No matter how much you love writing (or teaching or baking or putting up drywall) there are always going to be things about it you hate.
You can love hiking, but still hate it when your toenails fall off. Just because you delight in your baby does not mean you find joy in cleaning up barf. And we writers, however deeply we love our craft, always have something about it we detest.
Maybe it’s forcing out that first impossible draft. Maybe it’s laboring over revisions. Maybe it’s building a platform, sending out queries, or waiting for responses.
What can we do about the stuff we hate doing? You may think you have no choice but to gird your loins and keep at it. But in fact, there are things we can do about the tasks of daily life (or daily writing) that are getting us down. Here are four.
1. Stop doing it.
I’m serious here. If you genuinely dislike doing something, the first thing you should ask yourself is whether you really have to do it. Often, that answer is going to be “yes.” Don’t like cleaning the bathroom? Disciplining your kids? Paying taxes? Too bad, you have to do it anyway.
But sometimes, if you think about it carefully, you’ll realize you don’t have to do the thing you dislike, or at least you don’t have to do it all the time.
This is the way it was with me and cooking. After writing and teaching all day, the last thing I feel like doing is chopping vegetables and stirring sauces. What I want to do is sit down with a glass of wine.
For years, I cooked anyway. My thinking was: Normal people cook meals and then eat them. Not cooking is aberrant.
Fortunately, I got over it. Now, I make sandwiches, drop by the deli on my way home, or throw a frozen vegan pizza in the oven. My diet’s as healthy as it ever was, and I’ve freed up several hours a week. I’d love it if someone would walk into my house and prepare a 7-course meal from time to time, but until that happens, I’m perfectly happy to microwave a Trader Joe’s frozen entrée and declare it dinner.
2. Figure out why you dislike a task and change that one thing.
We tend to think in black and white. We either like doing something, or we don’t. This prevents us from looking closely at exactly why we feel the way we do. The answer to that question can help us redesign our tasks, eliminating or altering the specific things that are bothering us.
I used this technique back in the 90’s when I was in the throes of a love-hate relationship with teaching. I’ve been a college professor forever. But I went through a phase of utterly disliking my work. I would wake up with a knot in the pit of my stomach and come home depressed. I thought of changing jobs, but couldn’t get over the feeling that teaching was the right thing for me despite my negativity toward it.
It wasn’t until I spent some time reflecting on why I disliked teaching so much, that I could address the problem. The reason became clear. I lacked confidence. I didn’t think I was a very good teacher, and I wasn’t sure about anything I did in the classroom. That pit in my stomach wasn’t just dislike, it was anxiety.
Once I understood that, I could address it, learning new teaching techniques, getting support from colleagues, and gradually building up a sense of esteem about my teaching. Now, I’ve come to realize I’m a pretty good professor—not one of the ones you remember on your deathbed, but good enough.
3. Find something you love in it.
The flip side of # 2 is closely examining unpleasant tasks to find an angle or aspect you enjoy.This is how I learned to love my author’s platform.
When I first started building my platform, the advice I got was to do everything: Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, Tumblr, YouTwitFace, Doodle-Scroodle, Pin-the-Tail-on-Donkey…okay, I’m making things up now, but you get the picture.
The problem was that I hated some aspects of platform building. Some social media sites frustrated and overwhelmed me. Some made me feel like a huckster and others made me feel too exposed.
I was so uncomfortable, I almost stopped building my platform.Then I decided I’d just keep doing the parts I liked. I realized that I enjoy blogging. I find the lightning-fast world of Twitter exciting and the slower, more intimate world of emailing writing strategies satisfying. So I focused on those aspects of platform building and eliminated everything else.
Overnight, my feelings about my platform changed—and that was reflected in the energy I brought to my readers.
4. Stop evaluating
So what if none of the above work? There are always going to be some things that we can’t stop, change, or learn to love.
In that case, we need to turn to the Zen solution: Stop evaluating.
Let go of the idea that everything you do is either “good” or “bad,” “pleasurable” or “displeasing,” “play” or “work.” Put your judgment on pause. Silence the self-talk.
Just do it.
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