Volume Twelve: Picking Yourself Up

Writing, like any other artistic or creative undertaking, is far from an exact science. I in no way believe myself to be a master of the game or a voice of authority on the dos and don’ts of writing. This column is simply me sharing with all of you some of the things that I’ve picked up along the way that seem to help me out. Use them, abuse them, make fun of them, or sell them on eBay. Now, on to the article!

“Picking Yourself Up”

There’s a universal truth not only in writing and creating, but in life in general. We all fall down. We screw up, we say the wrong thing, we make a bad decision. Sooner or later, we all find ourselves flat on our backs in the dirt. Left to look up and wonder how it all went so wrong.

When writing there are a lot of ways to end up like that. Most of those ways tie in with being lazy. I talked last time about deadlines, but what happens when you miss one? You’ve fallen down, so to speak. You messed up, you spent too much time doing other things and didn’t have enough time to work and hit your deadline. At that point you’re left with one thing, your reaction. How do you react to the fall? We all screw up the same, but we don’t all react the same to that screw up. How you deal with a fall like this will not only define you as a creative individual, it will define you as a person.

Have you ever heard a married couple talk about how they like fighting, because it affords them a reason and a chance to make up? That’s how I view writing screw ups. Being down in the dirt is no fun, that’s a fact. But it is an opportunity. A chance to learn something about yourself. To document a fault and start working on it. A chance to stand back up and prove to yourself that you can do it. You can shut off the television and you can tell your friends no and you can dedicate yourself to something you believe in. On some small level, it’s a chance to be a hero. Think about it, what defines a hero? It’s someone who overcomes some great problem or gets through some harrowing trial. So what if you screw up with your writing or with whatever? So what if you made a mistake? That’s in the past. What you need to deal with now is how you are going to recover from that mistake.

Last week I talked about a deadline I had set for myself. Not only did I not hit this deadline, the truth is I didn’t even get close. What’s worse is that I barely tried. I was tired. How’s that for an excuse? I’ve been tired this week. Is that what I’m going to say to Marc Silvestri when he’s asking me for the next Darkness script? Is that what I’m going to say to Bob Wayne (I think that’s the Batman editor) when he asks me for my next Batman script? Is that what I’m going to tell my fans when they are expecting the next issue of one of my comics? But the fact is, it’s past. I fell down on this one. So now what? What comes then? Do I mope about it? Do I beat myself up about it for weeks and just waste time and stop writing? Hell no I don’t. I swooped in there and I started writing. I may not have made my deadline, but I’ve set out to prove that I can hit my deadline. To prove that next time I will hit my deadline. I sat down and I came in like a Hollywood movie hero, I pulled victory from the jaws of defeat, I rescued the damsel in distress, I saved the world from destruction. That may be overstating it somewhat, but truth is, I proved something to myself. I got up and I put the mistake behind me. I got motivated. I got excited.

I got something done.

Which in the end is what it’s all about.

Until next time, this is the slightly overweight member of NSYNC and the only person who watched Blind Justice, Aaron Hall, signing off. If you have any questions or comments about creating comics feel free to email them to freejenkins@gmail.com and I’ll answer them right here in this very column because yes, I care about you that much.