So I am perforce taking my remaining vacation day for the year and spending it chilling with my frighteningly brilliant sister, eating a whole lot of pakoras, and, of course, writing like a madwoman.
My dismay and heartbreak, internets. IMAGINE THEM.
My sister draws for a living. She is also in school full-time for graphic design. And on top of this she has her own epic projects percolating on the back burner. We were talking yesterday about how you manage to wedge your own stuff in around the cracks; she was bitterly discouraged at how difficult and anxiety-making her own stuff had become when for clients she could confidently hash out concepts and refine them without any trouble.
Here's the thing: your own work? It's still work.
It's just that the client is you.
Ever have one of those days where you really want to draw and you go to start and then WHAM OH LOOK EVERYTHING YOUR PENCIL TOUCHES IS CURSED
— Zélie Bérubé (@zibliedraws) February 22, 2015
After sleep and talking with @metuiteme and Indian food and a multivitamin I am feeling a lot better.
— Zélie Bérubé (@zibliedraws) February 23, 2015
Among the things from said conversation that struck me is that for some reason I feel way too emotionally invested in work I do for myself
— Zélie Bérubé (@zibliedraws) February 23, 2015
Staring over my own shoulder being like "THAT'S NOT RIGHT" while I've barely even started working? I'm ACTUALLY my worst client.
— Zélie Bérubé (@zibliedraws) February 23, 2015
You get used to finding a foothold in an abstract idea, drafting text around it, noodling around with it until it works, having it come back for a shift in emphasis, and then again to be cut down by half because it turns out there won't be space for the French version otherwise. It makes taking three or four tries to sort out a scene in a novel and then finally axing it or moving it and having to readapt it all over again look reassuringly normal.
This from Kameron Hurley is also spot on:
Writing is a job, for me. When you get to work at 8am at your day job and your day job is writing, well...you come to work and you write. Having a day job in marketing and advertising actually trained me really well on how to hit deadlines and write to spec. No one ever comes to work where their job is stocking vending machines and says, "Well, I really need to warm up my stocking-vending-machine brain." They just get to work.
(Almost more reassuring, coming from her, was this:
Working on a Thing, feeling overwhelmed by Impostor Syndrome. Fake it til you make it, my friends.
— Kameron Hurley (@KameronHurley) February 23, 2015
We're in good company!)