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[shuflynn]

Writing About Writing v4

Do you hide the fact you write?

You might raise your eyebrows at that. Maybe because you are a closet writer, maybe you’ve never hid it, but I believe this post will resonate with all writers.

I did hide the fact I wrote stories for a long time, despite taking a creative writing degree at university. I didn’t mind people thinking I was writing essays, but fiction was another beast altogether. I never told anyone, not even my girlfriend, that I wrote stories, despite it being my favourite thing to write.  

Why? For me, I think this stems from growing up with my family and friends who are anything but creative. None of them work in a creative industry or are artists of any kind, so despite writing being a super-serious, viable career option for many people around the world, in my own little bubble, it felt alien. A guilty pleasure. Something I had to hide because it was so different.  

I think there will be many different reasons writers hide their hobby, and some may even prefer to keep their writing their own. I too was going to settle for that, until I began to realise I’d seriously like to consider it as a career option.

And like any career goal, especially a difficult one, it’s made much easier with the support of your family and friends. You can’t write novels whilst clicking off the screen when someone enters the room. Writing is hard enough! It’s time and energy consuming. And when completing a big project, it consumes a large portion of your life.

Ideas cloud your brain and the stress of disguising that is going to destroy your chances before you even start...

You deserve to be able share your work and get feedback. By writing, you’re actively challenging your brain. You’re doing something difficult, birthing something out of nothing... when really, you could just be watching TikTok.

If this post does apply to you, I encourage you to take those steps to show your work to someone you trust. For me, this was allowing my girlfriend to read my dissertation, a short story set in a world of monsters and monster slayers.

Though it felt like she was peering into the depths of my soul, a weight had been lifted from my shoulders. She liked the story and her encouragement helped me in the final stages. She even saved me a few marks by pointing out where I’d forgotten to take words out.

‘If someone had handed me that in a book,’ she said. ‘I’d have believed it was from a professional!’

‘Great!’ I replied. ‘So, you think I should go for it? Become a writer?’

‘Yes, why not?’

‘Well,’ I say. ‘It’s probably going to take five or ten years of practice to really make it, so... will you be okay earning the money whilst I stay at home all the time? You know, practicing? I promise, once I write that book, I’ll make it all worth it!’

‘Erm...’

[shuflynn]

Writing About Writing v3

Do you hide the fact you write?

You might raise your eyebrows at that. Maybe because you are a closet writer, or maybe because you’ve never hid it, but I believe this post will resonate with all writers.

I did hide the fact I wrote for a long time, despite taking a creative writing degree at university. I would just tell people that it was English, more or less. I’d click off Word when someone entered the room (so they probably thought I was watching porn or something), and I never told anyone, not even my girlfriend, that I wrote.  

Why? For me, I think this stems from growing up with working class family and friends, who are anything but creative. I don’t resent them for it, in fact I’m like them in every other way, except for this hobby I had. Despite writing being a super-serious, viable career option for many people around the world, in my own little bubble, it felt like a guilty pleasure. Something to hide, to cringe at.

Whenever my parents asked me what I was going to do with my creative writing degree and I couldn’t reply honestly, out of embarrassment, I felt like my head was going to explode. My plan to not reveal my hobby to them until I was published with a 50 grand check in hand probably wasn’t the best option.  

I think there will be many sorts of reasons writers hide their writing, but one thing I can quite confidently assume is the universal negative aspects, especially if you’re career goal is to be a writer in some form. Because, as I’m sure you know, writing is hard enough! It’s stressful, time and energy consuming. If done seriously, it consumes a large portion of your life, and the stress of trying to disguise that is going to destroy your chances before you even start... but lets flip that. When you write, you’re actively challenging your brain. You’re doing something difficult, creating something out of nothing, when you could just be watching TikTok. You’re challenging yourself to such an extreme that why, it would be a shame to not get some credit, right?

