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00:00:01
The Imposter's Guide to Writing Anyway
162 Plays1 month ago
In this episode of Pen Pals, Krisserin and Kelton confront the demons of self-doubt that haunt their writing lives. Between morning pages and late-night edits, they unpack their deepest insecurities: Krisserin fears her technically-sound writing lacks soul, while Kelton wonders if she knows how to craft a novel at all. They swap strategies for silencing the critics – both external and internal – from reading work aloud to find its rhythm, to using other art as a 'pulley system' to escape creative ditches. Through tales of childhood competitive classmates and bosses who demanded humility after success, they recognize how much of their imposter syndrome comes from voices outside themselves. With their new approach of assigning each other goals, Krisserin commits to editing two specific chapters while maintaining her 5AM writing routine, and Kelton agrees to brain-dump her novel's treatment before tackling 1,500 new words. As they navigate their writing journeys, they discover that sometimes the most difficult character to write convincingly is the one who believes in herself.
Get in contact with us at: officialpenpalspod@gmail.com
Music by Golden Hour Oasis Studios
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Transcript
00:00:00
Speaker
Hi, Kelton. Hi, Chris Erin. How are you this week? You know, feeling like a fraud. I'm Chris Erin Canary. And I'm Kelton Wright. Follow our quest to publish our first novel. From first drafts to query letters, through inevitable rejections, and hopefully eventual success.
00:00:17
Speaker
From California to Colorado, this is Pen Pals. How are you doing this week, Kelton? Gosh, how am I this week? I did wake up in a really bad mood today. Like, of no fault of the child or the husband or any animal or my body.
00:00:35
Speaker
You know, it's not even like PMS time. I just woke up and was like... but You had a bad dream? No, I had really good dreams. Maybe you're just resentful that you couldn't stay in your dream and you had to wake up and live life.
00:00:47
Speaker
I know. I woke up before it got real good and was like, God damn it. Put me back. I definitely have those mornings when I wake up after having a dream in which my husband did something that pissed me off and I'm like looking at him sideways. I'm sorry to hear that you woke up in a bad mood.
00:01:06
Speaker
ah Hopefully things will get better today. Yeah, at least I didn't wake up feeling like an imposter, which is what we're talking about. Good old imposter syndrome. Yeah, I don't wake up feeling it like an imposter. It's once I sit down to do the work and start reading what I wrote, then the doubt starts seeping in.
00:01:26
Speaker
All right. Before we get into this week's episode, we got to talk about, did we accomplish our goals? Chris Aaron? do need to talk about that. Oh boy. How did you do I have to thank you because i did print out my book and I was able to read the whole thing in a couple of days and waking up at 5am and sitting down and just reading was actually a great call. I think in past when I have done that and I printed out the book, it felt like a very daunting task.
00:01:58
Speaker
And this time I came to it with a different attitude and it went by really quickly. And then I spent the rest of the week editing like two page two, three pages, but I did it. And I have you to thank for encouraging me too. Cause I think I was feeling overwhelmed, but then when you gave me that challenge, I was like, all right, well, Kelton told me to do it. So I'm going to do it. So thank you. All right.
00:02:26
Speaker
Mood boost. Number one, I'm feeling better. That's awesome. I saw the printout of your book and was so excited for you. That's so rad. How long do you think cumulative it did take you to write the first draft or or this is this technically the second draft?
00:02:42
Speaker
Well, if we're being honest, when I started this rewrite, the draft that I was working off of was the fourth draft. and take So I started writing this book in 2012. I put it down in 2016. I've been working on it for four years.
00:02:59
Speaker
And then I picked it back up again in 2024. So cumulatively, it's taken me 13 years to get to this draft. So real fast. Yeah, you know, like nothing. Well, and I think that's why i haven't had the struggle of sitting down and, and, you know, producing words because I've been thinking about this book for so long and working on it for so long. It's not yeah brand new material. These aren't puzzles that I'm trying to figure out for the first time. It's really just looking at it with fresh eyes and new perspective and trying to get the meat of things down on the page. I don't know exactly when I started working on this draft again, and' have to go back and look and, and see, but um,
00:03:45
Speaker
I can tell just based on this week because I finished reading the book, I want to say Tuesday morning. So I did it pretty quick. I read a bunch of it on Sunday, Monday and Tuesday. And then I think I started editing Wednesday morning and it took me Wednesday, Thursday and Friday to edit the first chapter.
00:04:02
Speaker
And I still have to go back and and look at it again, but sure it's going to be a lot of work. I can tell. Did you take notes while you were reading the draft or did you just read the draft?
00:04:13
Speaker
Oh, no, I marked the crap out of it. Yeah, it's got. And this is great, a great segue into like talking about eventually talking about imposter syndrome, because you know you're just like, marking things like this is horrible.
00:04:29
Speaker
X out this part, this is direct fix this, you know, so that is definitely part of the whole process is thinking, wow, I'm so glad I accomplished 80,000 words of absolute garbage no i'm kidding i didn't think that but there were some of those thoughts i'm sure and i'll have you know my goals this week which were three hours a thousand words and make ben take the baby out of the house i will clarify in the last one it's not make ben ben is happy to take the baby out of the house but all three were accomplished and technically all three were accomplished yesterday
00:05:07
Speaker
I got to... Ben asked me yesterday morning, he was like, so how how is the novel going? I don't feel like I've seen you working on it. And I was like, oh, God.
