Criticism is a really odd thing. It’s not odd in the sense that it’s unexpected, but what’s odd about it is what it can do to you, especially when you realize that it’s the first time you’ve really ever experienced it.
Writing is always something that’s clicked for me. This is no surprise - I’m a writer. Two and two generally tends to make four, or at least enough that I’ve come to rely on it. I’ve always excelled in with all things writing - my published works, with beta readers, and in workshop settings. Sure, I’ve experienced criticism before, but I’ve never had comments, questions, and suggestions shake me to the point where I’m losing sleep. Until now.
My MFA-level workshop is really the first time I’m surrounded by people who don’t take my work for granted as good (or who aren’t expecting and hoping it to be), and who are criticizing it on both a macro and micro level. I, of course, expected this - and even wanted it as a way to thicken my skin and improve my book - so it’s not my own imperfections to which I’m reacting. In fact, I’m grateful to see the holes, the disconnects, the tired language to which my own tunnel vision has blinded me. However, it’s how the criticism is affecting me and my process that’s really knocked me flat out.
I’ve never been at a point where I’ve received so many conflicting opinions - and ones that conflict with my gut instincts, too - where I have no way to reconcile all of the information that’s coming at me. Where I have no idea what to take with a grain of salt, and what to embrace fully. Where I have no idea how my intentions and gut play into everything. Where I am asking questions of myself to which no answers exist. So now, I’m terrified to open up my computer and begin work, because all of the input has become so jumbled that I can’t stare at the screen without feeling like everything is totally inadequate, like I’ll never be able to fix it, and even if I could, like a solution even exists. Like I’ll never be able to bring certain sections of prose up to to the level of some of the other writing in the book. When I open my laptop, I can’t even figure out which questions and comments are the ones that are stopping me in the first place.
I sat and had a long talk with my professor tonight about how this is all affecting me, and it was the first time I’d had the realization that I’ve never really been criticized like this before. It explains why my reaction has been so consuming, so shocking, and so halting. I have no experience on how to internalize things, how to detach myself from certain comments and pick and choose what’s meaningful, and how to prioritize my own instincts using that little thing called “confidence.”
I hope that gaining a little bit of perspective on why I’m having such a visceral reaction will help me calm down. Thanks to Stephen, I’ve given myself a concrete, small task to try out to help ease me back in, give me some confidence, and free me from trying to revise the entire manuscript in one go. I’m anxious to see how I do.
I know I’m in a unique situation: I’m very young and not previously published in fiction, but I’m sitting on a strong, potentially publishable manuscript with professional interest and the weight of a time crunch over me. It’s inevitable that there’s going to be some kind of dissonance in that equation that may very well end up feeling like a bit of a car crash sometimes. I’m just hoping that I will learn to ease up on myself sooner rather than later.
M
