Unexamined beliefs can keep a writer in a prison of your own making.
by Anne R. Allen
“Think outside the box” has become a mindless cliché these days. It’s repeated so often that the meaning has pretty much disappeared.
But it’s still excellent advice—if you know how to follow it. Unfortunately, most people are unaware they’re inside boxes, so they have no idea what it means to think outside of one.
Discussing somebody’s “box” can be like talking to a fish about water. The “box” is all there is.
Most of us are boxed in by beliefs that have been programed into our brains from day one by our culture, families, politics, and that 4th Grade teacher who told you if you kept reading comic books, you’d never amount to anything.
Shaming Creates Unexamined Beliefs
Shamers like the anti-comic book teacher are dangerous because you usually don’t remember them. You may have forgotten your 4th Grade teacher’s name.
All you know is you feel guilty when you read things you enjoy—plus you have a secret, persistent fear that you’re never going to amount to anything.
Very often a belief you’re sure “everybody knows” has come from a random shamer who once made you feel bad because of your lack of knowledge of a particular subject. Sometimes they’re authority figures, but often they’re just bullies or “know-it-alls.”
It may very well be that the shamer was even more ignorant than you, or just plain wrong. But an authoritative tone made you accept the statement as fact. (Remember that the most ignorant people are usually the most confident. That’s called the Dunning-Kruger effect.)
You’ve never questioned this “information” because it was the first information you got on a subject. Plus it was probably delivered in a emotionally memorable way.
“First Information” Becomes Unexamined “Truth”
The first thing you hear about a subject is filed in your brain as fact. Especially when coupled with an emotional experience. It’s how the brain works.
You put your little hand in fire and got burned, so you learned that fire is hot. That fact becomes hardwired to your brain—part of your sense of self. You’re a smart primate who knows fire is hot.
An authoritative person speaking in a demeaning tone can have the same effect as a burn. A shaming tone programs people to accept information as fact.
That’s how cult leaders and radio bloviators control their minions.
False information imprisons victims in a box. Unless they’re somehow shocked into questioning why they believe the misinformation, they can’t escape.
I started reading about this after a bizarre incident working in a bookstore. The owner made me shelve the collected works of Emily Dickinson in the Romance section. She insisted Emily Dickinson wrote “girly trash.”
Nothing I said could change her mind, in spite of the fact she “adored” Emily Dickinson.
I finally figured out some uneducated, sexist moron must have shamed my boss for loving Emily Dickinson when she was young. So she had created a false belief that became hardwired to her brain.
If first time you hear about Emily Dickinson, you’re told she’s a major American poet, that’s what you’ll believe unless something big happens to dislodge that belief.
But if the first time you hear about her, an authoritative person declares that Dickinson’s work is “girly trash” you’ll believe that.
This belief becomes a part of “who you are.” You will defend it as if you’re defending your own body—until that lightbulb goes on and you say, “why do I believe that?.”
It’s Tougher than We Thought to Change Minds
Researchers have discovered that when confronted with facts that negate their unexamined beliefs, most people will double down on those beliefs, rather than consider changing their minds.
So maybe there was a schoolmarmish know-it-all in your first critique group who told you in a withering tone that only terrible writers use the word “was.” She may have trapped you into the mindset that “was” is a taboo word.
You now believe that “everybody knows” using the word “was” is the mark of a bad writer. And you will continue to pass on that misinformation.
Unless you finally ask yourself why you believe this odd pseudo-fact, your writing can’t escape that “box” you’re trapped in. (For more on the “was” police—who changed a handy editing tip to an ironclad “rule”— see my post “Should You Eliminate ‘Was’ from Your Writing.”)
People-Pleasers are Easily Trapped by Shaming Statements
People who strive to please all of the people all of the time are especially susceptible to accepting bogus beliefs without examining them.
If you have “people-pleasing” issues, when somebody makes a disparaging remark, the thing that has been disparaged may become taboo for you, even after the unpleased person has left the picture.
I had a friend who inherited her parents’ house and immediately had the drought-tolerant tam junipers-and-rocks landscaping torn out. But she couldn’t afford to replace it. The house sat unlandscaped for years. When she tried to refinance, she couldn’t, because tearing out the landscaping had reduced the home’s value.
