Pausing is Powerful

On finishing my first draft...

We talk about chasing dreams and goals with full steam ahead, pacing ourselves after we’ve overcome the uncertainty and fear of starting. There’s a sense of urgency that screams ‘NOW! DO IT NOW! FINISH IT NOW! YOU BARELY HAVE TIME!’ Every fibre in our being wants to eat, sleep, drink, nitpick and obsess over that one thing. A mention of it gets our ears perked up and we vibrate from excitement because it's what we’ve been ‘called’ to do, and surely we can’t be wrong for being too focused right? 

Objectively speaking there isn’t, but in the process of things life can happen and a lot of the time, the process involves waiting, slowing down and looking away from our work. It could include waiting for feedback after sending out applications, uploading a video or sending out newsletters. It could include setting your manuscript aside for a month so you could edit it with fresh eyes and let the story marinate (and yes there were tears at the realisation of this). 

It dawns on me that sometimes, there’s nothing more you can do but wait, and my God it can be excruciating. Everything in your body finds it unnatural, your mind starts fanatically searching for instructions because what do you do when you’re in limbo and it feels like waking up without falling asleep? There is the adrenaline haze that comes with ending a goal or hitting a milestone and transitioning into a state of rest or finding what next to do. It's fuzzy, it's weird and it’s uncomfortable. 

I finished my first manuscript about two weeks ago. It's a huge deal I tell you, a freaking huge deal and I am so proud of myself for getting to this point. I feel a lot more mature as a writer and that has made me realise that there’s a process to everything! From something as mundane as walking to building a rocket, there’s a process to it. As creatives, it's a tricky thing to learn especially when you’re young and passionate.

It's why a lot of our first few works don’t make as much sense and are barely refined enough despite how good they might seem. The good thing about falling in love with your craft means waking up and finding out its much more work to be done and it's not unwelcome. Sure you might bitch about it and ask the gods ‘Who sent me?’ but you’ll meet each step with curiosity awe and intentionality and before you know it you’re on a roll. 

It’s easy to start out wanting to be the exception, or with the mindset that ‘rules are meant to be broken’ and ‘I want my style’ but that’s such a funny thing because even without our crafts we are an embodiment of everyone and everything we have interacted with. We carry them with us everywhere without knowing it. Isn’t it better to pick and choose what you let bleed into your work with intention then? 

Getting to the editing phase and following ‘how-to’ guides on it is fun. I always thought editing takes the fun out of writing till I started reading this book;  fix your damn book by James Osiris and realised that a lot of these general ‘rules’ and processes aren’t made to stifle our voices and messages, it’s supposed to refine them and it's from knowing what their function and the ‘why’ behind it, that we can find out if it serves our art or if it needs to be trashed. 

Anyway, I’ll take this short break to focus on shorter projects and maybe touch grass a bit too. 

Bye!

Janoma

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Author’s Note

You Guys!!!!! We have so many new people here *intense screams!!!!!*. So I made a post on notes about completing the first draft of my novel and I got so much love and more about 60 ish new subscribers. I just want to say thank you so much and welcome aboard!

For a short re-introduction: Midnight Musings is a safe space and companion for the wandering young adults who are still figuring this “adulting’ thing out and won’t mind company along the way. I write articles, poems and short stories documenting the experiences of young people through my eyes. I am also very much open to collaborations!!

Song of the Week:

I’m falling in love with Mitski lately, and Washing Machine Heart feels like something one of my Main Characters would listen to cause he’s not like other boys hehe.