And so, speaking as writer who has come clean, I can rejoice as I talk about the positive aspects. It feels like a weight been lifted from your shoulders. From small things as to replying honestly when someone asks what career I’d want to aim for off the back of my degree (sci-fi/fantasy author, by the way!) to getting my girlfriend to proof-read my dissertation, an 8000-word short story.

‘If someone had handed me that in a book,’ she said. ‘I’d have believed it was from a professional!’

‘Great!’ I replied. ‘That’s good to hear. So, you think I should go for it? Become a writer?’

‘Yes, why not?’

‘Well,’ I say. ‘It’s probably going to take five or ten years of practice to really make it, so... will you be okay earning the money whilst I stay at home all the time? You know, practicing? I promise, once I write that book, I’ll make it all worth it!’

‘Erm...’

(523 words)

[shuflynn]

Writing About Yourself V3

Have you ever written about yourself? Not just in a text, diary or a curriculum vitae, but a full-blown extensive narrative set in your life? Ever wondered how your life and your actions might come across when put onto the page?

I hadn’t. So when told to write a creative non-fiction piece based on myself, I struggled. Like many of you, I’m sure, when asked to write about an event in my own life, my life suddenly became eventless. I knew things certainly happened, even that moment of panic was an ‘event’, it just seemed alien to try and spin these moments into a narrative - especially as my life, fortunately, was still ongoing and had not yet reached its satisfying and timely conclusion.

Life’s just too random and coincidental to have an arc, right? Well, here did the lesson lie for me; and it applies to any type of storytelling. Conflict: we’ve all had conflict in our lives, big and small, and just like in fictional stories, conflicts are key to the story of your life. Nobody wants to read about the time you spent all day in bed watching Netflix, nobody wants to know when everything went to plan. No, sadistic as we are, we want to read when something goes wrong, when times get hard. And as a writer, what better to explore?

And so in the light of this revelation, I went for the jugular. I asked myself what’s the one thing that would be the most personal, yet valuable thing to reflect on? That’s how I ended up writing about a recent time, in the first lockdown, when my uncle passed away. I didn't try anything new or outrageous in terms of writing. I wrote it as though I was telling any other story, only with myself as the main protagonist. Despite never doing this before, this wasn’t going to be a vehicle to explore new writing methods, it was all about exploring myself and that uncomfortable time in a new way, from a different angle.

Having a word limit was helpful, because otherwise it’s hard pick a start and an end when it comes to your life. But I gave it beginning, middle and end. I organised it into chapters. I split into scenes and even dramatized it. I changed names if I wanted to, added my own dialogue when I couldn’t remember exactly what was said. The point wasn’t to do a word for word retelling of those times, because I’d already lived through it once. It was about looking at it in hindsight, a calmer perspective that removes all the franticness of the present. I ended up with an organised story, one that shows a journey, a struggle, and fortunately enough for me, a kind of happy ending.  

And now that piece feels incredibly valuable, especially when remembering my uncle. It feels more valuable than watching videos or staring at old photos, because it has it all in one: dialogue, actions, thoughts and surroundings. It moves, it plays out. Start reading at any point, and the scenes come to life in your imagination, it’s your treasured memories immortalised in words. Oh, and plus it got a first, so that’s a bonus.

To call back to that valuable lesson: conflict. It’s uncomfortable, but its fundamental to your life, and your stories.

(558 words)

[shuflynn]

Writing About Yourself v2

University has forced me to write about myself, exploratively. I never write about myself exploratively, not because I fear it what I might find or anything, it’s just not what gets me excited or what I would want to read. I prefer reading and writing about fictional characters in fictional circumstances, with all sorts of fictional twists, build-ups and payoffs. Nevertheless, I’ve wrote about myself exploratively and learned some things about how my own identity comes across on the page.

