What Would You Write If You Weren't Afraid?

 

 I'm working away on my novella for the FIRE OF THE FROST midwinter holiday fantasy romance anthology! The story takes place in the Bonds of Magic world more or less at the same time as the events in DARK WIZARD. You can preorder now for the December 2 release!

    

Also, this is really cool! THE ORCHID THRONE is on this amazing Book Riot list: 20 OF THE BEST ENEMIES-TO-LOVERS FANTASY BOOKS. Fair warning! This list might have you click-buying. It sure did for me. 

At the SFF Seven this week we're talking censorship. Charissa and KAK already provided excellent discussions of the difference between censorship and blocking disinformation and hate. So, I'm going to take the topic in a slightly different direction, which is looking at the ways we censor ourselves. 

A perennial problem for writers - perhaps for all creatives - is getting rid of the other voices in our heads. Something new authors often seem to ask is how to write about topics their families consider off limits for one reason or another. They can be concerned about dealing with sexual topics or gender-related ones, politics, family secrets, etc. It's not easy to free ourselves to write when there's that persistent worry that someone we love will read it and be angry. And so we censor ourselves, sometimes consciously, sometimes unconsciously. 

On a larger scale, we live in an era of loud voices. In an attention economy, where businesses thrive or fail based on clicks, the loudest, most persistent voices can be the most lucrative. This kind of environment isn't conducive to the silence creatives need in order to coax new art into being. Those loud voices can drown out the quiet whispers of something fragile and newly born to the world. The voices can also leak into our thoughts and dictate what we should and shouldn't write. Thus we censor ourselves, killing those new sprouts before we even have time to discover what they are.

What's the solution? There are no easy answers. I can offer that I have a poster hanging over my desk, one I made myself. It says:

What would you write if you weren't afraid?

I look at it often when I hesitate, when voices leak into my head, when I start worrying about the final story and how it will be received. It keeps me going. 

Write through the fear. You can always edit later. 

Is Fear Holding You Back in Your Writing?

Today is the very last day to catch the AMID THE WINTER SNOW anthology. After today it goes off sale and the stories will only be available as stand-alones.

Our topic at the SFF Seven this week is Our Favorite Motivational/Inspirational Quote.

Mine is so beloved that I have it hanging over my desk. Let me all-cap it for you.

WHAT WOULD YOU WRITE IF YOU WEREN'T AFRAID?

Any time I hesitate while writing, I look at that. And, liberated, I plow forward.

Now, sometimes when I talk about this, people tell me they aren't afraid of anything, certainly not in their writing. Which is fabulous, I guess.

(Really, I don't believe them.)

It's human nature to be afraid. Fear is a protective instinct that kept us from being munched by tigers back in the day and keeps us in the clear with the IRS now. Being afraid of the right things is healthy.

And I'm not talking about gibbering terror. I mean things like being nervous about walking down that skeezy looking dark alley or hesitating over a funky-smelling leftover from the fridge. Those things are warnings to think twice.

The problem is that we become conditioned to hesitate over social gaffes, too. After all, on an instinctual level, being outcast from the herd means the wolves can get us. In the age of social media, we worry about reactions from other people from sneering reviews to mass outrage.

Some of that is important. We need to observe our own biases and review what our privilege leads us to unthinkingly do and say. But that's for a later stage of the work - for review and thoughtful revision.

Before that, we owe it to ourselves and our creative process to disengage from caution and hesitation, to write what comes out. To write what is in us and wants to be spoken.

Write with courage and boldness, always.