I asked why she had been so eager to pull out the perfectly fine landscaping. She said “everybody knows tam junipers-and-rocks are awful.”
Turned out she’d once dated a landscaper who complained about the one-time fad for tam junipers.
“They’re so 1970s,” she said.
A few dates with an arrogant guy who made his money by pushing new landscaping trends—and this woman turned her home into a slum.
She was a prisoner of her unexamined beliefs in the importance of the opinions of people like Mr. Bad Date.
Writers fall into this trap all the time. Because your 9th grade English teacher had an attack of the vapors any time somebody ended a sentence with a preposition, you feel compelled to twist your sentences into verbal pretzels to avoid displeasing that teacher, even though she’s been dead for twenty-five years.
Perfectionism is the Bully that Keeps you Locked in that Box
People who are prone to perfectionism are likely to be trapped by this kind of shaming.
I once had a roommate who was the worst housekeeper ever. In fact, he got evicted from every place he ever lived because of the squalor. When I moved in with him, I thought the mess was temporary (we were both actors in the middle of Hell Week before the opening of a big musical.)
But I was handy with a vacuum cleaner and a mop, so as soon as I moved in, I tackled the worst of the mess. Not scrubbing all the corners, but I tidied things up and cleaned the high traffic areas, to make the house liveable.
I thought he’d be pleased, but when he came home, all he said was “you didn’t move the couch! I can tell you just vacuumed under it without moving it. And the drapes are still filthy.”
I later found out his mother was a meticulous housekeeper. Because he couldn’t clean the house to his mother’s standards, he couldn’t clean it at all. The only thing he could do was criticize people who did.
He was paralyzed by his perfectionism and his unexamined beliefs about what “cleaning” meant.
Creativity Wounds Create Unexamined Beliefs.
Some people long to write, but can never put pen to paper because of what Grant Faulkner calls “Creativity Wounds.” He said that when we “put our souls into the things we create, and the world rebuffs us, or is outright hostile, the pain is such that it might as well be a flesh wound. In fact, it sometimes might be better to have a flesh wound.”
Those wounds create beliefs we never examine for fear of opening the wound.
I think a man I once knew had that kind of wound. When I wrote a story loosely based on an anecdote he liked to tell about his family, he dropped me in fury. I asked a mutual friend why, since I thought the guy would be pleased I’d paid attention to his story.
He wasn’t, the mutual friend said, because he’d wanted to write it himself.
I pointed out the man had never penned so much as a haiku in his life, so the thought he might want to write fiction had never crossed my mind.
“But he’s always wanted to be a writer!” the mutual friend said.
The man died recently without ever writing a word.
I wondered what overly critical teacher or peer had wounded his young creative self. The pain had given him beliefs that stopped him from ever fulfilling his dream.
Writers have to be willing to write imperfect, sh**y first drafts, or they’ll end up like my poor friend.
Allowing Yourself to Play Can Help Confront Unexamined Beliefs
My late friend probably had more unexamined beliefs than most people, but we all have them. I know I have many. But I used to have more. (Therapy helps.)
The first step to freeing yourself from them is acknowledging they exist. And they may have been caused by “Creativity Wounds” you need to examine, so be brave.
The next step is allowing yourself to play and have some fun. Put yourself back in the child-like state of mind you had before you were fed all those limiting beliefs.
This is why NaNoWriMo works for a lot of new writers. It forces them to put the stuff on paper in a playful way, joining in a national game. So those perfectionist pre-programmed beliefs are overridden.
NaNo wasn’t around when I was flailing around with my early writing. And I’m not sure it would have helped, but it might have. One of my unexamined beliefs had to do with genre.
My parents were both literature professors, so I had unexamined beliefs about literary fiction being superior to genre fiction. This kept me writing and rewriting the same unpublishable literary novel for years.
Finally a friend I trusted pointed out that I was always reading mystery novels and funny women’s fiction. Why didn’t I write books like that?
Bam. I had to examine why I believed I had to write literary fiction. And realized I didn’t.
When I finally let myself write a funny mystery, my writing flowed easily.
