Author Archives: Chris Csont

Becoming a better writer. Becoming a better Homo sapien.

Stop Saying You’re A Bad Writer

Stop it. Right now.

That voice telling anyone who’ll listen that you’re a bad writer? The one that needs to put down anything you’ve written before somebody gets a chance to make up their own mind about it? That one that stops you from moving forward on the work you need to do?

Separate it from yourself. Call it the voice of Insecurity.

Yes, with a capital I. Insecurity is its own being, like a parasite or a demon that needs to be exorcised.

Insecurity loves to waste your time. And it loves to make other people think they’re wasting their time with you. Insecurity will flat out tell people that your work isn’t worth their attention.

Insecurity will try to tell people that you aren’t worth their time.

But Insecurity isn’t you, and it doesn’t need to be permanent. You can quiet that voice. You can find confidence to supplant it.

Confidence starts when you stop using the passive voice to speak about yourself. Stop thinking “I am a bad writer.” like it’s a constant.

You build confidence through action, so adjust your thinking accordingly.

Look at what you did, not just at what you produced: I wrote today. I edited this. I found a different way to say this. I asked for help.

If you say “I am a bad writer,” you commit to that idea. You choose to accept it. You make it so.

Practice builds confidence. Write. Write a lot, but don’t only write. Immersing yourself in the written word, critiquing other writing, and listening openly and deeply to those who offer to critique your work are all part of the practice.

You focus on the practice, because some days leave you disappointed; so the good days come more often. But no matter the outcome, the effort remains the same. The momentum of actively working carries you through.

Focus on the practice to remind yourself that the writing and the writer both keep changing.

Practice until you stop saying “I’m a bad writer.” Practice until you learn to say “I write.” Then keep practicing.

Seabase Alpha

The Hydrolators. A row of specially designed, retro-futuristic elevators ready to take guests under the ocean to visit Seabase Alpha. I held my father’s hand and waited for my family’s turn to board. I tapped my feet, eyes darting over the crowd of sunscreen-scented tourists, cameras at the ready. They went inside the Hydrolators, the doors closed, and a minute later, another group would board.

I was ten years old, and I wouldn’t put my head underwater in a pool unless suitably bribed. During the swimming lessons my mother insisted I take at the YMCA, I clung to whatever flotation device I was offered. That pool, with its dim, sickly green lighting, appeared bottomless. The instructor said I could float on my own if I just laid back and trusted the water to hold me.

But I knew things could sink. Water swallows them up. I kept my white knuckle grip on the kickboard.

My parents and I entered The Living Seas pavilion mostly knowing what to expect. There was a short movie about the ocean and a ride that took you around a coral reef. Yes, water and I didn’t get along, but there was a fight going on inside me.

I was the kid who told his preschool teacher that he wanted to be a paleontologist when he grew up (and then had to explain what that was to his classmates). I was the kid who checked out every Isaac Asimov branded book about space from my elementary school’s library, one by one. I was the kid who wanted to spend a big chunk of our trip to Disney World going to as many of the attractions at Epcot as we possibly could.

That was the battle: Science is cool! vs. Your watery death is an inevitability.

The crowd thinned out and we waited to move up. I started sniffling. Impatient twitching turned into fearful trembling.

I knew that Body Wars didn’t really shrink my family down and inject us into somebody’s body to swoop around inside their capillaries. I knew that when Pluto snuck up behind me at breakfast and put his gigantic mouth on top of my head, it was just a person in a suit.

But an elevator? Those are real.

One of the Disney World employees saw me and came over to talk. She asked what I was scared of and I told her that I was afraid of going down so deep.

She could have taken us to an exit. She could have said it was alright to pass on something you were scared of and left it at that.

Instead, she showed me a door. She lead my family off to the side of the Hydrolators to a door marked for staff use only and pushed it open for me to look through.

I saw the other side of the Hydrolators. They didn’t go anywhere.

The Epcot employee explained to me that there were a lot of effects that happened in the Hydrolators to make it feel like you were moving, but it was just for show. Something they did to make the ride feel more special. And then the doors on the other side would open.

She asked if I still wanted to go on the ride, and I nodded. She pointed to the line of people getting ready to get into the cars that would take us all around the reef and said we could head right over.

But I wanted to go back and see the Hydrolators. I wanted to see the bubbles. I wanted to feel the shaking. I wanted to see the rock walls moving behind the elevator glass to simulate sinking deep into the ocean.

I wanted to learn how this whole exhibit had made me ignore all the obvious red flags that a science-minded kid should have recognized (Such as “How would they build an undersea base in Orlando, which is in the middle of Florida’s peninsula?”). I wanted to laugh at myself for being afraid of this magic trick.

