After reading Lamott's Shitty First Drafts, a feeling of relief exuded me, especially about my most recent first draft. Like Lamott, I find actually starting to write the worst part of the whole process. Beginning that opening paragraph, sitting down to type, forcing myself to string words together is completely overwhelming. I find myself second-guessing my writing regularly, comparing myself to others, and worrying about every little detail, instead of just getting something down, (the 'down draft', as a friend of Lamott's calls it). Sometime I catch myself using a thesaurus on every single word to make it perfect. In fact, I've already used it twice in this post so far...
What's even better than the relief that Lamott provided, was the humor that went along with it. Suggesting to put all the little worried voices in our heads in jars with volume-control was an excellent idea. She gives way to the seriousness that writing seems to be thought of and instead makes it more of a relaxed process, and a humorous one. Hopefully I can use this advice as I write more and more, but it will definitely be hard to break the perfectionist that I, and most others, have inside us. It looks like I'll be needing some glass jars.
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