Writing a few thousand-word creative non-fiction piece in the second year, having never done it before, was a challenge. When told to write about my own life, despite having lived it since I was born, I couldn’t find any material. Zilch. Why? I knew things certainly happened, it just seemed alien to try and view it as a narrative. My life seemed too random and coincidental to have an arc. I’d never considered how I could structure a real event into a creative story, despite how every day we’re all constantly telling each other useless stories conversationally.  

I learned that just like in fictional stories, there must be a conflict. When something goes wrong; when things get hard; this is the only thing I found worth writing about. The only thing with actual value for me. This way I could either greater understand, resolve or just simply reflect on a time of my life that was hard or uncomfortable.

As a result, I chose to write about when my uncle died in lockdown, which was quite a bizarre and turbulent time. The actual creative process was mostly dedicated to the writing itself and which parts to convey. But as I reflect on the piece now, I view it as one my best pieces of writing. It feels incredibly valuable to have this story which depicts real ‘scenes’ of my life, reminding me how I was thinking and feeling at those times and orchestrates those scenes into a narrative, with a satisfying and truthful ending. Writing about it has allowed me to greater understand my feelings and experience, with my own thoughts literally turned into words. Mostly the whole piece feels incredibly important as life was so irregular then and everyone was overtaken with covid news, so it seemed like my uncle didn’t get a proper send off, but this piece is a capture in time which is dedicated to him and feels now like it had to be written.

Writing this piece affirmed to me that conflicts and hardships aren’t a wholly bad thing, but are actually fundamental in life, just like in a fictional story. Who’d want to read a fantasy book without the protagonist being challenged? How would we see them change and grow stronger if they were never put under pressure, never had to face the villain? It would be boring and a story without value. Living your life is no different, writing about your own life is no different, except the tough journey depicted and the resilient protagonist, is you.

Sometimes though, the ‘conflict’ is just too painful to face head on, as a hero might run headlong towards the evil dragon’s lair. Life is often not so simple, reality is often much crueller and more unforgiving than fiction, because a cathartic good ending isn’t guaranteed. But if you’re still alive to write about it, then maybe you should. I found what doesn’t kill you can make you stronger, it just takes effort.  

(578 words)

[shuflynn]

Writing About Writing

Why do I like writing? I sometimes get shocked the same way people do when they ask what I’m studying at university, and I reply, ‘creative writing’. They say, ‘I didn’t take you for that,’ or ‘oh really, didn’t expect that’. I don’t blame them for it, because writing’s been something that I’ve always had trouble of displaying or talking about openly. To me, there’s an inherent cringe factor to it, because especially in my case where all I’m interested in is writing fiction, you’re essentially saying you like finding yourself alone so you can escape into a fairytale world - which is hard to admit to your fellow working-class family and friends who are anything but artistic or creative. Obviously, this escapism is no different than going to the cinema to watch a film, but writing is your words and your thoughts put on display for the world to see. Not some strangers name you only see on credits.

Dad would probably prefer for to do something more hands-on. Mum would probably say ‘grow up, son, if you wanted to be writer you’d have written loads of stories by now.’. One of my sister’s has a maths degree so that’s all you need to know about her. They’ve asked me a few times what I’m actually going to do with this degree, to which I haven’t been able to honestly reply: ‘I don’t know, probably try and write fantasy novels for a living!’ what I’ve actually replied is, ‘I don’t know... I’ve enjoyed tossing off for an extra three years though...’

Truthfully, writing has only recently grown as something more than just my hidden hobby (that I would obsess over a few dispersed months over a year) to something I’d consider as a career goal. I can’t pursue this career if nobody in my life knows about it. I can’t write good stories whilst also clicking off every time someone enters the room, and probably thinks I’m watching porn or something. Writing is hard enough as it is without living a double life! Trying to suppress what’s inside you for the sake of embarrassment which is, 90% of the time, entirely conjured in your head, is only going to result in regret. Regret when it’s too late.

