Does This Support the Life I'm Trying to Create?

 

My wife has this Post-It on her desk, and I think about it all the time—every time I'm trying to figure out where to spend my time and effort. "Does this support the life I'm trying to create?"

I like it because it raises an even more interesting question (related to a previous post)—what is the life I'm trying to create?—and it doesn't leave that question in the realm of pie-in-the-sky dreaming. It forces me to think about what I want and what steps I can take right now to get there.

And I'm thinking about it even more lately because of, well... lots of recent and ongoing changes. I don't know what all the future holds, but I love to imagine a future where my work is all steady* private editing clients (very flexible and fulfilling), I'm able to write at a steady* pace, and I'm—I dunno—GMing tabletop RPGs or writing Twine games or something and playing games with friends and the diaspora that will be my family.

* The word "steady" is doing a lot of work here. I'll take what I can get, so long as my stress remains manageable.

That sounds like a lot of stuff, now that I write it all out like that. But then, that's the other point of the question: to examine things one step at a time.

This is why I started the blog (and continue to figure out a posting cadence that works for me) and why I am open to private clients even while I have a long-term contract. My answers to this question have instigated other stuff behind the scenes too—some of which might even show up here one day.

Why am I talking about this? Well, mostly because I'm thinking about it a lot, but also because I suspect you can benefit from it as well. In my experience, that's usually how this works.

So, what is the life you're trying to create, and what steps are you taking to support that? (And is there anything you're doing that doesn't support it?) I'd love to hear about your own decisions and dreams.

What If You Don't Make It?

I saw this comic by Katie Shanahan the other day, and it's really stuck with me, so I want to share it.

See, I'm 47 years old and have been writing professionally for a couple of decades. I've published some stories and helped ship some games, and I'm super proud of all of that. But, you know, I started this blog with bigger dreams and excitement than has been borne out thus far.

But this comic helped remind me that I'm not done yet—not if I don't want to be.

And if there's one thing I've learned in 17.2 years of active social media, it's that I am basically never alone in my feelings. So, this is for you, too:

Will I make it? I don't know.

But what does "making it" even mean? I get to paid to write sometimes (even making the occasional royalties). I've designed and written for multiple highly rated games (even enabling a record-breaking crowdfunding campaign). I've raised over a dozen really excellent humans (possibly saving the lives of some). I've streamed games, speedrunned (speedran?), and managed several TTRPG campaigns.

So... maybe I have "made it"? That question is what I'm actively working on, and have been for decades, and will be for as long as I write: Why do I do this? What do I hope to achieve? How will I know when I achieved it?

The answer used to be "get published!" Which I did. And that's still something I'm aiming for, but I don't want it to be my definition of "making it." There's no sense trying to find my value in something that's out of my control.

And that's why Katie's comic really speaks to me. Maybe I've made it. Maybe I haven't. But it doesn't matter. I write because I enjoy writing. Nothing else.

Maybe I've made it when I'm enjoying making a thing. Everything else is icing.

Preaching Well

Last week, I talked about being "preachy" in fiction and why it's maybe not as bad as people think it is. In particular, there are lots of examples of fiction that are not only super popular but arguably so because of their message.

So, the problem is not messaging in fiction. Fiction is messaging, and (whether you are aware of it or not) all fiction is political. People generally don't have a problem with preaching in fiction unless the message is something they disagree with.

Like I've said before, you aren't writing for those people.

But you do want your message to be written well and received well by those who are open to it. Here are a few tips to help with that:

1) Portray All Sides with Empathy

A common problem in fiction is when one group of people are portrayed as intelligent and sympathetic while another comes across as cardboard cut-out villains.

Religion is a common victim of this. The atheist and non-Christian analogues in Chronicles of Narnia—the folks who don't believe Aslan is real or who work against him—are often insufferable. Edmund and Eustace, for example, are simply the worst characters (until they believe).

Secular sci-fi isn't much better. I've lost track of how many stories I've read in which the protagonists are open-minded and intelligent while the villains are pompous religious jerks.

Even if you don't agree with a character's point of view, they do. Nobody thinks of themselves as evil, and as the author, it is your job to figure out why not and portray that sympathetically.

