, and Power. The Idea contains the overriding, perfect plan of creation, the Energy brings the Idea into the world through physical and mental suffering, and the Power, drawing from both Idea and Energy, indwells within the work and suffuses it with meaning and life.

Unfortunately, or fortunately, every reader also has his own creative trinity, and upon receiving the Power, will immediately reinterpret it with regards to his own Idea of what the work should be like. It is impossible for anyone to truly receive your original Idea, because the Idea is too vast at this stage for even you to fully comprehend. You can only know the Idea through the workings of the Energy. You will only know it fully when the work is consummated.

In other words, no-one will ever see your work the same way as you do. Even you may not know what exactly you want the work to be. What you see as perfect may be, to another person, utter dreck. What you see as trash may be, to another person, sublime beauty.

It is something that you have no possible control over.

The ancient Stoics believed that the only thing a man could possibly master was his own emotions. That the universe and everything in it was cold and capricious, and that in the end joyless Fate would bring to each man his impersonal end. With view to that, it was better to remain in a state of strict self-control at all times, immovable and insensitive to both joy and sorrow, for all those things are transient.

We tend to take a more lackadaisical view these days. But the Stoic insight, even if it does not strictly apply to everyone in a personal sense, does most definitely apply to us as writers.

Let me repeat: you cannot control your readers. They are, in a sense, as distant from you as the stars themselves. Warmer, perhaps, but definitely capricious. It's their money, after all.

No-one will ever react to your work in the precise way that you wish him to at any moment. That would require you to seize his thoughts, his heart, his very mind. It would require you to coerce his love, and love is the one thing that can never be coerced, lest it cease at that moment to exist.

So why, then, are you so afraid of being imperfect?

The twin tendencies of fledgling writers - overt self-criticism and blatant procrastination - stem from the hidden conviction that even if the words got out of their heads and onto the page, they wouldn't be good words anyway. The two personas in every writer's head, the red devil and the white slug, are born from the pursuit of an imaginary perfection.

Imperfection is not its own perfection. That is a blatant contradiction. Imperfection is not, and can never be perfection. The unattainable exists for a reason. But if we can't hope to grasp perfection in this life, then can't we have a little fun along the way, at least?

Look back. How many of the good things in your life were happy accidents?

If you can survive past the age of three, drink potable water, breathe non-toxic air, chew with your own teeth, and read this post through no fault of your own, what are the odds that if you just write, someone, somewhere, will find something beautiful that you didn't intend to be there? What are the odds that you might find yourself expressing some truth that you never even knew existed? What are the odds that your favorite character might burst fully-formed from your creative brow, take on a life of her own?

Life brings strange gifts. Just close your eyes, empty your mind, and reach inside to take them.

####

A year ago, I was going nowhere with my work. I was writing sporadically, inconsistently. My literary output was limited to a single sale of short fiction, already a year-old, and all my attempts at selling were falling flatter than my floor.

Now, a year later, I have one sale and one acceptance, which is not much more than I had before - but more importantly, I'm writing faster and more regularly than I have at any point prior. I'm 40,000 words into my first novel, and I've taken up blogging again, entirely because of Steemit.

I used to be self-critical, ineffectual, and pedantic. Now, I'm just ineffectual. But I'm very happy to say that writing is fun again. A year ago, I was barely hitting 500 words of fiction in my first hour. Now, I can hit 900 without any warmup. These are not fast speeds, but they are consistent speeds. I know how much I can do in a given length of time.

I'd love to cover more ground, but in the interests of space, I'll have to leave off here. If you want to hear more of my thoughts, please stay tuned for the next installment of this series. Thanks so much for stopping by!