Peering through that door opened up worlds to me. That moment carried greater resonance when I got around to reading Philip K. Dick and Jean Baudrillard. The memory was sitting in the background as I watched Jurassic Park and thought about how maybe paleontology wasn’t for me, but there might be something to storytelling and film. I still think about that moment in a more literal sense, like when my wife and I went to Universal Studios, and I spent time on the rides looking for the tricks. Trying to spot the seams of the illusions. That moment even crept up during my first encounters with Buddhism.

But maybe the most important part of that moment for me to remember is the compassion of the employee, and how she did more than just try to calm me down and keep the ride going. She showed me that there could be joy both in being tricked and in discovering how it had happened; that skepticism and wonder don’t need to be mutually exclusive.

The Five Stages of Ending a Project

Relief

It’s done! That big, terrifying, exhilarating thing you’ve been focusing on is finally complete!

Exhale. Let that knot in your shoulders work itself out. Maybe take a nap if you’ve been losing sleep.

This stage is all about finding physical and emotional equilibrium. You may not feel manic joy at reaching your goal, so don’t force it. There’s no need to start singing, “Is That All There Is?”. It may feel more like settling down, a choppy sea returning to a gentle low tide. If this is where you’re at, appreciate the feeling.

But it may also feel like slamming on the brakes. Your mind and body have been working hard, and when at a loss for where to direct that energy, it can feel like everything is shaking apart. On more than one occasion I’ve reached a deadline or gone through an event that tested my endurance to come out the other side and wind up with my immune system waving the white flag. The post-deadline cold or flu used to be a given.

I wish I could tell you there’s a secret to avoiding that crash. I wish I could impart some bit of sage, been-there-done-that wisdom that will save you grief. All I can say is that paying attention to yourself on your way to the finish line and being mindful of what your body tells you takes patience and practice. It’s worth the effort, because you’ll be better prepared for what follows.

Gratitude

Even if something you did was entirely manifest by your direct effort, you didn’t do it in isolation. This is not a time for some Randian, bootstrappy gloating about your success. People helped you in other ways, like offering mental support, reminding you to eat, or picking up the slack elsewhere while you were laser focused. They deserve your gratitude, and they’ll appreciate being included in however you choose to celebrate.

If others collaborated on what you were working on, they definitely deserve thanks. If their fingerprints are on it, you need to respect and honor that involvement.

Gratitude isn’t just polite, it helps you to acknowledge the scope of what you just did. To see the full picture of the effort it took to complete.

For example, say you made yourself a cup of coffee in the morning. Someone had to stock those beans for you to purchase. Someone had to roast the beans. Someone had to ship those beans from where they were grown. Someone had to pick those beans. If you want to get even more granular, there were some pollinating insects involved, too.
And we haven’t even touched on how your mug came to be.

If your coffee can warrant that much gratitude, whatever you just completed has its own web of responsible parties. Take the time to let them know you see the part they played.

Sloth

There’s a gap in your to-do list now. It’s a space that doesn’t yet have anything to fill it and you may not feel a sense of clarity or urgency to amend that.

Check Twitter every few minutes. Watch a bad movie. Take another nap. Spend far too long picking out your produce at the grocery store.

Rearrange the icons on your phone. Like, really do it right this time, you know?

The worst thing to do is berate yourself for this lull. That’s like telling someone who just finished a marathon that you can’t believe they want to get a ride home instead of running back.

Don’t do that. Embrace this lethargic fugue state like the hard-won boon that it is.

Clean Up

But sooner or later, you need to snap out of it. There are things to do. Small things. Things that fell through the cracks or weren’t considered important enough to focus on as you set your sights on the goal line.

That haircut you’ve needed for a month. That stack of dishes. Returning phone calls and emails. Sweet Jesus, the laundry.

How long have you been out of salt? Do you even remember? Time to fix that.

The time for tunnel vision is over. Being a person involves lots of little tasks. Maintenance tasks. Smaller parts of a whole. The things you can take care of easily when you’re not consumed by something, body, mind, and soul.

Make a list. Start working down it. Keep doing the small things. Keep putting them on the list. It’s an uphill climb, but you need to build up some momentum.

What’s Next?

There’s two variations on this stage, which I’ll be describing as Hamiltonian and Bartletarian.

In the Hamiltonian version, there’s a sense of confusion, trepidation, and uncertainty. What Comes Next isn’t clear, and requires some trial and error.

Bartletarian is all about forward momentum and a clear progression of goals. You may have had an inkling of what was next in line as soon as you achieved your goal, and now you’re ready to tackle it. Like a puma. Or Martin Sheen.

Either way, you know that something new is coming up. Best to get ready for it.