Writing Is Never Finished
You’ve probably heard the adage about how writing is never finished, it’s just due. I used to tell that to my students in an effort to relieve some of their anxiety about striving for “perfection” in their writing. I tell it to myself, too. I remind myself that “perfection,” in general, doesn’t exist; and perfection from creative endeavors or productive tasks is probably even more elusive, primarily because it’s so subjective.
I have a love-hate relationship with deadlines. As a teenager, I thrived on them, lived by them. But those deadlines were primarily of the academic/schoolwork variety, and the work was often mundane. The public education system that I grew up in (circa 1980s and 1990s) emphasized grades and not necessarily quality work. (I now know how independent of each other–how generally unrelated to each other–grades and quality work are.) Follow directions, do the work with reasonable care, complete it by the deadline, and you’ll earn an A.
In the “real” world, deadlines abound (e.g., paying bills, making mortgage payments). Meetings at such-and-such a time (be there or be square!). Appointments. Getting to the store before it closes. Catching (or, otherwise, missing) a flight. One needs to plan ahead so as to not run out of toilet paper or coffee—the basics, you know. Because there are consequences. And, oh, how I envy those people with non-worrying personalities, who don’t internalize all these deadlines and conditions of time. How I envy cultures where time is merely relative and not an intricate part of life. Just think of all the phrases we use on a daily basis that emphasize time and its swift movement: “In a minute!” or “I don’t have time.” or “What time is the meeting?” or “You’re late” or “You’re early.” I am a worrier, so in my head (and on paper) is always a list of what I need to do and when I need to do it by. The key word here is “need.” I’m an all-star procrastinator, so if a task can wait another day, I’ll probably let it (but I’ll fret about not having done it, of course, because . . . time).
What about arbitrary deadlines, those deadlines without much consequence? This past week was busy for me. I had a deadline for a critical essay, one of the required graduation components for my MFA in creative writing. I’d been working diligently on the essay for months—reading, researching, taking notes, and writing. And the writing part was not a difficult task in and of itself—the hardest part, in fact, was trying to keep it under the 30-page maximum. But because I was working on something with a hard deadline, other things (including posting to my blog) took a backseat. And it got me thinking about deadlines with respect to writing.
Being self-employed, I have to be self-motivated; I have to create a structure of sorts so that I deliver my services in a timely manner. The most important things to me are delivering quality work to my clients and meeting set project deadlines—going above and beyond on both counts when possible. I love to exceed clients’ expectations. So, work has to come first. As I’ve been working on my MFA these past two and a half years, I’ve had various deadlines for submitting my creative and critical work as well. But what will happen in two months–after I’ve graduated? I have trouble setting arbitrary deadlines for myself. And even though I have a weekly writers’ group that provides me with a hint of a deadline, I am not required to produce for the group. It’s more of a motivational deadline than a true deadline.
Without hard (or, even, more flexible yet true) deadlines, some of us tend to flounder. This might sound like a negative thing, but I don’t see it as such, not completely, at least.
Consider this scenario:
I write a piece (a poem, a story, whatever) to share with my writing group. They provide me with critical feedback, suggesting changes and/or ways I can develop the piece more. When I get home, I put the draft with said feedback on my desk, near my computer. I work on other stuff—meeting work deadlines, taking care of life. The piece sits there, eyeing me. I tell myself I want to think about it some more, that I’m not quite ready to work on it. Or I tell myself I don’t have time right now. Maybe next week. I tell myself that and then keep telling myself that. Eventually, I decide to clean up my desk, so I put the piece (with the critical feedback) in my filing cabinet. Out of sight, out of mind. Life goes on. Then, a year or two years or five years or maybe even ten years from now, I pull the piece out of my filing cabinet. I’m interested in it again, ready to breathe new life into it (pardon all the clichés—I’m working on a deadline here!).
I have—literally—hundreds of pieces (poems, stories, parts of stories, ideas for stories, beginnings of novels) tucked away in journals, notebooks, or filing cabinets. Are they “finished” pieces? Unfinished? Who knows! Because writing is never “finished,” per se; it’s just due. And if these pieces aren’t due—if I don’t have to submit them somewhere, to someone—how can I possibly know whether they’re done or not?
The upside of having all of these unfinished or in-process pieces is that I can’t ever say I have writer’s block. I just can’t! I can go to my journals, notebooks, or filing cabinets and sift through the contents and—you know what?—I almost always find something surprising. Sometimes it’s something I don’t remember writing. Other times, it’s something I remember, but I’m surprised at the uniqueness of the idea or even the quality of the writing. Many of my “current” stories (ones in my creative thesis, ones I’m actively trying to publish) have come from these scraps.
No Deadline for Success
I set goals more than I set deadlines with my creative writing. Goals are a kind of deadline, but I don’t see them as the same thing. Deadlines are helpful; they can be extremely helpful, in fact. But arbitrary deadlines are just that: arbitrary. Changeable. Movable. Yet not meeting them can feel defeating and counterproductive. And when you’re a writer—when you’re producing something that you want to be proud of, that you want others to see—you do want to be careful that you’re not just submitting something because it’s arbitrarily “due.” An important lesson I’ve learned in life is that we all grow, mature, and develop—physically, psychically, socially, spiritually, mentally—at different rates and in different ways. Just because society might try to dictate arbitrary social norms and “rules,” those rules don’t have to be followed. So don’t set an arbitrary deadline just because you think you should. Do what’s right for you. There’s no deadline for success. It happens when it happens. Work toward it, of course, but don’t give it an ultimatum. And remember that “success” has a different meaning for each person, so don’t compare your success to the perceived success of others either.
You don’t have to write alone.
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