I almost didn’t finish this article. Versions of it sat in my Google Drive for the better part of a year, always started and never finished. With each opportunity, I’d open the document and stare. This will be the time, I’d think. I’d type a few words, inching forward. Then, I’d close out and inevitably move on to a different idea. Maybe next time.
Once I’ve started a project, it’s hard for me to resist the impulse to immediately start a new one. In the process of trying to finally finish this piece, I’d open a new tab, add several more, and flit through each of them searching for a thought that would prompt me to return to the blank page. Once there, I’d scrawl out a few words. Then, I’d hop up and wander over to the sink to do dishes or to the bed to pet the dog, who looked up at me, unimpressed, as if to say, Is this all that you’ve accomplished since last time?
When I sit down to write, I imagine that I’m standing on the edge of a cliff, looking down into a canyon, and I can’t see to the other side. I can only see far enough ahead to take the next step, which I don’t want to take. There’s a stubbornness in me. Inwardly, I dig in my heels as I approach any opportunity that requires effort, knowing what I’ll have to undergo in order to reach my desired outcome: nothing less than transformation. I’ve experienced it. I’ve played the role of devoted artist working on her craft, scrawling out draft after draft until I’ve written a piece a dozen times over with enough leftover words to create an entirely new essay, albeit an incoherent one. I once sat with an essay for 12 hours, turning it over and rewriting it only to call it unfinished at the end of the day. I lacked the wherewithal to focus for that long, feeling vulnerable, exposed, and exhausted through the act of trying while feeling like I had little to show for it.
That’s what writing seems to be about now: having something to show. The expectation often works against me, fueling the jitters that have me bouncing around the room, trying to land anywhere except in front of the computer. If I fail, at least I know why. At least I can dwell in the land of potential, where I can spin out a dozen stories about how I succeeded once I tried. But I balk at the actual attempt because what happens if I do try and still fail?
Theodore Roosevelt would say all the better. In his speech, “Citizen in a Republic,” he says:
It’s not the critic who counts; not the man who points out how the strong man stumbles or where the doer of deeds could have done them better.
The credit belongs to the man who is actually in the arena, whose face is marred by dust and sweat and blood; who strives valiantly . . . who at best knows the triumph of high achievement and who at the worst, if he fails, at least fails while daring greatly.
I’m not so convinced of the former president’s words. The start and end of an endeavor are the safest places to be, but the middle becomes a great expanse of attempts, and in the trying there is incompleteness and mediocrity. In the middle, results are not guaranteed, and progress becomes circular and cyclical rather than a linear advancement. The stubbornness in me does not easily forget the series of failures that lead to success. The stubbornness in me doesn’t want to go there. It’s risky. Yet as Robert Frost wrote, “The best way out is always through.”
I borrow these words —“risk,” “exposure,” and “vulnerability”—from Brené Brown, a researcher on the concept of vulnerability. In her interview with Forbes magazine, (where she referenced and introduced me to Roosevelt’s speech) she says, “Vulnerability is not knowing victory or defeat, it’s understanding the necessity of both; it’s engaging. It’s being all in.” In over my head is what it feels like sometimes. That’s why it can feel vulnerable, too, to sit with these particular thoughts for a prolonged amount of time. These aren’t just the wandering, aimless kind. They’re the ones I turn over and over, hoping to invoke meaning that might resonate. To even admit that this is my intention veers into vulnerable territory. With each turn, I can easily envision all the ways I could misstep, speaking insensitively here or ignorantly there. The downside of a vivid imagination, I suppose.
Not only does vulnerability draw you into the arena, but it asks you to find meaning in the process it takes to reach the end, a process for which I have little tolerance. Over time, I’ve settled into perfectionism. I lack patience. I see little value in progress because I desire the result. And with a lack of patience, an intolerance—for all things ambiguous and in-between. In my metaphor of the canyon, I perch on the edge of a precipice, dreading the downward climb. Perfectionism makes me see each step as nothing more than a nuisance. I remember the hours spent in effort with little to show for it, unable to see the benefit of gradual improvement because even improvement is not enough. I’m trying to find my way back, though. And I’m trying to maybe not drag my feet with fear but relearn an acceptance—and maybe awe—of things in-process. Because that’s what I am.
As my writing journey acts as a metaphor for my journey with myself, my feelings on writing mean that as I build tolerance for the imperfection of process, I am building tolerance—and eventually love—for myself. And I wonder if it's perhaps not so inconceivable to see goodness in the fragments of a self I’m still learning to be. No effort considered a waste. Gratitude for every part, whether it ends up in the final form or not. Deliberate steps forward, knowing there are no shortcuts, remembering that “The best way out is always through.”
Elisabeth Ivey writes literary non-fiction and young adult fiction. She has contributed to The Odyssey and Messiah College’s The Swinging Bridge, and she has presented research on representation in youth literature at the PA NAME and IMAGINE Social Good conferences.