00:05:20
Speaker
And so I had... My working days are usually Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday, Saturday. And the other days are Ben's woodshop days.
00:05:31
Speaker
And so I had used Tuesday and Wednesday to crank out a whole bunch of client work. And then it was just like Thursday was pretty much all novel. And that was nice. It was a nice way to do it.
00:05:42
Speaker
Um, to just have it concentrated where I obviously I still had like take breaks, to feed the baby, blah, blah, blah. But to be able to just be like, you don't have to work on anything else today.
00:05:54
Speaker
I did have to do that several times. I had to go back to my to-do list to be like, you don't have feedback on this project. You haven't heard back about this project. You don't have to work on this project until next week. You have no reason to do any of this client work.
00:06:09
Speaker
So work on the novel. And that worked. Well, I have to say, this might be the new way for us to do things where we give each other goals because it seems like the pressure ah scott A goal imposed by someone else is really effective.
00:06:26
Speaker
So yeah, I like that. i like this framework. I like it too. Let me ask you a question. Last week when we spoke, you'd mentioned a potential new client that you may or may not be taking on. Is there any update on that?
00:06:43
Speaker
No, I actually, i emailed them and was very vague about my yeses or nos. I expressed excitement, but was like, I would love to hear more about it. And they didn't reply.
00:06:55
Speaker
and yesterday i wrote to them again and was like, hey, just checking in excited about this project. Let me know when you can talk. you know, classic, I had to go back and reread that person's email several times to be like, did they really want to work with me?
00:07:12
Speaker
Do they like me? Were they serious about this job? You know, you like, you're you're investigating the periods and exclamation points, et cetera. And I came to the conclusion that like, yes, they definitely want to work with me. This is something happening on their end. So i was like, take a breath, let it come when it comes.
00:07:30
Speaker
you're making money. It's okay. It would be nice to have more, you're paying the bills and that's, that's all you can do for now. I'm sorry, but that's so annoying.
00:07:42
Speaker
Only, only because i i understand the entire thought process that goes through considering ah decision like that. You know, it's like, oh, well, this could be a good opportunity, but then these are the things I have to sacrifice. And they sent an email and it's probably nothing to them. They were probably like, let's reach out to Kelton and see if she's available and you know it just get some irons in the fire. And the meanwhile on your end, throws you into a tailspin of like, I need to make all of these considerations and make all of these decisions on something that may or may not come to fruition. Yeah, and potentially find childcare, which yeah you know anyone who knows children or has them
00:08:26
Speaker
It should be well acquainted with how difficult it is to find childcare that you can afford right now. Yeah. So, but the the upside is this project would not start until the end of March and i am on vacation at the end of March.
00:08:43
Speaker
So, you know, i will worry about it then. Yeah. Well, sounds like we had a productive week. I'm very happy for us. Good job, us.
00:08:54
Speaker
yeah Now let's talk about all the bad thoughts we have about ourselves.
00:09:01
Speaker
Feeling like a fraud. Do you remember the first time that when someone asked like what you did, you said you were a writer?
00:09:12
Speaker
and probably repressed it
00:09:16
Speaker
it. Well, I mean, you and I have both had careers and I think it's really easy to... default to the thing that you have on your LinkedIn profile, or what you're paid to do.
00:09:28
Speaker
Right. And the thing about my job too, is it's a really unsexy title, you know, like, Ooh, I do growth marketing. What is that digital marketing? What does that mean? never mind yeah Nevermind.
00:09:43
Speaker
But you know, what I've come to say now is the thing that really fulfills me and the thing that I love most is writing. I have to almost have my career first and then qualify it as this other thing that i do you know, because if I were to, and I have presented myself as a writer, then come all the questions around. Would I have read any of your writing?
00:10:11
Speaker
Probably. um So no, I think it's, It's a weird question and I ah don't remember the first time I've said it, but i I'm sure I can recall the sentiment that I felt at the time, which was embarrassment.
00:10:26
Speaker
funny, I do remember the first time that I really identified as a writer was in 2015 when I was renewing my passport and had to fill out my occupation. And at the time I was the managing editor at Headspace. So I was doing more editing than writing, but I had just published ah book ah from my dating blog,
00:10:50
Speaker
And like words were a big part of my life at the time, even though it was like, oh, well, technically. And I wrote writer on my passport occupation. And I was like, it's for real.
00:11:03
Speaker
You are a writer. You must embody this now.
00:11:08
Speaker
i And I know that because I was just renewing my passport last month. And I was like, oh sweet baby. i remember this. What a darling. That's really cute.
00:11:19
Speaker
That's really sweet. I aspire to have writer in my bio as my profession someday. and in the meantime, my I, until I publish anything, I'm probably a little too a little too shy to do that myself, but good for you.
00:11:32
Speaker
I love that. but i love that for you. It doesn't mean I haven't come around on that a million times and been like, how do I get away with calling myself that? Because I think at least in American capitalism, what you call yourself is the primary way that you pay your bills.
00:11:51
Speaker
So like, I'm a lawyer, I'm a doctor, I'm a woodworker, I'm a painter. and You know, I think obviously nuanced conversations have tried to move away from that, from the what do you do? It's more like, what do you like to do?
00:12:06
Speaker
How do you spend your afternoons? But that is still like a funny question asked on the chairlift to a stranger. you like to spend your afternoons? They're like, uh, skiing.
00:12:17
Speaker
and So, you know, ah when I'm primarily paying my bills through content, which likewise to a digital marketing career, people are like, what is that?
