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LadyBug
Member
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Posted: Sat Apr 19th, 2008 07:45 pm |
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I'm a pain in the ass. I'm exceedingly eager. I'm opinionated. I won't trust one persons word on anything, even if they're a supposed expert. And I'm not stubborn enough to stick to a project indefinitely.
You'd think eagerness is a good thing but it seems to really turn some people off. Send too many long emails full of my thoughts on a subject and some people just stop responding.
I compulsively speak my mind, even when I know it will offend people. I'm willing to admit when I'm wrong, but this just often comes off like I'm weak and uninformed. I try to do all my research BEFORE I speak my mind but sometimes there are things you can't know until someone experienced tells you.
I know there are experts out there, but experts are people. And people are often made up of their opinions and perceptions. Two experts can give different views on the same subject. Therefore, logically, I can't trust ONE person to tell me the whole story. I think I upset some authorities because I won't just defer to their opinion, even if they're way more informed than I am.
I give up on a project if it's not working. I'll beat my head on a problem for long a while. I'm still trying to do my Online Reading Circle for Playwright despite the fact that we're continually short on scripts and participants. If it doesn't perk up in the next couple months I'll move on. Or I'll try to make it evolve into something that works. But I'm just not stubborn enough to stay with something that isn't working for an indefinite period of time.
Here's my problem; all of these reasons are why I'm terrible at social networking. I don't like going out into the world and selling myself. Everyone keeps telling me that people who are successful have to become good at social networking. I'm willing to live with limited success but how do I acheive that when I'm SOOOO terrible at the one thing that everyone keeps telling me I need to be good at?
I'm the kind of writer that sits at home and writes. I'm in my early thirties. I have 15 years worth of writing just sitting in my home and spread across the internet. 170+ Poems, 50+ Essays, 6 Novellas, 5 Full length Plays, 12+ Short Plays, and 26 YouTube Video Poems.
The world doesn't seem reward writers like me, so I'm trying to find ways around these parts of my personality. If anyone can give me some helpful thoughts as to how to work around my shortcomings, I would love to hear it. I know some of you will have the urge to tell me how to change my shortcomings but that just isn't going to happen. I believe your more likely to be successful if you find some way to work around a bad habit than to go cold turkey.
Last edited on Sat Apr 19th, 2008 10:57 pm by LadyBug
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Edd
Moderator
| Joined: | Sat Jun 10th, 2006 |
| Location: | Denver, Colorado USA |
| Posts: | 920 |
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Posted: Sat Apr 19th, 2008 08:47 pm |
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My dear LadyBug,
I really don't see you as having a problem, according to what you wrote. All the things you seem to think are negative, seem like requisite personality traits to the making of a genuine person--the Artist. You sound very much like me, so naturally I think you may even be a genius. :-)
Being opinionated is the only sticky issue. I, as with most of us, am very opinionated, but what I've had to learn for my own good was to respect the opinions of others. I learned to say to friends, and strangers alike, that I don't appreciate or haven't yet learned to appreciate a thing when I'm thinking that the thing in question is a pile of-- Why? Because I've learned to respect the opinions of others by learning to respect others through some very good examples I was (and am) blessed to have in my life. Some right here in this forum. It took me a very long time to learn I wasn't "It" and that there is a world filled with Humanity who believe that through their eyes is the center of all. It is a common and Human phenomenon. It pains me when I share the fact that I love something and someone proceeds to tell me how much they hate it. It seems such unnecessary provocation. Now, it also pains me as much to hear myself saying something that may hurt another, so I try not to. My mentor back when I thought I was a poet--he was a novelist--said to me, "Nobody cares what you don't like. Tell them what you do like." Sage advice and I haven't forgotten it in over forty years. (Hello, Marc. I hope you're up there watching over me. I wish you hadn't drunk so much.) What I also learned is that how we say a thing may well be as important as the thing we say.
The more I learn about myself, the more I learn about others and the more I learn how to get along with others--and "the how" and "the what" we express in our writing is bound to improve. For me, it's all a matter of maturation and I don't want it to stop till the moment I die--or longer if it's in the stars.
"The world doesn't reward people like me," is indeed a sentiment I do not share. I guess I haven't learned to appreciate that point of view, or I've been at that fair before and stayed too long. I person like you taught me how to read--really read. It was a person like you who taught me the difference between strings of words and Literature. A person like you offended and made enemies of many. I met that person through her work while in my early thirties. She turned my world upside down. She became my spiritual mentor and remains so to this day. Her name is Gertrude Stein.
Just keep doing what you're doing. Get your stuff out. And, here's a really important secret: If you continue to believe that the world doesn't reward people like you--it most likely won't. Some blame the world and some really don't want the world to reward them. Some find that doing the best work possible is reward enough. I guess it all depends on what one really wants.
I wish you love, laughter, bravos and fabulous lighting,
Edd
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LadyBug
Member
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Posted: Sat Apr 19th, 2008 11:03 pm |
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Edd,
Thank you so much for your reply. I greatly appreciate your insight.
I added the word "seem" to "The world doesn't reward writers like me," because you are completely right. If I let myself believe that no one will ever be into my work, I'm setting myself up for failure. And what I really feel is that it SEEMS like the world doesn't reward artists like myself.
Despite that seem, I continue to pound the proverbial pavement because there are writers out in the world that HAVE made it and ALSO challenge my preconceptions. So, I do have some small belief that I can make it. Even if I have moments of feeling like I'm beating a dead horse.
Eliz
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