Insecurity check-in

Yep, mine's still there. As most of you know, today is the day for letting all those fears hang out. Brought to you courtesy of Alex Cavenaugh's
                                      
I wrote myself a note, this morning, that I needed to do this blog. So now, this evening, I am finally writing it. Now, don't think I don't know that you can write blogs ahead of time and then post them. But I always feel like I'm cheating if I do that. Please know for any of you that plan out your blogs, I don't think YOU are cheating, the rule only applies to me. Because it might make my life easier, it must be wrong on some level. Which leads me to my trembling knees vent for this month.

I am too disorganized to ever be able to make a go of a writing career. One of my friends came over recently and looked around my house at the bins, shelving, and hooks on the wall and said,"Don't buy any more things to organize with because you don't use them." She is correct and not mean like the comment makes her sound.

I have, in my life, attempted multiple systems that I was certain would lead me to a life of tranquility, the type of peace that can only occur when your setting is not the- move some stuff around so I can get to the keyboard- chaotic one. I have attempted to fly with Flylady and bought agendas, and calenders, and all sorts of electronic devices.

Each of these things work for a little while but then, once the newness wears off, I revert. Writing doesn't take tons of effort after I get started but finishing and editing do. I could produce multiple rough drafts every week if I never had to fix them. Which is the place I find myself now. I have probably 15-20 short stories, a few novelettes, and at least two novels that just aren't publish ready. (Publish ready HA!, one of the novels is split into two parts that need to be somehow combined). Then, there are the new story ideas weaving down the boulevard. I think somewhere deep down I believe the next story I truly love will inspire me to do the work necessary to make it a sale. That being said, I have truly loved almost all of these stories when I wrote them with the exception of one horror one that disturbed even me so I was happy to leave that behind.

So, do I go back and edit? Or do I move forward with new stories? At what point do I stop and say enough to the dancing muse and focus on fixing the ones already on the hard drive?

Do I really have anything to say? (Insecure Writer's group #2)

Hello, why yes, I am an insecure writer on so many sad, sad levels. This blog hop was created by Alex J Cavanaugh  as a way to provide Insecure Writers Support .  I totally stole those links because I still have been too lazy to learn to do it. Except that it isn't really laziness, technology frustrates me in that things that seem pretty easy to others often elude me. People have offered to help but I'm worried if they try to show me and I can't get it, I'll look stupid. I have spent at least an hour trying to figure it out before, but like some of the higher math classes, some concepts seem to hit a brick wall in my head which leaves me jumping on the other side trying to see over it and all I get is tired and frustrated.

I'm feeling like that about writing too. I finished nano and part of me is excited about getting in there to do some clean up but then another part of me asks if there is any point to it? My pattern seems to be to work at something for a little while and then I just want to be done. That would be fine if, five drafts in, my work was published, critically lauded, and sending me royalties (really, I'd be happy with the first and last or actually just the first).

Most of the time, I send it off, hoping that it is good enough so I can stop revising, and it usually isn't. Which then makes me wonder if it is just that my stories will never be clean enough to communicate my ideas. Or is it something even more horrible?

Could my ideas suck? Maybe nothing I write has any real substance. Other kind writers and friends clap me on the back (metaphorically speaking) and say they love the stories but the rejections keep coming. After paying for an editor to give me suggestions and revising it accordingly, my YA novel (my first nano novel) was rejected by over 30 agents. Not all of them requested the full novel but at least five of them did before rejecting various versions. I made so many "Improvements" in that book, not knowing what wasn't working, that it is a mess now.  I shudder when I think about going back to try to clean it up. Not to mention that the request is not to resubmit to the same agent and I don't think there are any left that do YA that I didn't hit up at one point or another in the revision process.

So I move on to the next project. I've been published a few times on my short stories ( a very small percentage given the amount that I have submitted) so I think that maybe I need to only focus there.  Only, every short story is part of a novel in my head. The question becomes will anyone but me ever care if I don't write the stories? I know it is perseverence, dedication, and hard work that make it happen but I've had a long, dry spell and I'm feeling a bit parched.