alexandraerin

In real life, few emotional problems actually boil down to anything so simple as a single cause, much less anything that can be summed up in a single sentence. But I think a lot of my more disproportionate responses to criticism comes from things that, if human beings were perfectly rational creatures (or to be more specific, if I were a perfectly rational creature), would make me care less.

First... if I think the criticism is groundless or misses the mark, it ticks me off because it feels unjustified, and thus, unjust. This is very much rooted in a middle-class white kid's definition of injustice (where unfair is somebody else getting the last green popsicle... this is sometimes called a "first world problem", but using that label would ignore the fact that in the first world there are a lot of people who have to deal with actual injustice. Heck, I have to deal with actual injustice, but not at a level that's stopped me from worrying about popsicle flavors) and it ties into "Wrong On The Internet" syndrome. It's the worst kind of Wrong On The Internet... it's somebody being Wrong On The Internet about me.

And of course, my ire gets compounded when somebody comes along and repeats the canard that if criticism stings there must be something to it.

Obviously if I were perfectly rationale, then that canard would be true... except I wouldn't be bothered by on-target criticism if I were rational. I would just be affected by it, while more-or-less ignoring off-target criticism.

But I'm not perfectly rational, so reading criticism that I think misses its mark or misses the point still has the power to ruin my day. Or I have the power to use it to ruin my own day. I don't know.

Second, the more the majority of reader comments are enthusiastically positive, the more I seem to be bothered by the few complaints. Anybody reading this or observing that might be inclined to first think that it's fly-in-the-ointment syndrome, or that I want/demand universal adulation or something... but like "If it bothers you it must be right", that's too simplistic and off the mark.

I keep finding myself wanting to tell the people who aren't happy with the latest chapters that they're far out-numbered by the people who do like them and that I can't make everyone happy with every chapter. And here's where we come to a truism that actually is true: they aren't the ones I'm trying to convince. I am.

I'm being defense, but it's not because I see their criticism of me as something I need to defend myself against. I'm defending... for lack of a better word... my record. I'm defending my failure to have entertained this one person this one time, and by extension every person I've failed to defend every time.

And of course, if I were perfectly rational, then "I can't please everybody all the time." would be a freeing sentence. Instead it manages to ring in my head as both an admission of failure and my only defense against that failure, which leads to the most vicious of vicious cycles. I actually sit down to respond to comments saying words to the effect of, "Sorry you didn't like this one, but I don't expect everyone to like every chapter. Hopefully there will be some ones more up your alley soon enough!" but then I find myself getting more and more worked up as I go.

Sometimes, of course, I do manage to say just what I mean to and walk away feeling good.

In case it's not clear to anyone, the purpose of a post like this is not to go "OHHHHH MY GOSH THE COMMENTERS ARE SO STUPID AND ANNOYING" or to complain about having to deal with them. Because I don't have to deal with them. If nothing else I could just turn comments off again. Rather, I'm working through how I deal with them, so that I can deal with them better in the future.

It occurs to me that at this point in my life/career, I'm actually often pretty okay with criticism in the sense the word is usually used... it's advice that really has the magic button-pushing power over me. It's only because criticism so often carries with it implicit or explicit advice that it makes me see red so often.

I mean, when I look back (metaphorically, I'm not actually going to go back and read the comments) on the comment exchanges that I really got worked up on at the time, that's the common thread. If a commenter just leaves replies that implies he thinks Mackenzie is a hero with a thousand faces on a journey through the belly of the beast so she can fire off the gun on the mantelpiece from act 1 to defeat her antagonist or whatever, I'm inclined to find it amusing. When I see the same commenter telling me that X needs to go where Y is and Y should be replaced with Z... RAEG.

And I then start interpreting all the commenter's nonsense as containing implicit advice: This is the way stories are supposed to be, so this is the way you should be doing it...

I've known that I don't take advice well, and I've often thought that it's like a subset or special case of my aversion to criticism. But now I'm thinking I had that backwards.

I think the proof of this insight will be when I try to apply it, under the theory that understanding why some criticism pisses me off so completely will help me to control that reaction. Because when I get unwanted advice that I can tell is well-meant and is by somebody I perceive as a friend or at least a well-wisher, I usually do manage to avoid flying off the handle at them.

