Procrastination alert; fear of failure · 12:38am Apr 27th, 2014
Probably my favorite thing in the world is that little 'lightbulb' that goes on when you finally 'get' something. Mobius strips finally make sense, or you suddenly see that one pun and for some reason it's funnier than the entire rest of the fic.
Myself, I just had one about procrastination.
I was reading some blog about math and fear of failure, and it talked about procrastination being symptomatic of fear of failure [1]. And I just got it.
I'm absolutely terrified of failure. I mean, I just have no words whatsoever. I know this, and even have enough self-awareness to think it's silly or something, but that hasn't stopped me from spending all day sputtering around on the internet instead of working on my current fic project [2]. Actually, I've probably spent most of the month sputtering around instead of working on it. [3]
I'm not sure where I was going with this. This blog is, in itself, a degree of procrastination. But y'know. Share it.
[1] After the phrase
Sing it with me: “I hate math!”
if you want to go searching for it.
[2] Which is due (self-imposed long-externally-committed deadline) on May 1st, for you keeping track at home. MAY 1. That's not even five days away anymore.
[3] Not all, some was legitimate "other-stuff-I-had-to-be-doing". But most of it was wasting time.
Oh yes, I can relate to that blog so keenly you wouldn't believe. That blog post was me, if you only replace "topography" with "my PhD research project". The kicker is that I had an advisor who worked in an office right next door who I could have asked for help at any time...
...and I hardly ever did. Because, well...
Yeah.
It's called imposter syndrome, by the way, the belief that you are a no good fraud who is here by accident and as soon as someone notices you are gormless moron you will be thrown out on the street soyou'dbetternotmakeafussordrawattentiontoyourself.
I'm not sure how well this applies to fic writing, but I'm sure it does. All I can say is you are not alone. I'm not sure I can help, because I never really figured out how to stop being absolutely frickin' terrified of everyone in my department who already had their doctorate and from a fic-writing standpoint, well, see, the thing is I have these 30,000 words I never quite managed to publish for much the same reasons.
So if you ever figure it out, please tell me how.
2053809
Oh boy, imposter syndrome! I've heard about that. I don't think that's what's going on, I know I'm a no good hack by the standards I'm measuring against but I'm here chucking stuff around anyways. (Maybe imposter syndrome versus what I wish I were doing? 'Cause I've got ideas, see, for this big spaceship nighepic series...)
However:
> 30,000 words
> canisee
(I've also got this idea that maybe giving someone else a publish button could help, but I'm not sure how well it relates to the taskathand.)