I’m thinking about perfectionism again, specifically with respect to how it can skew your opinion of success and failure.
There’s this concept that comes up a lot when you read about issues like perfectionism: all-or-nothing thinking. It’s a trap that’s easy to fall into.
If you’re a fic writer falling into this trap, you might feel like you’re an absolute failure if your fic isn’t a 100% accurate depiction of the scene you see in your head with flawless grammar and zero typos. That is a, quite literally, impossible standard to meet and as a result of never meeting it, you probably feel one or more of the following:
- lack of motivation
- certainty that there’s no point in even trying
- self-hatred or some other form of intense dissatisfaction with yourself and/or your skills
This is a completely logical way to feel in that mindset, by the way. Your standard for success is so high that you’re constantly a failure. If your standard for success is impossible to meet, then there is no point in trying. If there’s no point in trying, how could you possibly feel motivated?
In order to move away from those feelings, you need to move away from that all-or-nothing, black & white mindset.
One way to do this is by figuring out a new standard for success that actually can be achieved. For example, give yourself permission to have occasional typos in your stories. Gaiman’s Law states that an author will always find a typo the first time they open their published book. If even Neil himself has resigned himself to this fate, then hopefully you can too. If you managed to write your story then that’s a success and finding a typo after you’re done doesn’t turn that success into a failure.
Another thing that’s helped me is to think of every failure or mistake or dissatisfying result as a learning opportunity. If I’m not able to do something now, that doesn’t mean I won’t be able to do it at some point in the future. I just need to keep trying. Practice makes better. Practice also helps you figure out the things that are easy for you and the bits that are hard and where you might need some help - either from a fellow fan or from another kind of resource.
I think part of the reason why people can get so anxious about their fanworks is because we care so much about them. We love the characters. We love the world. We want to do them justice in our writing, and we want other fans to love our creations too.
It’s important to remember that all of us love imperfect things all the time. It’s not perfection that makes a thing lovable. It’s the heart that’s put into it.
There’s a lot of fear behind perfectionism. Fear of being caught doing something wrong. Fear of being shamed for a mistake. Fear that imperfection makes us unworthy or unlovable. Fear that a single flaw will ruin an entire work. Fear of failure.
If you want to be able to move through that fear, you need to be able to reduce it somehow. The most effective way that I’ve found is to stop writing with the goal of posting something online. Write for the sake of writing, without the pressure of showing it to someone else. That might help you to get out a first draft (or second or third) without that worry about being judged and found wanting.
If you’re not ready for positive self-talk or reframing the internal narrative (I get it. Been there.) then allowing yourself to be less than perfect in a place where no one else can see you might be a good first step.
And just because I think it’s important that you hear it from time to time: you are a wonderful, creative, amazing human being - mistakes included.
