I think a lot of us have The Fear when it comes to writing. It could be anything: an Instagram caption, a blog post, a book or a newsletter. I’ve been writing online in various guises for fifteen years and have got past that feeling of hiding under my desk every time I publish a blog post or Instagram caption (although, admittedly, that did take me some time). But doing something new, something slightly out of the comfort zone like when I started my newsletter and, just this week I’m going to start writing for Medium, brings those fears and insecurities flooding back.
Instead of just writing how I feel I start thinking about how an imagined reader might perceive my words and potentially misunderstand. I scrutinise each sentence to make sure it says what I want it to say.
My fear of being misunderstood actually comes from real life events.
In January 2020 within a few days of each other I received two horrible messages on Instagram. One was left on my latest photograph and the second, by a different person (though who am I to know - it may have been the same person) came as a direct message. The first message - and I can’t remember it verbatim as I deleted it and the screenshot I took of it - said my photographs were vain and shallow and therefore I was vain and shallow, that I wasn’t a proper writer and was just messing about with Microsoft Word and coffee.
The second, the direct message, was a person who was angry with me for talking about my Instagram followers and how I’d managed to stop the decline and started to gain a following again. She basically said I was a whiner and was pathetic, sad and desperate for validation.
I stared at both these messages for some time.
Yes, with shaky legs and a churning tummy.
Trying to understand what I had done to attract such vitriol. I’ve made them sound fairly tame here but the actual messages made prolific use of the f-word and had much in the way of aggressiveness. I’m no prude, my language in real life can be colourful but the aggressiveness was what hit me so hard in the stomach.
I felt misunderstood. I wasn’t ‘whining’ about losing Instagram followers. Far from it. I was, in fact, sharing my journey because I thought this might help or inspire others in the online community.
And I wasn’t just ‘messing about with Microsoft Word and coffee’. (I use Scrivener for a start!) I was showing up and sharing my work online and making the usual mess of printed paper on a desk look a bit prettier and photogenic - because that was part of my creativity. A warm up, if you like, before the main event of writing.
The message on my public feed I deleted straight away and blocked him. The direct message I actually thought about, composed a reply and sent it. But then I had second thoughts, deleted my reply and just blocked her.
Sadly this isn’t the first time I’d received a message like this. I received one on my blog a number of years previous calling me ‘fat and pathetic’ and not upset enough about the fact my chicken had just died! I was actually upset about my chicken dying but when you have fifty or sixty of those little critters over the course of seven years you do get a little hardened to them passing. Again, what bothered me then was being misunderstood. I was sharing little snapshots of thoughts, ideas and creativity. And someone reads one of two words the way they weren’t intended - or inserts their own thoughts into your words - and bam you get the full force of their wrath.
Blocking is the best way forward with these things. That’s what we’re taught. Block, ignore and move on.
It’s good advice but what do we do with the emotions continuing to whirl around in our heads? We’re left bruised and mentally composing replies we could have said and, get this, trying to justify our work to someone who, quite frankly, will never appreciate it whatever we do.
I wanted to shout and argue and reason, basically do all the things I’d do in real life if, say, my husband had misunderstood something I said. But you can’t do that online. Or you could but you’d make the situation worse and probably end up harming your image.
So we block, stay silent whilst going through emotionally draining turmoil and move on. Maybe we open the app with more caution in the future, maybe modify our creative behaviour a bit because we feel self-conscious.
Maybe dilute our online selves a little bit.
And this is the bit that frustrates me. Actually it angers me. Because it had taken me years to work up to the point of sharing my writing online. Of being vulnerable to strangers. And you get casual comments from keyboard warriors that knocks you straight back to the beginning.
It’s like the game Snakes and Ladders. You’re moving forward square by square every time you publish some of your writing. Occasionally you get a confidence boost and land on a ladder. But it’s a dicey journey as one roll of the dice and you’re sliding down the snake of no confidence.
When I did my survey into confidence and creativity sixteen percent of people said the main reason why they didn’t put their creativity out there was because of what someone had said or what they thought someone might say. A lot more included it as one of many factors affecting their creative confidence.
It happened to a member of The Confident Creative Club a few weeks ago. And it did to her what it did to me. It stopped her from writing, from posting. It made her adjust how she expressed herself, what she shared.
Please, don’t stop being creative because of what you think someone might say or what someone has actually said. Incidentally I’m not talking constructive criticism here. I’m talking actual trolling.
Don’t not write that blog post because you think someone might message you nasty things. Because there are people out there, with the anonymity of the internet, who dare say things online that they wouldn’t dream of saying to your face. And they get upset over bizarre and seemingly trivial things. Things you cannot anticipate. So don’t dilute your personality for these people, real or imagined. You have to keep going and doing your thing. You’re doing this for you.
If this ever happens to you lovely people reading this, I also suggest this: Don’t keep it to yourself. By that I mean share with a friend, partner, spouse, colleague, Instagram friend or a safe community that you’re part of.
Just don’t let it sit in your head and churn around and eat you up.
I messaged my lovely friend and vented to her. It worked a treat and stopped the thoughts spiralling in my head. The member of the Club I referred to above shared with other members within the Club. The worst thing is when you don’t vent how that message has made you feel and instead you convince yourself that they’re right. So you stop writing. You stop creating.
The thing is, trolls are never right. Real or imagined ones. So don’t dilute your creativity because of fear. Block, vent, journal and then move on. Tiny steps. But positive, firm steps. This is your creative journey. Keep going.
LINKS:
Medium: helenredfernwriter.medium.com
Newsletter: helenredfernwriter.com/deskstories
The Confident Creative Club: helenredfernwriter.com/the-confident-creative-club-join