00:12:28
Speaker
And you're like, well, everything that you see. i feel like Mufasa being like, this whole kingdom could be content.
00:12:39
Speaker
My mom has no idea what it is. Yeah, try explaining to someone that you're a direct-to-consumer CPG e-com manager.
00:12:51
Speaker
like, do you buy things online? i sell things online. That's what I do for a living. Well, let me ask you this. I think any healthy person questions their ability somewhat and has some sort of imposter syndrome. Do you think an element of imposter syndrome is healthy?
00:13:08
Speaker
Of questioning yourself, Yes. of feeling like an imposter. wouldn't want to say it's unhealthy because I think it's unavoidable. I do think there are the rare people who just never question themselves.
00:13:22
Speaker
And oftentimes we call those people assholes. ah but I'd like to avoid being in that category as much as possible, even though I do have kind of like rampant confidence.
00:13:38
Speaker
Rampant confidence. You know, it's like, do you remember in elementary school when there would be like an assignment that's like, describe the person that you look up to the most?
00:13:49
Speaker
Or like, who in your life do you admire? i have... several examples where I list myself and I'm like seven years old. I was like, nah, it's me, babe.
00:14:01
Speaker
It's me. Maybe I'm recording this episode with the wrong person. Listen, I have been humbled over time. i have been humbled by the algorithm.
00:14:12
Speaker
I have been humbled by like the quantification of people's enjoyment, um and which I think is a good thing. You know, it's sort of inevitable now that I look at my peers and you can you can see. It's like, here's the book sales, here's the likes, here's the shares, here's the subscribers, here's the follows.
00:14:33
Speaker
And there's these quantifiable numbers that don't really tell you how good the work is, but to a degree, they're like, well, people like this. And you know, there's there's work out there where i I know it's objectively bad and yet people love it.
00:14:48
Speaker
There is this book called The Subtle Art of Not Giving a Fuck. And it is it is a bad book. It's a bad book. you could This is like the kind of advice you give to a friend over coffee, where you're like, pull your shit together.
00:15:03
Speaker
Like, just care less. And he wrote a whole book about it. And i read an excerpt of that book like a decade ago when it came out. And I was like, this is... This is not inspiring writing.
00:15:17
Speaker
And it sold millions and millions and millions and millions of copies. So now, whenever I feel like an imposter, I'm just like, babe, it doesn't matter. Like your writing could be bad. It could be excellent.
00:15:30
Speaker
And at the end of the day, it kind of comes out in the wash. you You might make it, you might not. Doesn't matter. So that's usually my own pep talk to me when I'm feeling shitty.
00:15:43
Speaker
Which, I don't know if that works for you. you I'm just going to say, how often does that happen for you?
00:15:51
Speaker
I think weekly. Yeah. Okay. Yeah. I mean, I'm publishing weekly. And so there's always this element of like, wow, cool. I'm terrible. No one likes anything that I do. What an embarrassment I am putting myself out there. How shameful.
00:16:05
Speaker
And then I move on with my day, you know? I love that though. I mean, I think that when I look at you and when I, when I perceive Kelton, I see someone who we've talked about this, is very vulnerable every week with your newsletter and on social media. And you post a lot about it your life. And I think that that takes a lot of guts.
00:16:26
Speaker
And it also opens you up towards criticism. It opens you up towards positive and negative feedback. And I'm sure you're looking at the reaction and the engagement with those things and feeling a certain way about it, right?
00:16:42
Speaker
So, but you just keep doing it. And I think that when it comes to imposter syndrome seems to be The key is to just get over it. and Maybe that's what that guy was writing about. i didn't read that book.
00:16:55
Speaker
Get over and just keep doing it anyway. I try to think of my self-doubts like the wind here. I love where I live. I had a very specific list of things I was looking for to find this place to live.
00:17:10
Speaker
And one of the things on my list was that it could not be consistently rainy or windy. and don't like being wet and I don't like being blown. So we found everything on our list except the wind. It's so windy here. It's constantly windy. It's always blowing. And I have to still go outside and do everything that I love. And when the wind is just buffeting me constantly, I'm just like, oh, I hate this.
00:17:37
Speaker
But it's not going to stop me from going for a hike or a run or a mountain bike ride. It does occasionally stop me from sitting on the deck and enjoying a cup of coffee Like you can't be in stillness in the wind.
00:17:49
Speaker
And I think that that is sort of a great analogy or a metaphor, whatever it is for imposter syndrome. I can't be still in my self-criticism. I have to literally get up and move through it.
00:18:03
Speaker
When I am feeling that... that's really heavy doubt where it's like crippling, you can't do it. you You've hit a wall, you're blocked. I have to turn to other art or to movement.
00:18:16
Speaker
And that is the only thing that can kind of pull me out of the ditch, if you will. It's like, you can pull yourself out. You can like just do your morning pages and slog through it.
00:18:27
Speaker
But other art is like a pulley system for me. I'm just like, I feel better. ah feel better Yeah, it's true. I think when you read something really profound or if you go to a museum or even a concert, it's very inspiring.
00:18:40
Speaker
i don't get daunted by the greatness of others, but I definitely am inspired by them. And it sounds like what you're saying is with imposter syndrome. It's not avoidable, but you can move through it. You just have to keep moving through it. And I love that because it is definitely a great tip on how to overcome it.
