Comments on: You don’t need support to write: you own your own words

By: Denise

Denise — Fri, 10 Oct 2014 15:01:13 +0000

I understand what you’re saying, and I think that support from the people around you is very important when you’re trying to accomplish writing goals. Support is subjective – waiting ten extra minutes for dinner to be made, say, or just not being negative about the work being put in is being supportive. I would say that outside validation of what you’re doing as a writer isn’t necessary – at least until agents, publishers and editors are involved. Your family and friends don’t need to say how awesome you are and cheerlead. But, having them give you the room you need to get done is definitely a good thing, and in some cases, necessary.

By: Caroline

Caroline — Sun, 03 Aug 2014 11:33:54 +0000

Thanks for such an interesting post. I really enjoyed reading it and thought I should add my own two cents here. I agree that we should not need our family (or even our friends’) validation in order to write. If we want to write, nee if we must write, then how family feels about it should not be an issue and, yet, all too often it is a concern and the decisions that must be made on the foot of it can be very complex.

Indeed, our words can often be easier than our actions and we often look to family for validation in all aspects of our lives. Browsing through a forum a few weeks ago I came across a post from a young writer who was terrified at the prospect of publishing their work, as they knew that they would be mocked by their family for having written anything at all. Whether or not family members do this in jest is one thing, but this poor person was becoming creatively crippled by their fears. In this sense then, your advice is very pertinent.

However, there is another sense in which it is important that a family is supportive of your writing and that relates to finding the time to actually write and the question of what happens if you become really good at it.

Particularly in your immediate family, if they are unsupportive then they may resent the time that you need to take in order to actually produce something. This may only be 30 minutes a day but it is 30 minutes that you take for yourself, not your family. Also, presumably a person writes with at least the vague hope that they will be successful, that others will read their work and that someone, someday may even pay them to write more. With the best will in the world, if this happens, then writing will become another part of life and one that is likely to change it in someway. Family then, has to be willing to come along for the ride, otherwise a person will have to make the choice and decide which is more important writing or family. This is not a choice that, I imagine, anyone would relish having to make.

These are not easy issues to deal with and I’m glad that this post opens a discussion about it here because it might be surprising (to non writers at least) that something as simple a writing a story can have such a far reaching personal impact on the creator.

By: TheseWomensWork

TheseWomensWork — Fri, 01 Aug 2014 21:05:51 +0000

Thank you for this. It needed to be said. I come from a family that was emotionally abusive and my sister and I were the lowest on the totem pole because the family was extremely patriarchal. My parents still think I need validation and approval from them for everything I do. It’s taken me a long time to discover that my own approval for what I am doing is the most important thing. Now it amuses me when my parents try to “assure” me that they will help me publish my writing. I don’t need any help from them and no approval from them either.

Tam

By: Icy Sedgwick

Icy Sedgwick — Tue, 29 Jul 2014 11:03:02 +0000

I’ve been lucky in that my family enjoy my work, and support what I do, which in itself is a good space in which to work because they give me the time to do it, but I dated a man who dismissed my work as merely “okay” because it didn’t fit within the highbrow range of cultural materials to which he was accustomed. I was asked to respect whatever writers he was interested in, but I was not allowed to be offended when he showed no interest in my own work, as if it wasn’t worthy of note. I found myself actually apologising for the ‘genre’ fiction that I write. Eventually I just asked him not to read my work if he was so disinterested. We’re no longer together and in all honesty that’s a toxic influence my writing didn’t need!

By: Katherine Hajer

Katherine Hajer — Mon, 28 Jul 2014 03:13:51 +0000

I totally agree the support question can lead down some very bad paths. Worse is when writers get the advice that they *should* receive feedback and support from romantic partners and family members. It means people close to the writer who don’t support the idea of them writing anyhow now have ammunition: they have material they can run down and belittle in the name of “giving feedback”, and encourage the writer to find something else to do. You know, something they’d approve of.

By: Ariel

Ariel — Fri, 25 Jul 2014 16:31:48 +0000

You’re 100% right – having support is great but if you don’t have it shouldn’t stop anyone from writing. I’m not always at that place where I believe in myself and my writing to try it everyday, but I hope to get there. Wonderful post!

By: Lori Schafer

Lori Schafer — Thu, 24 Jul 2014 17:07:11 +0000

Thank you, Racheline! I, too, always have the same response to the “support” question – it simply isn’t relevant to me whether I have support or not. Of course, everyone’s situation is different, and if your writing has to come at the expense of feeding your family, that’s another story. But for most of us, who are writing part-time anyway, this is not the case. I don’t need anyone’s permission to do what I want with my time – and if they don’t like my writing, they don’t have to read it!

By: S. L. Saboviec

S. L. Saboviec — Thu, 24 Jul 2014 16:28:13 +0000

I kept a nearly daily journal for almost five years, primarily around college. It was a great experience to purge myself of any of these doubts. Prior to that, I was free with whatever I wanted to write because I was young and immune to worrying about what others thought about it (lucky me in that aspect–in other aspects of my life, I was terribly shy and withdrawn). After writing a private journal for so many years, it never occurred to me that I wasn’t allowed to write what I wanted.

But the journaling was important in other ways: It taught me how to be honest with myself first and foremost, which is the beginning step to being honest with others. So important if you want to be an effective writer, one that writes from your deepest soul.

By: Bob Braxton

Bob Braxton — Wed, 23 Jul 2014 21:01:17 +0000

words belong. I write, without selling, regardless of someone else’s approval. My gender is different (from female) at least on the surface. Sometimes the writing is writing me and not the other way around. Thank you for sticking up for all words that are writing and writers who have words to say.