You’re at a cocktail party, are introduced to one of the guests. He asks, “What do you do?”
“I’m a writer,” you respond.
“Oh. What do you write?”
At that moment, does your stomach churn with anxiety and your palms sweat? Do you believe that if telling the truth, you’ll be looked down upon, that others behind your back will whisper, “He writes that weird nerdy science fiction stuff…he writes erotica, must be a pervert…she writes trashy hackneyed romances, must not have any talent…she writes that highfalutin literary stuff that no one can understand – and that no one ever buys.”
When you’re afraid how others will react to your writing, you’ve allowed them to define you. Should you write only what others find acceptable, you’ve allowed them to control you. You’ve given their values a higher priority than your own tastes and standards.
As you writer, you cannot care what others will think of you or your writing. You instead must care about the truth.
Of course, “the truth” often is a wide swath of gray. People possess different values, they see the world from different perspectives, their memories falter over time. But what is your truth? What are your values? What is your perspective on the world? What is your memory of an event?
If your strive to be truthful in writing – that is deliberately not contradicting your values, not distorting your perspective, and not altering your memories for personal gain – your words will be authentic. Not all readers may agree with you (and truthfully, you never can please everyone), but they will respect your genuineness.
And perhaps the best response your writing ever can receive is criticism of your ethics, viewpoints, and recollections. It means that your writing touched more than a nerve in readers and suggests that others fear what you have to say because they have something to lose should the truth be widely known.
So don’t mumble your answer and fidget when someone asks what you write. Tell them loudly and confidently what your book is all about. They’ll then be the ones whose foreheads break a sweat…or maybe they’ll even be the ones who heartily clasp your hands and thank you for what you’ve written.
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My name is Rob Bignell. I’m an affordable, professional editor who runs Inventing Reality Editing Service, which meets the manuscript needs of writers both new and published. I also offer a variety of self-publishing services. During the past decade, I’ve helped more than 300 novelists and nonfiction authors obtain their publishing dreams at reasonable prices. I’m also the author of the 7 Minutes a Day… writing guidebooks, four nonfiction hiking guidebook series, and the literary novel Windmill. Several of my short stories in the literary and science fiction genres also have been published.