00:19:00
Speaker
The thing I'm always struggling with is I'm always going to have negative thoughts and and negative self-talk about the work that I'm doing, especially when you are in these early stages of drafts and you're just finding your way through the story and you're writing things.
00:19:17
Speaker
you're You're just doing bad writing on purpose because you're just trying to get through the draft, right? um I think that that is inevitable, but there are going to be so many external sources negativity and people telling you that you can't do things that it's,
00:19:34
Speaker
you kind of have to have that internal self-reserve of the confidence that we're talking about to just keep moving through it anyway. Just say, I'm going to keep doing this because it's important to me and because I have to, and because I want to.
00:19:48
Speaker
um and remember earlier on in my career, i had We did this incredible deal where we went and pitched the celebrity for their business. And i had led the entire project from start to finish. I was the first person on the team. I led the presentation. I created the entire deck.
00:20:06
Speaker
And i was sitting on the rooftop of the standard hotel in the boom, boom room or whatever it's called with one of my coworkers and two of my bosses. And it was a great presentation.
00:20:17
Speaker
Everyone was on this high. And my boss said to me, just remember Chris Naren to be fumble.
00:20:27
Speaker
And I looked at him. This was months of hard work. yeah I knew it was a hand Of course, they were all men. I was the only woman. He told me, Chris Aaron, just remember need to be humble.
00:20:40
Speaker
And I looked at him and I said, fuck humility. just worked my ass off for this project and and deserve to be here, you know, and that saying that.
00:20:54
Speaker
screwed my opportunities at the company for the rest of my career there. They like looked at me differently after I said it. And I think that there is this, especially with women expectation for us to not be confident and to let imposter syndrome get us down. And so we have to work extra hard to overcome those things. And so, you know, i think that I'm, I'm okay with my own internal,
00:21:19
Speaker
self-doubt, but I get really pissed off when other people try and like push me down, you know, but then yeah I query 70 agents and get 70 rejections and I'm like, well, maybe they're right.
00:21:33
Speaker
I want to know when your negative thoughts happen, what are they saying to you? Hmm. I feel like I'm in therapy right now. What are my negative thoughts saying to me?
00:21:47
Speaker
What aren't they saying to me? I mean, on my worst days, it's usually something around the fact that, and it's it's always, it always comes back to you're not a good writer, you know?
00:22:00
Speaker
and And actually, to be honest, I have this fear, my deep seated fear. I guess I'm going share it now. Yes.
00:22:13
Speaker
I feel like throughout my life and everything that I've done, I'm a good mimic of, Like I know i can look at something and I can reproduce it.
00:22:23
Speaker
And I, whether that was in sports or if it was in, um you know, when I was doing theater, when I was younger, i can like hear voices and I can mimic them.
00:22:34
Speaker
Helps really a lot writing a dialogue because I can like hear things and then mimic them. So for me, and I'm like, thinking to myself, if am I just absorbing these things from other writers and other stories? Are people in my life and stories that I've heard told to me and just mimicking them?
00:22:53
Speaker
And i'm I can do a really great impersonation, but there's no art there. That is my biggest fear, is that the book that I'm writing and the stories that I'm telling, it is this empty thing.
00:23:08
Speaker
that when an agent reads it or when other people read it, they look at it and they go, okay, well, this is a great, this is this like surface level effort of work and it doesn't go deep, doesn't have meaning and impact. And I think that's my biggest fear.
00:23:25
Speaker
I finished my plot class recently. And in that class, Rufy Thorpe came to speak to us and someone asked a question similar to that. They were like, I'm worried that I'm just,
00:23:38
Speaker
imitating other voices. They were asking it ah in relation to, does she read other novels while she's working on one? And she was like, yes, of course I do. um And they were like, do you ever feel like you're like, oh no, I'm picking up their voice.
00:23:52
Speaker
And she was like, you might pick up someone else's voice for like a paragraph or two, but then you just start sounding like yourself. And she, you know, she made us feel good about that in the way that it's like, if you need a little engine fuel to like keep going. Maybe you do have two paragraphs that sound like someone else, but that would get edited out by the time you make it to an editor anyways.
00:24:15
Speaker
um And so she was like, you will fall back into your own voice. Like you can imitate someone's walk, but if you are walking long enough, you will just start walking like yourself again, unless you're like constantly thinking about imitating that walk.
00:24:31
Speaker
So I would encourage you to relax. Thanks. and What every woman wants to hear. yeah totally. Just relax, babe. You're overreacting. You're being so hysterical.
00:24:47
Speaker
It's not much that I'm, I mean, that's that question I used to have for myself when I was a younger writer. i used to think that I couldn't read other things while I was writing. And it was true that I could feel the impress of other writers on my work while I was reading. But that was a long time ago.
00:25:02
Speaker
I think for me, it's not so much I'm worried that my writing is going to sound like another writer's writing. Because I know that I have a unique voice in my own um ideas and stories that only I can tell.
00:25:17
Speaker
But i guess what my concern is that i could write an entire book or three. And um it is never going to get to the level where it actually has the impact that I want it to, that it's not actually... um you know, and maybe this is going back to the first rejection that I got for the first book, that these things are well, that I'm doing are well written, which is a note that I got.
