Getting out of Your Own Way

[truepenny]

[first published on Storytellers Unplugged, July 7, 2010]

“I do take my work seriously and the way to do that is not to take yourself too seriously.” –Alan Rickman

---

So I was talking with a friend the other day about writing and art and being, or not being, a pretentious asshole, and she said, “Why don’t you write a Storytellers Unplugged post about that?”

And I said, “Thank you for doing my homework for me.”

Because it is a problem, and I think it’s one we all go through, the pendulum swing from “I’m just playing around, there’s no need to take anything I do seriously” to “I am a Serious Writer and you must Admire my Art.” The key, I think, is the Alan Rickman quote I used as an epigraph, not least because he shifts the discussion from “art” to “work.” Frankly, “Is it art?” is something so subjective that it’s not a useful question for an artist to ask. Everyone’s answer to “What is art?” is different, and even something that seems to be a consensus may be overturned in another five years, or twenty, or a hundred. And it’s something that you can’t control. Whereas, “Is it work?” is a pretty easy question.

But it can be hard to get the balance right between taking your work seriously and not taking yourself too seriously, especially when there are so many factors conspiring to make you feel defensive about taking your work seriously. There’s a lot of pressure on people who do creative things to be self-deprecating about them, whether it’s the “it’s just a hobby” gambit or “I’m not really any good at it” or (if you are a professional) “I’m just a hack.” All of which are ways of abjuring the idea that one takes one’s work seriously.

When I was a teenager, I went militantly the other way. I had a teacher who disparaged genre fiction, and I bristled up like a porcupine and became very much, “This is my Art and I am an Artist, and I will make you see the error of your ways!” It’s the opposite reaction, but it’s just as much a defense as the other. And there for a while, yes, I was really hard to live with. I’m not sure what knocked it out of me, but I think part of it was learning that making art and Being An Artist are not the same thing. You can do one without having anything to do with the other. Making art doesn’t require starving in a garret or being crazy or doing drugs or getting an M.F.A. or any of the other thousand and one things our culture thinks artists have to do. All that making art requires is that you do the work.

You don’t have to be defensive about it, either. You don’t have to tear yourself down, and you don’t have to build yourself up. Neither one makes a difference to the work you’re doing, unless you let yourself become poisoned with your own propaganda. Self-deprecation and self-aggrandizement are about how the world sees you and how you see yourself, and goodness knows it’s something we all struggle with, but it’s also, from another perspective, missing the point. Because the thing at stake isn’t your self (arguably, your self is just sitting around getting in the way), it’s your work. For me, at least, it’s easy to say, “Oh, I’m not a very good writer,” but it’s quite another thing to say, “Oh, that’s not a very good story.” Because, dude, if it’s not a good story, why did I send it out? Why did the editor buy and publish it? And in my heart of hearts, while “I’m not a very good writer,” may feel true a whole freaking lot of the time, “That’s not a good story,” is going to feel like a lie. If I’ve gotten to the point of sending it out, I believe it’s a good story, and it’s nonsense to try to say otherwise.

For me, I think that’s the crux of the matter. Not whether I’m taking myself seriously, or not seriously, but whether I’m taking my work seriously. Because the rest of it, a lot of the time? Is just my self getting in the way.