Despite all the work I’ve done on myself, despite trying to reframe creative endeavors as a process, not a binary, I realized I still expect myself to be able to do the new job perfectly after less than a month. Because it’s just writing! I should be able to do that, I’ve done it forever, it’s easy…except when it isn’t.
Austin Kleon linked this last week in his newsletter and it blew my mind. It’s from a book by Verlyn Klinkenborg, as blogged by Mandy Brown:
If you think that writing—the act of composition—should flow, and it doesn’t, what are you likely to feel?
Obstructed, defeated, inadequate, blocked, perhaps even stupid.
The idea of writer’s block, in its ordinary sense, exists largely because of the notion that writing should flow.
But if you accept that writing is hard work, and that’s what it feels like when you’re writing,
then everything is as it should be.
Your labor isn’t a sign of defeat.
It’s a sign of engagement.
The difference is all in your mind, but what a difference.