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Let's Get Serious
I fear I need to make myself unpopular again.
Just to be clear, this is never a goal, just an acknowledgment of what will happen. I honestly remain puzzled at how people can take offense to me stating my idiotic opinion on how I view and interact with the world, but, as ample evidence has demonstrated, they do.
But as I consider the resultant behaviour irrational, I can't get too worked up about these folks, even though I may enjoy poking them when they do get offended because I dare have an opinion for which they do not care. I view it the same as finding coins on the ground. When I find a coin, I pick it up. I am told by some folks that you only pick up heads up coins because others are bad luck. OK, I won't mock you for your superstition; I will just pick up the coin and then mock you should you have to try to lecture me.
See how that works? I leave people alone until they decide they need to apply their idiot behaviour to me. I've got my own idiot behaviour, I'm doing fine, move along.
But, hard to believe, this isn't the main reason some folks will get upset with me. Let's dive right into the fray.
I consider myself a serious writer. This does not mean I claim to be good or talented or anything other than serious. I am a serious martial artist, a serious actor, a serious father, and a serious writer, among other things.
By serious I mean I try to be aware of and constantly improve myself in these areas. I reflect on my methods and my actions and my successes and failures. I take notes and avoid making the same mistake twice and listen when people who are more successful than I am tell me how to get better.
I am willing to change and embrace new ideas and break down into minutia all the reasons everything happens so I can understand it better and become better at it faster.
How does this apply to writing? I take monthly backups of everything I write, saved to DVD, stored securely. I track versions and note by date significant changes in a piece of work. Any story, poem, essay, etc., I write I write it as if it were going to be published. I am intolerant of errors and an attitude of "good enough," striving for everything to be, at least, "good."
This is why it is alien to me the way many folks approach their writing, treating it as if it were a bowel movement that they had processed and now must be released, never to be touched again.
And, quite honestly, I am not intending to say everything they write is shit, what I am saying is that the only control they acknowledge is that they were there when it happened and are responsible for the end result. What's more, often the only copy of anything they have is what they’ve submitted to Neopoet.
And if the difference in approach and outlook were not enough, this is what makes me think:
"Really?"
Because in my mind if you do not have a copy of your work in a safe location you are implicitly saying:
"This is just some crap I did."
And, truth be told, I believe you.
Just to be clear, this is never a goal, just an acknowledgment of what will happen. I honestly remain puzzled at how people can take offense to me stating my idiotic opinion on how I view and interact with the world, but, as ample evidence has demonstrated, they do.
But as I consider the resultant behaviour irrational, I can't get too worked up about these folks, even though I may enjoy poking them when they do get offended because I dare have an opinion for which they do not care. I view it the same as finding coins on the ground. When I find a coin, I pick it up. I am told by some folks that you only pick up heads up coins because others are bad luck. OK, I won't mock you for your superstition; I will just pick up the coin and then mock you should you have to try to lecture me.
See how that works? I leave people alone until they decide they need to apply their idiot behaviour to me. I've got my own idiot behaviour, I'm doing fine, move along.
But, hard to believe, this isn't the main reason some folks will get upset with me. Let's dive right into the fray.
I consider myself a serious writer. This does not mean I claim to be good or talented or anything other than serious. I am a serious martial artist, a serious actor, a serious father, and a serious writer, among other things.
By serious I mean I try to be aware of and constantly improve myself in these areas. I reflect on my methods and my actions and my successes and failures. I take notes and avoid making the same mistake twice and listen when people who are more successful than I am tell me how to get better.
I am willing to change and embrace new ideas and break down into minutia all the reasons everything happens so I can understand it better and become better at it faster.
How does this apply to writing? I take monthly backups of everything I write, saved to DVD, stored securely. I track versions and note by date significant changes in a piece of work. Any story, poem, essay, etc., I write I write it as if it were going to be published. I am intolerant of errors and an attitude of "good enough," striving for everything to be, at least, "good."
This is why it is alien to me the way many folks approach their writing, treating it as if it were a bowel movement that they had processed and now must be released, never to be touched again.
And, quite honestly, I am not intending to say everything they write is shit, what I am saying is that the only control they acknowledge is that they were there when it happened and are responsible for the end result. What's more, often the only copy of anything they have is what they’ve submitted to Neopoet.
And if the difference in approach and outlook were not enough, this is what makes me think:
"Really?"
Because in my mind if you do not have a copy of your work in a safe location you are implicitly saying:
"This is just some crap I did."
And, truth be told, I believe you.