BEING AN ANXIOUS WRITER/AUTHOR
I have always struggled with anxiety. I find it hits at the weirdest times, and sometimes it overwhelms me to the point where I have to stop what I'm doing, take a break and come back to it later. I know I'm not the only one who has times like these, but I do feel like mental health issues aren't talked about by writers as much as the physical ones. Some of that might be the stigma, or just people not realising that their experience while unique, is also felt by others in the writing and author space.
There have been a lot of tools in my toolbox for anxiety. Whether that's reaching out to writer friends, or just my friends who I can go to with anything, or whether that's talking it through with my awesome editor, or even talking about it more openly on socials. There are ways to deal with it, and ways to allow yourself to breathe a little along the way.
Drafting has, not really, ever been something that heightens my anxiety. I feel at home drafting and creating. I feel like even if there's something that's not working, I have time to fix it later. This mindset might be just the reason that revision causes me more anxiety and editing even more so. I have reached the later, and now I have to fix it otherwise things are not going to go well.
Of course, having worked with editors who haven't been all that patient, and a bit aggressive in the way they phrase their feedback hasn't helped the editing process become something I can look forward to. After all, a learned response is hard to break, and for a while I worked with an editor where I felt like one step wrong would unleash a barrage of anger and I never do well with confrontation, especially like that. Thankfully I've not worked with this editor in a long long while, and because of that have had a couple of good experiences with other editors since. This has, somewhat, allowed me to unlearn that anxiety spike and start to lean into and enjoy the editing process more.
My point is that there are many pitfalls for those of us who are already prone to anxiety, and there are ways to deal with them. Whether that's finding someone who can, and does, support you, or finding a way of working that allows you to breathe, relax, and also somewhat enjoy the work you're doing. I had that with my last editor, and I have that with my current editor, and they've both really helped with working through that lingering anxiety tied to the editing process.
But it's not always easy to just unlearn something, and it's definitely not easy to cope with the constant thrum of anxiety when you're trying to do the one thing that you need to do before you can publish your next book. I've done breathing exercises, I've done down time. I've spent time listening to music, spent time reading through good things in my good stuff folder. I've talked to other writers about what is and isn't normal when it comes to what an editor should or shouldn't do, but my brain's natural response is to panic, is to get anxious, and while I hope that one day that will change, for now it's my reality.
So even if you're someone who gets anxious, try and find those ways to cope, to move through the anxiety and come out the other side. You will be a better writer for it. You've got this, and we believe in you!
Any questions? Lemme know in the comments!
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