00:25:47
Speaker
um What does that mean? That theyre they've been written about? No, they're well written. Like I wrote it well. Like the sentences work on a, you know, on a sentence level, the story is like put together, but then like, there's just no,
00:26:04
Speaker
meat to it. There's no soul behind it. There's nothing that leaves a lasting impression on people where they can just, you, I'm sure you've read a book and you're like, all right, you just like kind of like throw it in the pile of things that you've read and will forget. And, um, if I even get to that point. So I think that that's where my imposter syndrome is. It's more so, don't even know how to put words to it, but, um, that I can practice well enough I guess like think of about, would think about it in terms of an artist or a dancer or a singer, where I think a singer ist is a great point.
00:26:41
Speaker
You know, like I can sing. I have, again, this is why I'm like, this is might be what my my whole thing is about, but I can sing. I have good pitch. I can hit the notes properly, but my voice has no character.
00:26:56
Speaker
You know, when you're thinking of singers, you think of like people whose voices transport you to another place like Adele or Billie Holiday, these distinct sounds that no one else can um make but them. And there are lots of singers who are incredible technicians who can project and they hit the notes perfectly.
00:27:20
Speaker
But then you just like, get like it does nothing for you. And I hate to say this, but like Idina Menzel is kind of that type of singer for me where you're like, man, that woman's got pipes. But like, do I enjoy listening to her sing?
00:27:33
Speaker
Not really. No, I would never create my capacity for writing to Idina Menzel's vocal capabilities. But that's my concern. It's like, I could write a whole book that has a beginning, a middle ah end, and it has a plot and character development and it's well written.
00:27:50
Speaker
But then you're just like, and Yeah, but also all those singers you're describing, the ones with the, you know, great pitch and good pipes, but no, je ne sais quoi.
00:28:03
Speaker
They can still have very lucrative careers. Maybe not very lucrative, but they can have careers. don't want that. are you It's like, of course I want to be like Anne Lamott and Ursula K. Le Guin, but I'm also happy just having a book that makes it into Barnes & Noble.
00:28:19
Speaker
Like, I don't need to be one of the greats. I just want to be a novelist. um And I, you know, I think that the hard part with querying, obviously, is like you need to find the one person that's part of your audience that it resonates with.
00:28:35
Speaker
And so, of course, that that person who said it had it didn't have the meat or however they politely phrased it. just isn't part of your audience. I get the fear though.
00:28:46
Speaker
Like, you know, you don't want to like spend all this time on something to have it be generic, um, or basic. Um, but sometimes basic stuff rules.
00:28:59
Speaker
I see. I don't mind if it's basic, as long as it's resonating with someone, you know? Yeah. But I think again, it's, I think of these You know, you think of ballet dancer who can hit the points, but then the artistry's there. Or maybe even a ah painter who can reproduce a perfectly piece of art by an impressionist, but they have nothing of their own flair to it. I want, my my hope with my writing is that the stories that I'm telling are going to impact people and stick with them and make them feel something and afterwards. I don't want it to just like,
00:29:37
Speaker
I want people to love the stories that I'm telling. And I also want, you were like, you could have a lucrative career. was like, I don't want that. Of course I want that. Of course I want a lucrative career and I want my book in Barnes and Noble.
00:29:49
Speaker
um But I want ultimately to write something that, ah you know, my daughters will be proud to say my mom wrote that book, you know.
00:30:00
Speaker
That is also ah fantasy I have. I want Woods to be embarrassed when people are like, oh my God, your mom is Kelton Wright. And I want them to say that because of the books that I write.
00:30:14
Speaker
They'll be like, I read that essay she wrote about your dad. Hell yeah. Hell yeah. Listen, we all get famous somehow.
00:30:25
Speaker
I'll take it if I can. don't know if I want to be famous. Maybe I'll have a nom de plume. it was just like hide behind it and it terrifies me but yeah that's my biggest fear and and um when I'm letting my imposter syndrome get to me it's definitely the thing that I worry most about is maybe I'm just a really good technician and I figured out how to make it sound good and I don't know how to make it feel good but what are your demons whispering in your ear kelton
00:30:56
Speaker
My demons, when specifically when I am writing the novel, are that I don't know how to do that. I know how to write a personal essay. Like i I have it figured out for myself, the style that I want to work in and that occasionally resonates with people. But for a novel, sometimes I'm just like, I don't know how to get from point A to point B. And the little gremlin in my brain is like, and do you never will.
00:31:24
Speaker
And like, I'm just like, ah, shut up. We are just trying to get some words on the page. um But yeah, it's it's mainly that I feel like I don't know how to do this. And then where that thought, kind as it kind of tumbles down the hill and becomes a bigger snowball is that it's like, I don't know how to do this.
00:31:42
Speaker
So learning how to do this is going to take years. So even writing one book is going to take over a decade. And if it's going to take over a decade, then the resonance of this idea won't even matter at that point. So what is the point of you writing this book?
00:31:58
Speaker
Just go write one of your stupid little essays and move on with your life. And then I'm like, oh my God, Jesus Christ, calm down. And then we have to Sisyphean roll that snowball back up the hill and just be like, you are a snowman.
00:32:12
Speaker
sit here. And it's like, it's so frustrating because it really stops me in my tracks. I get barreled over by that. And then i lose momentum.
00:32:23
Speaker
And that is when I return to the weeds where I'm like, well, maybe I'll just think about story structure and I'll think about the plot and I'll like come up with more names. And it's like, I stopped writing because I feel like I don't know how to do that writing.
00:32:38
Speaker
And then I have to, you know, I do have methods for dealing with that. I pick up books but that I love and I just read a page or two. to be like, okay, that's how it works.
