Gestation
You have something to say! You have a voice! Get your message out there! Don’t hold back! Tell the world who you are, what you have to offer!
Aaaand now I need a nap.
I mean, hooray for empowerment. Hooray for this time, when more and more of us (lucky ones, who have the means) are pursuing work we love, are proud of. We’re connecting with offerings that are aligned with who we are. Or we’ve discovered our love of writing and feel our words might have a place in the world, in front of more eyes than our own.
And we haven’t smashed capitalism—not yet. We’re still working against the backdrop of commodification and competition. Worse, you may have noticed that we’re in the digital age. Anyone who wants one gets a platform, and there’s a ‘right’ way to use it. Nobody’s going to listen unless we’re loud! Unless we put ourselves out there! Unless we differentiate ourselves! Leverage the algorithms! Force the attention of people who simply don’t have any! Make them stop scrolling for half a second and listen to you!
Hang on, another nap real quick.
Is this natural?
I have several clients and friends suspended in this tension. Their writing is brilliant and burgeoning. Their offerings are nascent. And they feel the only thing to do is to shove these words, teetering, out onto the stage, in front of the searing spotlight. This is the message we get: who cares how old your writing is, whether it’s found its feet, learned its lines, whether it wants to be on stage in the first place? Wrap it in a bow and get it out there. Be loud and proud and public.
This is stymieing. Paralyzing. Of course it is. There’s a disconnect between what grows in our soul and what [we’re told] the faceless public gravitates toward. The ‘put yourself out there, out loud and right now’ narrative is in many ways fabricated, forceful, frightening. It’s born of a system that doesn’t regard souls, only status. I’d even go so far as call it inorganic, unnatural.
How things come into being
I’m not a mom, but from what I know of the process, birthing our writing (or any creation) into the world is not dissimilar to birthing a little human. It has to grow organically in us. It needs to gestate. Like anything on the verge of being born, it’ll tell us when it’s time.
It also takes its first steps in its own time. It peeps its first sounds when it’s ready. It lets us know what it needs, where it wants to go. Some of it is fast, almost instantaneous. Usually it needs some quiet time alone with you before it meets the world.
Like parents, like gardeners, like anyone in tune with how life unfolds, we tend to our creations by saying “yes” to whatever is revealed: the stories, the poems, the songs, the pencil sketches. We allow it through and watch, rather than force or direct, where it goes. Maybe it stays in the journal. Maybe it gets typed up. Maybe a piece of it gets posted somewhere or read at an open mic. Maybe we read it to a trusted friend. Maybe we feed it to the fire. In its own time, it becomes something, or it doesn’t.
How do we know when it’s ready?
There’s a big distinction between being perfect and being ready. Ready does not mean polished, typo-free, skillfully crafted with the proper subtitles and SEO. Nor does it mean that we feel completely confident that whatever we put into the world will ‘succeed’ (be heard, be seen, impress, attract). It means we’ve done all we can, and we trust ourselves and our little stories. Somehow, we know they’ll be OK.
How do we know? We practice. We hone. We err. We trust. We surrender. We risk. We do what feels right, say what feels true. We write the story we know. We do put stuff out there too soon. We definitely hold too much back. We realize this, course correct.
We infuse all of it with our devotion. Every cell of the thing is saturated with our love. That’s how we know (and that’s why it’s scary): because it isn’t separate from us.
We try not to listen to the “find your voice immediately and megaphone it to the stadium!” directive. Unless of course that voice quivers a cell-layer under the surface of your skin, obvious and fully formed, ready to burst to the surface. Unless megaphones and stadiums are your thing. In that case, by all means, broadcast. I’m just finding that that isn’t the case for most of the people I encounter. There’s a developing that needs to happen. A slow peeling back, a growing into.
You’re not that important (thank god)
However this goes, nobody dies—not even close. In fact, nobody besides you even cares that much, which I find to be incredibly freeing. There’s this funny assumption many of us harbor that once our writing is online or wherever, thousands of people are suddenly going to be reading it—that a larger public opinion will be formed, we’ll get gossiped about, judged by People Who Matter, even (a real concern I’ve heard expressed) stalked.
My loves? Um. None of that is going to happen, at least not any time soon. We can worry about public opinion and creepy superfans when a random passage you happen to post online goes viral, or when your work becomes so popular you are turning down offers for six-figure speaking gigs.
For now, for most of us, there is plenty of room to experiment with what does feel right. To draw the people to you who connect with your offerings. You are free—so very free—to keep your work close, listen to it, cuddle it, share it gradually with people who are safe. Maybe pop something on your website or online. Like putting your kindergartener on the bus for the first time, you hope only that it survives, eats its lunch, mingles nicely with the other words out there.
Tend to what is yours to do. Write. Draw. Dance. Do the work. Stand back and watch with pride and terror as it walks into the world all on its own.
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You don’t have to sit on your egg all by yourself. Join a group of folks who will greet your creation with wonder at a Mini-Retreat, or in person in Berkeley, CA on September 30, 2023. I’m also available for 1:1 support as you birth your work into the world.
