Reading betty's journal

I have so many notebooks filled with partial stories and story ideas, but I never finish them. As soon as a great introduction gets put on paper, my interest in the story tapers off, and I start another. I do have one that I managed to write about 50 typed pages on, and it is pretty good, but I have no idea where to take it from its current position, nor whether I want it to go anywhere.

My latest excuse for not writing has been that I didn't have Word on this new computer. Then my wonderful, thoughtful, supportive boyfriend bought Word and installed it for me. Now I have files full of partial stories and story ideas.

What sucks is that everyone that knows me thinks that I'm this great writer, that I'm destined for greatness and immortality through the printed word. Many of them also think I'm an artist and a musician, too. What they don't know is that I'm not great at anything. I'm mediocre.

Mediocrity didn't used to bother me, but lately it has gotten under my skin. And not in the romantic Frank Sinatra way, either. I'm realizing that I don't feel passionate about anything- and if I do, the passion is so transient that I lose interest after a short time.

I wonder if I am depressed or if I have some sort of a learning disabiliy. I'd rather be depressed, just because I'm tired of people putting diagnoses to their shortcomings.

I am just me, searching for simplicity.........and a good hair stylist

This post was edited by betty on Jan 22, 2005.

Medocricy is only one view on the subject, and it happens to be yours.
Every writer, artist, muscian and every other creative person I know sees the worst about themselves and has a difficult time getting past that.
Including me.

I've got all these people telling me how I need to get out there and do something with my art because I'm so extrodinary as an artist. (I am doing something with my art, I'm doing it)
I keep getting told I should be doing this, I should be doing that, all the while they are throwing out ideas that make me wonder if they would be able to do them if they were the one having the expectations thrown at.
What they've all forgotten in this is I'm just me. I know there are artists who are better, and more sucessful and more this or that.

The expectations that others have of who they see us as is hard to live up to, live under or even wake up to.
It makes being able to relax enough to do what we love hard, at best.
And when it isn't this free flowing "perfection", that somehow means we are automaticly less than...
The funny thing is we have the idea that they all must be right, because after all they stand there ooohing and aaahing over ever bit we do, and so we try to come up with something extroidnary to match or beat the wonderful that we've created, only to realize that we are not quite able to get there.
So we get frustrated and start over.

Maybe what suits you best is writing smaller bodies of work.
Enough zing to carry you through to an ending.

...at any rate, you've obviously got a unique body of work, one might say it's a volume of great beginnings...
Let the immagination run and let reader finish it for themselves....

just a thought

It only looks that way because your standing on your head.

I've actually thought of putting together a "Book of Starts".
That was until I heard of National Novel Writing Month (NaNoWriMo), in the book No Plot, No Problem!.

National Novel Writing Month is in November, and the ultimate goal is to write a 50,000 word story without a plan or preconceived greatness. You just write to write; most likely the whole thing will be crap, but it sounds like fun. I'm thinking about trying it.

There is a web sight, I'm probably going to check it out as soon as I get done writing this message.

The idea seems great to me. Too often I get hung up on perfecting what I'm writing and I lose my ideas for the flow in the process. With NaNoWriMo I'll be worrying more about quantity than quality. I can actually finish something then clean it up after completion.

Maybe this will help me from being so anal in my writing, give me the fresh new start that i've been looking for.

I am just me, searching for simplicity.........and a good hair stylist