00:32:50
Speaker
Now that I'm working on a novel and not an essay, i every time I'm reading ah fiction book, I am kind of like, how are they moving from scene to scene? What is the goal in this scene? How many people are in it? How long are they in one place? Like I'm really inspecting it to be like, is there is there what is the momentum I'm feeling in this scene that's like making me want to read more?
00:33:14
Speaker
And it is is inspiring enough, but it's sort of like I'm putting one gallon of gas in my car at a time. And so I am like making it further down the road, but then the car just dies again.
00:33:26
Speaker
And I'm like, okay, where do I find some more gasoline, please help me And, you know, sometimes I'm like walking and leaving the car behind. You could take this anywhere you want. But I do struggle with that so much. I want to be ah great novelist, but at the end of the day, I i might just be ah a good essayist.
00:33:48
Speaker
I think you can be a great novelist. I think you have the potential to do it. It is a lot of work. It's really hard to do yeah And it's a thing that you learn how to do by doing.
00:33:58
Speaker
You're not gonna learn how to do cartwheel by watching other people do cartwheels. You have to swing your body around and be awkward and find your footing on your own. But the good news is There's a lot of things that you can do to get there besides just doing the writing, which unfortunately does take ah really long time. You were saying like, yeah, it might take a decade in my mind. i was like, no, it won't. And then I was like, wait a minute. Wait, one second.
00:34:24
Speaker
I was thinking about what we, what I said when we opened this episode and it has taken that long for me on this, at least on this book. um But, you know, The first book I wrote it, I wrote it maybe in like a year and a half and it was crap.
00:34:39
Speaker
It was crap. And then, um you know, the second book that I'm currently working on now, it took me four years of working on it and then putting it down ah and picking it back up again. But the third book I wrote, I wrote it really fast.
00:34:55
Speaker
like I think I wrote the first draft of in like four months and then I finished editing it in like a year and a half. off It yeah went by really quick and it just, it gets easier and easier and easier, which is why you see a lot of these authors who have published a ton. They just start like, you know, that and they have teams that they work with to help produce their books, but they just start spitting them out because it becomes muscle memory. Right.
00:35:21
Speaker
Yeah. I think that you're in a great position because one, you you already know what you need to do, which is reading like a writer and dissecting stories and also just reading a ton gets you there.
00:35:33
Speaker
Once you start reading a lot of books, you start seeing the patterns and how these things are set up and understanding how structure is and understanding, oh, like that's, that's what that author did there, you know? um So I feel like your imposter syndrome challenge is something that you know how to approach You just have to tell that little demon in your head to kick rocks and that you're going to be doing this thing.
00:36:03
Speaker
i have like, ah I got like psychological shit I got to get over. for I mean, my darkest demon, my, my demon that hides under all the rest um is that it's too late for me.
00:36:16
Speaker
Oh, please. but Listen, I'm telling you because I also agree. I think it's stupid. i would never say that to someone else. You know, I would never believe that for someone else. I would just be like, oh my God, you're out of your mind. What what are you talking about?
00:36:31
Speaker
I can give people the right advice and believe it all I want, but I can't help it. That's like my deep seated clawing from beneath pulling me down into the grave of not doing anything is that I'm just like, well, chances are gone.
00:36:48
Speaker
Move on. Why though? Because let me ask you a question. If you, if you could have graduated from college and just wrote and didn't have to worry about working or making money or having children or any of that, would you have published a book by now?
00:37:06
Speaker
Probably. Yeah. yeah Yeah. Not everyone can just, you know, hunker down and and just write for you know however many years in their 20s.
00:37:20
Speaker
i wish I was really busy with my career earlier on in my 20s and then I had my first child at 29. It just wasn't in the cards. It was never going to be that way for me.
00:37:31
Speaker
And I think you need to give yourself a look little grace to understand that those kid that those kids, those kids, but those little assholes who publish books in their twenty s no. I mean,
00:37:43
Speaker
It's different. It's different circumstances. That boss that told you that you needed to have some humility. I have one of those in my past. It was not a boss. It was a classmate.
00:37:54
Speaker
I think it was my senior year of high school. And we'll, I'll just call him John. John was a competitor in my class.
00:38:06
Speaker
um I was very competitive in high school. I was like, I'm going to be valedictorian, blah, blah, blah. um And John told me one day, just in the hallway, like between classes, I don't have any idea what led to this, but he was like, you know, you could be a lot more successful if you stopped focusing on your social life so much.
00:38:25
Speaker
remember even at the I was like, okay, listen, my grades are perfect. I have an amazing social life. I'm involved in everything. What more do you want from me? I feel like I'm doing great.
00:38:37
Speaker
Focus less on my social life to focus on what? um And I have never forgotten that, mainly because I think focusing on my social life has actually been the key to a lot of my success.
00:38:50
Speaker
um And that like being a social person and curious about other people and involving myself in their lives is like, Anyone will tell you that helps you get ahead. It's called networking.
00:39:03
Speaker
But I do think sometimes about that, i'm mainly in hatred and disdain, but sometimes in like, if I focused more, would I have achieved more? And it's like, well, yeah, of course. But would you like your life? Yeah.
00:39:18
Speaker
John was making you. He was trying to like get in your head. Fuck that guy I mean, he did, obviously. It's been 20 years and I'm like that son of a bitch.
00:39:30
Speaker
Yeah, where are you now, John? The audacity of a man to say something, not even a man, a boy to say something to you like that. it just, you wonder, um what were his parents telling him at home? Yeah.
