There’s a lot of give and take when you make your writing schedule. You make bold plans—logical, they seem, at the outset. Then life happens, or the narrative doesn’t cooperate, or any of the myriad ways that reality brings the impact of actual effort into the picture. This is when #rubbermeetsroad. And we always have choices, we can melt in the face of a setback, declare nothing’s working when our productivity doesn’t match our schedule, or we can make an adjustment.
Dreams+visions are maps that send us out exploring. Obstacles are the rocky terrain. Where we end up is often somewhere unexpected. That’s because the ephemera of visions cannot be recreated with the weight of words (or within the weight of the world). Wherever our efforts take us we would not have made it there without having a vision and setting out to achieve a dream.
When we do crossing the rocky terrain in pursuit of our visions, we are gifted with new strategies that we can bring to the next pursuit. One of the most important learnings we get from facing challenges and tracking dreams is how to keep moving in the face of setbacks.
Success is only achieved by managing setbacks, yet many of us take setbacks as an indication of what they should or shouldn’t be doing. They interpret an obstacle or a setback as a judgment on their talent, their dreams, or their goals. But the fact is, we all experience setbacks. If we put an extra burden on ourselves, judging ourselves for having the setback, we’re putting extra weight on our backs for the journey.
The question is not why do I have these setbacks, it is what am I going to do to get through this set back and what will I do after it passes. The bounce back is EVERYTHING! How do you navigate setbacks? Is it fuel? Is it the nail in the coffin of your efforts? As I say to my daughter when she has a setback, “What are you going to do about it?” As my dad says to me, “How bad do you want it?”
The more strategies we build to handle setbacks the more we stack the deck in our favor. Reaching the finish line relies on us not letting setbacks deter us. They may delay us, redirect us, or turn us around, but we can’t allow them to take us completely off track.
All of that to say, I was pushing hard to get my revisions done on the current draft of my YA novel. I wanted some time off to rest between this draft and the round of edits that come next, but alas the revisions required re-plotting and deep thought that slowed me down. I could easily get stuck obsessing over my missed goal, but I’m opting to keep my cool.
When we’re fragile and tentative about our relationship to writing, a schedule mishap has the power to set off the internal critics. Over years of failure, I’ve developed tenacity and a growth mindset. My target is bigger than my mistakes. Missed goal dates is part of the process. Missed a date? Step back, assess, reset and carry on. The only way to completion is forward
‘Remember that the idea we often attribute to Darwin, “Survival of the fittest”, doesn’t mean the strongest or the smartest or the luckiest, but the ones best able to acclimate to change.’—From “10 Things Every Child with Autism Wishes You Knew” by Ellen Notbohm
In other words to thrive , we need to have the ability to ADAPT, ADAPT, ADAPT. Which is what is required in writing. I had a period of asking successful novelists (or reading about successful novelist’s) perspective on it getting easier from book to book. And they all insisted that it doesn’t get easier because every book is different.
What I take from that is that we have to shift to meet our needs and the needs of the project. When you find something that works, work the bleep out of it. When it stops working, find something else. There are so many factors and contributors to setbacks, so I hope you all are building strategies for bouncing back and being buoyant.
Happy adapting, folks! Let’s not be afraid of the reset.
Onward!