So, I am getting the feeling as I'm writing today that I'm not going to quite recapture the magic of the past few times I've sat down to write Tales of MU... i.e., I'm not going to end up with two chapters worth of good text. I have a good start in terms of momentum and I can build on that and I could probably finish the day with about 7-8 thousand words, but.... that wouldn't give me two good chapters.

Looking at the 1,300 words I have so far, it's obvious to me that for the rest of my workday I'm going to need to take a more reflective, more considered approach to the material. I'm going to be need to be shaping as much as I'm producing. One really good chapter is within my reach, if I give up the goal of writing two chapters.

So my bold plan to be done writing Tales of MU for the week today will probably not come to pass. But here's where things work out nicely: this leaves me to find one day in the next three to write the next chapter with the same care, if it needs that care. And if it doesn't, I'll finish off the week with a head start on next week again. If it does, I'll be writing Monday's chapter on Monday. Not like I haven't done that before.

I'm not actually modifying my overall plans. I'm not giving up on the idea that days will come... and come with reliable frequency... where I can sit down and write two good-sized chapters' worth of good story at a good clip. But the thing is I need to let them happen, to be ready for them to happen, to make room in my life and my mind for them to happen, and to be ready for when they don't.

Like when I'm writing my Fantasy in Miniature stories... I'm no longer counting on the idea that I'll be able to write one every day. I'm giving one day a week to write as many as will come. So far (that is, twice) it's been more than a week's worth each time, but I'm not counting on that. I'm counting on the times when it is to make up for the times that it's not. If every time I sit down to write Fantasy in Miniature, I sit down and write as many of them as I can instead of aiming for a quota, I'll never suffer for having an off day/week.

Same thing with MU. I have faith that the good days will get me through the decent and even bad days. This isn't a bad day. It could turn into one if I tried to force it to be a good one when it's got the makings of a decent day.

When I look at what I've written already, if I were to think, "Maaaaaaaan, I need to write another 5,000-6,000 on top of this in the next six hours", I'd be... well, either disheartened or frantic. Looking at it and thinking, "I have 6 hours to build on this and polish it and turn it into a finished chapter.", I can see I'm standing on much firmer ground.

The key is that I'm not stressed by this. I'm not anxious. I'm not bothered by it. In the past week and change, I've been coupling my prep periods with exercises in slow, deep, abdominal breathing (thank you, Cracked.com, for letting me know I was doing that wrong) and the results have been phenomenal in helping my control my anxiety, focus better, and exercise self-control in general. It turns everything I do into a much more deliberate act. I don't remember to do it all the time outside of work, but during my writing workdays it's now part of my routine.

I think a good metaphor here for why this is going to be a decent day rather than a good one is that you have to go slow around curves to avoid crashing. The first three chapters were a very straight line progression. Now I'm writing a transitional chapter, Sunday into Monday. Weekend into week. Summer break (for those who had one) into class sessions. At the same time I'm trying to reintroduce old faces and introduce new concepts. It's a very windy road, compared to the past three chapters, and it requires more care to navigate.

The chapters that follow are going to be going back to a linear progression. Class, class, class. New concepts will be introduced (New classes! It's going to be fun.), but I'm going to have the room I need to do it in.

And to close up this ramble: I've just realized that I am mentally doing one suboptimal thing here, and that is that when I adjusted my goal to be to get a really good chapter for Wednesday I did set a quota to hit. My mind put a firm, bright line over starting Friday's chapter. That's the equivalent of saying I'll write five flash stories in my weekly flash writing day because I only need five stories a week. It's entirely possible I'll finish up the day with a head start on Friday's chapter. That's not the goal but it's easily possible, and I'm going to leave myself open to the possibility.

Edit/Update:

I wrote this post in the midst of my second reflectioningary period of the day. I'm now in my third and I've just made the decision to take the part about ( the thing that's mildly spoilery ) and cut it out, to hold it back for later on. I think this chapter will be better and the chapter that eventually happens in will be better for it, even though the events I'm cutting only arose in the first place because I was thinking back to the parallel scene from last year and trying to make a comparison. Even though the real-world reason I added that bit won't apply any more, it still will make good story when it happens.

Basically, there's more than enough looking backwards in the first half of this chapter. By the time we get to Monday morning, it needs to be looking ahead. This is the sort of thing that taking a more reflective approach to shaping a chapter and working on the story as more than a single unit at a time allows me to do.