00:39:45
Speaker
That's wild. Yeah. Thanks, John. Thanks. There's all everyone has a John. Everyone has some one out there that, you know, wants to see them fail. I'm sure.
00:39:57
Speaker
I also want to mention, because we're since we're talking about other people that cause these doubts, I do think that is a huge part of imposter syndrome. Obviously, a lot of it is self-inflicted, but a lot of it is going to come from what other people say and maybe not even directly to you.
00:40:13
Speaker
It might be how they speak about your genre, how they speak about like the type of art that you're pursuing. You know, it's like when I was writing the dating blog, I was putting my heart and soul into writing some like really great essays and thoughtful advice.
00:40:27
Speaker
And then a lot of people immediately dismissed me because it was about dating. And I was like, oh, have you never been on a date? You're never going on a date? Oh, how beneath you.
00:40:38
Speaker
don't you just skip that step on your way to passing Starbucks for the indie coffee shop? I'm so sorry i write about love, the topic of all the greatest stories of all time. My bad.
00:40:50
Speaker
Obviously, it still drives me crazy because it's like you can have amazing art, whatever the category. And so like when I was just getting shot down by so many people saying that that wasn't real writing, i was just like, man, you do not get it.
00:41:06
Speaker
But it's still... You know, it's like someone scraping the paint off the door. You can keep the door shut, but it's just like they they're just clawing at you. ah And that you you have to have the wherewithal to recognize when it's someone else trying to inject imposter syndrome in you.
00:41:26
Speaker
So like step back when you feel the feeling and ask what the origin is. It might be your own dirty gremlin in the basement, but it might just be someone else.
00:41:37
Speaker
And if you can recognize who it is, you can step back far enough to be like, do I think their life is cool? Do i but if someone was like, you remind me of that person, would you be happy they said that?
00:41:50
Speaker
And it's like, you know, throw a little dirt their way.
00:41:56
Speaker
i love that. i And I think there's an important distinction between feedback and criticism and just pure nagging and people who... ah Like I said before, some people just aren't going to like you. They're not going like your genre. or They're not going to like what you have to say. And those people, you just kind of have to push to the side. And with the criticism and the feedback, some of it can be helpful and it's about taking what can be helpful and pushing away everything else and just staying true to the stories that you know are important to be told and the thing that makes you unique and your voice and your weirdness and and all of that.
00:42:35
Speaker
And just focusing on the work. I think for me, i am trying to always think about how I can just push my ego aside and just focus on the story that I'm trying to tell and not worry so much about what other people are going to think about me or or, their interpretations of me as a writer and just keep working on the story and and finding the joy for me, the imposter syndrome goes out the door when I'm doing the work, when I know I've put everything that I could into it and there's nothing else I could do to improve it.
00:43:11
Speaker
Um, and I read sentences that I've put together and things that I've written where I'm like, I feel really good about this. Like I, I love this. um One thing that I find very helpful is was talking about it in my class this week.
00:43:29
Speaker
We're going to be doing readings next week of our work that we worked on during the class. And when you practice for reading or when you're getting something together where you're just trying to like get it to a really clean and polished place, reading your work out loud and being able to hear your words spoken is can be like a terrifying thing, but you hear all of the mistakes, you hear all of the little things that you don't love.
00:43:52
Speaker
And by the end of it, if you just, even if you're not going to read it for someone else, and you're only reading it out loud to yourself. You can get your work to a spit polish shine that you can feel really proud about.
00:44:05
Speaker
And it's a really good method to kind of like shake off any lingering feeling of like, I'm not a good writer because when you speak the words out loud and you can like feel them in your body, you almost have ah this like physical reaction where you're like, Ooh, really like this.
00:44:22
Speaker
i love this. So that's my little um way of getting ah bit of a boost from, from my own work and making myself feel better about the things that I'm producing.
00:44:36
Speaker
I love that. I also do that. um After I send an essay on Sundays, I reread it several times to myself out loud. Part of it is just like, what did I miss?
00:44:49
Speaker
Where am I sloppy? But a lot of it is just the enjoyment of like, I liked that. Good. Satisfying. My daughter, of course, in true fashion, they always say that your children or your parents' revenge. And, ah Last night at like 10 o'clock at night, my daughter was working on an essay that was due last night, of course, because I was always the kid waiting to the last second. My mom's like driving me to Staples at like 11 o'clock at night because I needed some special folder that I forgot to ask her for the next day.
00:45:21
Speaker
um So we were working on this essay last night that she had to write about Helen Keller. And I started reading her work out loud. And she was like, you know, she's like, reaching over to the keyboard and like fixing things as I'm reading And I said, this what you should be doing. you know, like, this is how you know that you are going to feel good about something that you're writing is. It's We read a lot like, you know, when we're reading books, we never we never read books out loud unless you are reading to your child, which I do often.
00:45:51
Speaker
But when you're reading for yourself, you typically don't. But when you do read it out loud, you hear everything. It's amazing how like adding that extra, that extra sense to the experience changes, changes the work in a pretty remarkable way. So yeah.
00:46:07
Speaker
Chris Aaron, is that a little raccoon on your sweatshirt? It is a little raccoon on my sweatshirt. I love it. I love it so much. ah My heroine in arms with our trash pandas. That's right.