2) Leave Your Message Open-Ended

When you think of your story's theme or message, is it a moral to be prescribed or a question to be explored? Life is nuance and uncertainty, but if your story has easy answers, it can ring false. Exploring that uncertainty, however, is what makes good fiction great.

Take the X-Men. These stories explore themes of racial discrimination, and while there is a repeated moral (e.g., accept those different from you), there are also always difficult questions raised. The conflict between Professor X and Magneto is a prime example. Magneto believes that mutants are the next step in human evolution and should rule the world. Professor X, on the other hand, believes humans and mutants can co-exist as equals. The latter is obviously the stories' message, since Professor X is the "good guy," but he is frequently faced with challenges that throw that message into question. Can humans and mutants ever truly get along?

Their struggle is never-ending, and that's the point of phrasing your message as a question. The struggles we face are open-ended. If you paint your message as black and white, it will feel false to anyone who—like Magneto—has seen that the world isn't so amenable to pat answers.

3) Let the Reader Come to Their Own Conclusions

If you've ever tried to change someone's belief, you know it's practically impossible. A person can't be told what is true and simply believe it, not even if they are presented with irrefutable evidence. They will refute it! However, people can and do change their own beliefs by coming to their own conclusions over time.

Don't tell the reader what to think or believe, but show them different viewpoints. Explore different answers to very difficult questions. And then... do nothing. Let them think for themselves.

It's the most frustrating and rewarding part of being an author (or a parent, or a teacher, or a therapist, or...). As my mom tried to teach me my whole life, you have to let them be wrong.

The Bottom Line is Empathy

The gift of fiction—and a requirement to create it—is to be able to put ourselves in someone else's shoes, to see the world from another's perspective. Reading increases empathy. A reader without empathy will bounce of most stories altogether, and a writer who lacks it will struggle to connect with any reader unlike themselves.

So, say what you want to say. Explore difficult questions and even present your own answers through your characters. But be fair. Be open-minded. Be empathic.

You'll be surprised how many more people you can impact.

On "Preachy" Fiction

I think I learned a bad lesson when I was a brand new writer—or maybe it was a good lesson that I just took too far. The lesson was this: Don't use fiction to preach.

What people generally mean by that is they don't want authors to write fiction with the express goal of teaching a lesson. They want a good story. They don't want to be moralized to.

Or so they say... 

But when the lesson is something the reader doesn't notice, it's not considered preachy at all. X-Men stories, for example, are hella preachy, but many fans either don't connect the themes of mutant discrimination to the real world or else identify with those themes in less controversial ways (e.g., some fans interpret X-Men's themes as discrimination against "misfits" or "outsiders," rather than racial prejudice).

And when the lesson is something the reader wants to hear, the audience often loves it! For example, the Chronicles of Narnia are a straight-up Christian allegory, beloved by Christians of all flavors. Andor is widely considered one of the best-written Star Wars stories to date, partially for being a straight-up anti-fascist manifesto.

It seems like it's not that people don't want messages in their fiction. It's that they don't want to be aware of messages they don't like. (You know, just like in real life.)

I started this post saying I learned a bad lesson. See, I spent a lot of my writing career trying to "say something without saying something"—trying to be subtle with my messages, trying not to piss anyone off or be accused of heavy-handed preaching. I ended up writing "fun" fiction but not necessarily the meaningful fiction I wanted to write.

My stories are fine, of course. Good, even. I've been published a few times. People have found meaning in my stories, and I'm thankful for that. Heck, I even have fans of stories that have never been published. But I was scared.

And I don't want to be.

And I don't need to be.

So, this is my encouragement to you: Write what you want to say. There will always be people who don't like what that is, and that's okay. You're not writing for them.

Will leaning into your message get you published and famous? Not by itself, no. It might even work against you at first as you figure out how to do it well. But it means that when someone does read your work, they are at least reading something that you want to say—and what you want to say matters.

So you do you, friends. Go ahead and...

Low on Creative Energy?

Sometimes, you're just doing so much creative stuff in a day or a week (or more!) that you don't have the creative resources you need to write something you might never be paid for.

And that's okay. Give yourself permission to not write for a bit...

...or to write something very short.