One funny example was: my girlfriend and I were once discussing getting a house together. One of my thoughts was: oh god, if we live together, how am I going to write? How I can explain sitting on a computer for a few hours? I’ll never be able to write! Any little hope of getting some writing in will be gone... it never occurred to me that all these issues would be swept away by simply being honest and telling her. That perhaps it would actually, even enhance it! Can that really be worse than trying to suppress it? No. Absolutely not.

[shuflynn]

My Body

I remember becoming conscious of my own body at around 15 or something. Conscious to say, I decided I didn’t like it. I’d pulled my eyes long enough away from my Xbox to look into the mirror, and there it was. I wasn’t fat – I’d always been labelled one of those that ‘can eat anything and get away with it’ – but I was packing a podge. I was comparing myself to the more athletic boys at school. Everything about me just looked soft and mishappen, the huge love handles made even worse by the skinny shoulders and arms and legs. In some ways, I’d have preferred to have just been fat all over, at least that way everything looks proportionate.

I know now that I looked like that because of the very sedentary lifestyle I lived. It came essentially from eating whatever I wanted and hardly moving around. Have all the ‘skinny genetics’ you want, its simple science. Funnily enough my brother was a personal trainer and worked at a gym, so at about 16, fresh out of school, I went to the gym for the first time. I still remember that first session. The bastard started on me on a leg day of all things. He probably wanted to let me know early of the realities of ‘pumping iron’. If its easy, you’re not doing it right! I was nervous, frightened, more conscious of the eyes on me than how I was shifting the weight, but I was glad I went.

I don’t regret spending most my time on my arse playing Xbox. In fact I’d say my time was better spent that way, because that’s where all my friends were and our bodies were something we never paid much attention to. Got the rest of our lives for that.  

[shuflynn]

Writing about Self

University has forced me to write about myself, exploratively. I never write about myself exploratively, not because I fear it what I might find or anything, it’s just not what gets me excited or what I would want to read. I prefer reading and writing about fictional characters in fictional circumstances, with all sorts of fictional twists, build-ups and payoffs. Nevertheless, I’ve wrote about myself exploratively and learned some things.

Writing a few thousand-word creative non-fiction piece in the second year, having never done it before, was a challenge. When told to write about my own life, despite having lived it since I was born, I couldn’t find any material. Zilch. Why? I knew things certainly happened, it just seemed alien to try and churn it into a narrative. Real life seemed too random and coincidental to have an arc. I’d never considered how I could structure a real event into a creative story, despite telling little useless stories conversationally every day.

I learned that just like in fictional stories, there must be a conflict. When something goes wrong; when things get hard; this is the only thing I found worth writing about. Drawing this comparison affirmed to me that conflict and challenge is fundamental in life, just like in a fictional story. Who’d want to read a fantasy book without the protagonist being challenged? How would we see them change and grow stronger if they were never put under pressure? It would be useless and boring. Writing about your own life is no different, except the tough journey depicted and the resilient protagonist, is you.

(266 words)

[shuflynn]

I am Born

I was born on mum’s birthday. 30th June. Ten minutes earlier it would’ve been the 29th, which would’ve just been irritating. I was ‘easy’. She almost fell asleep during labour. Maybe that was my birthday treat for her. Her and my dad were both puffing away on gas and air the whole time, sharing it like two smackheads sharing a spliff.  I’m glad they enjoyed themselves... probably too much, because my mum remembers looking around her and thinking: ‘fucking hell I best get this babi out ant I?’

And so I arrived, smoothly, careful not burst this little bubble mum and dad were in. Happy birthday, Mother. Here I am. People said to her, ‘Oh you’ve got the best birthday present anyone can wish for!’ but she’s said that was her last birthday for a while, because hers always got overshadowed by mine. She didn’t mind. I think she thinks the same as me in that it’s nice to have this unique thing, a gimmick that makes peoples eyes widen when you tell them, like it’s a fairytale. 1 in 365 chance. Birthdays are better shared.

(186 words)