00:46:23
Speaker
I am. I'm wearing a, for those who are just listening, and wearing a sweatshirt from Esalen, which I'm going to next weekend. I'm really excited. And they have a lot of little raccoons around the cafeteria And um so the sweater I'm wearing has a little ah embroidered patches that represent Esalen and one of them on my shoulders, a little raccoon in honor of Kelton.
00:46:44
Speaker
I love it so much. All right. I mean, we know who our gremlins are. We know what our, our demons are to fight. It's time to talk about goals.
00:46:56
Speaker
I love your idea. I think we should assign each other goals. We probably do need to talk about what we want to accomplish. I want to accomplish bad writing.
00:47:08
Speaker
I have spent a lot of time like cracking the code on the in the past three weeks and like, what is actually happening in this story? Who knows what when i feel pretty good about how the characters are going to interact with each other. And now I just have to like, put them in the page.
00:47:26
Speaker
So what do you think my goals should be this week? And maybe how should I accomplish them?
00:47:36
Speaker
my first instinct is to give you some pre-writing work to do, but I feel like you would hate that because it's not working on the actual word count of the novel. It's again, doing a little bit of the outside work for it.
00:47:50
Speaker
Listen, if you can tell me like how I should approach that and get a little writing done, I'll do it. I mean, i think that what could be useful for you, because it sounds like you,
00:48:06
Speaker
are having doubts about your ability to write this full book, right? From start to finish is what were, what if you were to write almost like a treatment for it as if it were a screenplay
00:48:19
Speaker
and hitting up all the beats. And so it doesn't have to be perfectly written, but you can just, is if you were going to write a short brief synopsis of your novel, see if you can get some ideas down on paper that don't have to be, you know, perfectly written, but just just to get ideas down and out of your head. I think that that could be an interesting in exercise. Okay.
00:48:45
Speaker
So why don't you do that? Don't spend too much time on it. It should be like a brain dump. And then outside of that- So like an hour, like 30 minutes? I need some constraints here. Oh, okay. um I would say do not spend any more than an hour on it.
00:49:01
Speaker
Like if you can get it done in 30 minutes, then that's rocking. Like that would be great. Okay. um Because I know you have a limited time. So, and I would not include that in your writing time. That's extra work. Okay. Extra work. great it Got it. Yeah.
00:49:14
Speaker
And you could do it on like voice to text if you want to, however you need to get it down, get it down. And then I think if Ben can get the baby out of the house one day this week, that would be fantastic. And it sounds like your three hours and a thousand words were we're good. So let's do three hours and 1500 words.
00:49:37
Speaker
Ooh, I like it. Pressure me. Pressure. All right. For me, what I want to get done this week, I, you know, i still trying to get up at five. They say it takes like 21 days to make a habit. And I think this might be my, I'm getting into the twenties now. So I want to keep doing it because it seems to be working.
00:49:57
Speaker
i just, I'm one really trying to figure out what I'm doing with these interludes that I'm writing and how I want, like the structure is still like a big open question for me.
00:50:08
Speaker
And then, um, just continuing to edit. I think I would love to be able to get through the second chapter, second, third, like two, two to four chapters of editing this next week would be fantastic.
00:50:20
Speaker
Are you done with chapter one? Can you put a chapter one aside for now?
00:50:27
Speaker
I've I feel like chapter one's probably 70% of the way there, but I don't know if I can get it to a hundred right now. Great. Okay. Then I think goals should be maintain your 5am wake-ups as you have requested and do chapters two and three. Okay. and Nothing else?
00:50:47
Speaker
No, nothing else. I don't, I don't even think you should think be thinking about structure and interludes and stuff. It's like, You know, get the chapters into a place where you like them so that they're more fun to play with.
00:51:00
Speaker
and Because I think the other stuff can kind of be like a distraction um and you can work on that later. Like you it was even like the last thing you listed basically. So it's like just obviously, you know, you want to work on that. That is a future goal.
00:51:15
Speaker
But right now you just read the book. It's fresh. Get to 70% on chapters two and three. but Okay. I can do that.
00:51:26
Speaker
Thank you.
00:51:29
Speaker
And if you have any self-doubts that creep in, just text me. Okay. I'll do that. I'll do the same. I try not to text you too much because I know you're busy. so Oh my God. You can text me as much as you want. If I'm busy, I'm busy. All right.
00:51:46
Speaker
But it's like, I am a modern woman. When I'm not busy, I'm looking at my phone. So... Okay. Same goes for you. i really do feel like your, your doubts of not knowing how to write a novel will be completely fixed by just doing it.
00:52:04
Speaker
You just got to do it, Kelton. And I know you can do it. I know have the type of fortitude. You have the type of fortitude. If you want something, you're going figure it out. So I know that that is just, you know, I think you're just recognizing that the mountain that you have to climb is, is a large one.
00:52:22
Speaker
And so you're just making sure and pure Kelton form that you have the right shoes and the right gear and enough water and enough food to to make the climb. So yeah, there its it's time that I stopped checking what I have in my backpack and just start walking.
00:52:37
Speaker
Just, just got to start walking. We will not make any more Lord of the Rings references. um really want to This week, I would love to hear from y'all listening what your gremlins and demons are.
00:52:49
Speaker
And maybe we can tackle some of those on one of the episodes. So write to us at officialpenpalspod at gmail.com. Make sure to subscribe, rate, etc. Share with your friends. Be like, hey, writing buddy, you should listen to this and we should make weekly goals.
00:53:07
Speaker
And then we should tell Preserian and Kelton about it. And in the meantime, happy writing.