Talking Yourself through Drafting

Some of you know that I hate drafting—which is weird for a writer to say, I know, but that's the way it is... or at least the way it was.

I've learned (through time and work and lots of counseling) that it's not drafting I hated. I hated the fear of imperfection and getting it wrong. I hated the pressure that I put on myself to write well or write a lot (or both!). Most of all, I hated that I hated myself for not meeting my own expectations.

Drafting is still hard, but I've been learning how to have compassion on myself—not just the part of me that's writing but also the part that puts so much pressure on me. That part just wants me to achieve my goals! It just wasn't aware that some of the ways it did that were harming me.

I've been easing my way back into writing consistently, and I've found myself approaching it differently. The tips below are some of what I've been learning. Maybe they can help you too.

Focus on the current words/sentence/paragraph. Don't think about everything you have to do—how many words you've written, how much revision you'll have to do, what you need to do later that day... All of that is overwhelming and makes it impossible to write. When those thoughts come, hear them then let them go, and focus on the next words again.

When you feel stuck or scared, take a break. I don't mean a long break like I've suggested before. Take just a minute or two, or maybe even just one long, deep breath. The sentence you're stuck on will look different. The emotion that's sticking you will pass, often much faster than you think.

Trust your past self. You've written before. You've revised before. You can do it again. (Even if this is your first novel, you wrote the paragraphs and sentences that came before. You wrote stories in school. You've told stories about yourself to friends.) Trust that you write for a reason.

Trust your present self. Thoughts will come that what you're writing isn't very good or that it isn't working how you'd like. But your present self can't know what's working and what isn't—not until you see the whole picture together. Trust that what you're writing now is good enough for now.

Trust your future self. Even if what you're writing were bad, trust that you will be able to make it better later. More than that: you can't actually know how to make it better until later. Your future self will handle that, and they'll be just fine.

Give yourself grace. Writing goals are good if they help motivate you, but they can backfire just as easily. When you find yourself afraid of meeting your goals, give yourself permission to turn them off. Whatever you accomplish today is fine. Five words are more than zero. There will always be days that you struggle to write, but there will be days later that you don't as well. Whatever you can do is good.

You write for a reason, and there are people out there who want to know what that reason is. We're rooting for you.

Make sure you root for yourself, too.

Human Editing vs. AI

I have my own issues with generative AI, but it is good at some tasks—tasks that (if it weren't for the copyright theft, plagiarism, labor theft, and climate-destroying energy needs) would actually be worth talking about in terms of how they can improve our lives.

One thing generative AI is genuinely good at is producing English sentences that sound intelligent. Among other things, this means it can be good at basic editing—making your words sound correct and smart—and it can even provide a kind of blind, meaning-agnostic textual analysis and recommendations for improvement.

That's editing, right? You can get it for free?!

Well, sort of. As with most things in our world, you get what you pay for. The Washington Post tested five generative AIs on their ability to perform this kind of editing. None of them did better than a D+, and only one of them didn't "hallucinate."

Free? Yes (for now).

Good?

If you have no money or critique partners, and you have the time and patience to investigate the accuracy of every suggestion, then AI can provide you with a kind of editing. It can make you sound intelligible... but not great or unique—literally the average of what the internet has to offer.

What can a human editor do, then, that the AI can't? Well, at their best, a human editor can provide the following:

• A-level corrections, recommendations, and analysis
• Insightful comments from a human who understands your intention and meaning
• Experience that comes from being an editor, a writer, and a human
• Suggestions that maintain your unique voice and vision as an author
• Harsh truths to help you improve
• Revisions that don't make up facts out of nowhere
• Connection with a human who's rooting for you

That's not to say all human editors are always amazing or do all these things, but an LLM never will. Finding a good editor is hard, but there are many out there who are worth the price.

The danger of generative AI is not that it's bad at things; it's that AI's intelligent-sounding answers fool us into thinking it's good at things, so we trust it with more than we should. We believe it knows more than it actually does.

I'm not gonna say don't use AI, and I'm not gonna say human editors are perfect. But if you choose AI, know what you're settling for, and if you hire a human editor, find one who provides value that's worth it to you.

(Am I one of those editors? Well, you can always try me out and see! A sample edit costs nothing but time.)