Some writers get stuck in the wrong genre for years because of unexamined beliefs in its superiority or their own lack of range.
Have You Chosen the Wrong Medium Because of Unexamined Beliefs?
Others might not actually want to write at all. Maybe their creativity would be better served in another medium entirely.
I was in a critique group with a man who struggled with every word, and descended into despair when he got less than glowing reactions to his long, conflict-free pages of description. Finally he dropped out of the group.
A couple of years later I ran into him at an art opening—his. He had become an accomplished painter. With all those tedious description passages, he’d been trying to paint with words. But it turned out all he needed was a brush.
He told me he’d always thought he “ought” to write and that painting was “just playing.” But writing had become so painful, he’d decided he might as well play. That led to him becoming a painter who made a lot more money than most writers do.
Like me, he had decided to take the easy route and “have fun.” And it turned out the easy path was also the way out of the box that trapped him.
Having fun and letting yourself play can be the key to unlocking that box and freeing your creativity from the beliefs you don’t even realize are keeping you trapped inside.
by Anne R. Allen (@annerallen) October 20, 2019
What about you, scriveners? Do you think you may be trapped in a box? Have you discovered unexamined beliefs that kept you boxed in? What pushed you to examine those beliefs? Have you ever helped friends see the beliefs that were holding them back? Did NaNoWriMo help you get past your unexamined beliefs about writing?
BOOK OF THE WEEK
ONLY 99C/99p Countdown Sale!!
HOW TO BE A WRITER IN THE E-AGE: A SELF-HELP GUIDE
co-authored with NYT 3-million-copy seller ,
only 99c/99P in the US and UK for five days
October 19-October 25
Friendly, down-to earth advice about how to navigate the treacherous waters of today’s publishing world. You’ll see a lot of books out there about how to write, and a whole lot more that promise Kindle millions. But this book is different. It helps you establish a professional writing career in this time of rapid change—and get answers the questions so many writers are asking
Anne—Brilliant post! thanks, and yes, Whatever happened to fun? In the pressure to provide “content,” writing has become a grim treadmill of “rules,” “shoulds” and “musts.” As you say, it’s hard to go against “everyone knows,” but, as noted screenwriter William Goldman once said: No one knows anything.
Maybe we “should” sell t-shirts? No One Knows Anything. Your choice of blue, red, black or green. Sizes S, M, L, XL.
Ruth–I love the tee shirt idea! Maybe black. With white lettering. In the Chiller font. Haha.
Yes, I’m so tired of the treadmill. Writers need to allow ourselves to be creative. Otherwise we should be stockbrokers. It pays better. 🙂
Now that I’m spending a fair amount of time online “building author platform,” I’m running into all of these RULES, which never rules when I earned a BA and an MA in creative writing. When I encounter these pronouncements (usually on a blog), all I can do is shake my head as I think to myself, Where did you GET that idea?
Liz, you’re so right! During the many years I was an editor at big 6 houses, I never once heard any of these so-called “rules.” Have no idea where they come from. The essence of anti-creativity.
Another aspect of this is “money block” (Google it. There’s some interesting stuff on it). It’s things that we pick up from our parents that we don’t realize, usually around money. But other things as well.
When I was growing up, I had a relative who wrote during the pulp era. He could never make enough money to live off of (because he only wrote children’s fiction), so it fueled the belief that you couldn’t make money writing.
My family itself was very supportive of me writing and encouraged it. But. One of those blocks surfaced about this.
My father was the son of a minister, who was the son of a missionary. He worked on many, many projects over the years, all on the side, and not a single one came to fruition. He actually came up with ultrasound technology, had a doctor family member who was willing to help, and never followed through. Other projects–all technical–were the kind where they were so long term, success probably was never going to happen.
The block? Follow your dream on the side but never expect to have any success or make money at it. That influenced me for years and still creeps up.
Linda–Yes. I think a lot of unexamined beliefs come from family ideas about money. In my family, talking about money was taboo. So I felt embarrassed about earning money at all.
Your family block is a common one. Often the person who is the real genius who invents something can’t let themselves earn money from it. There are always dozens of creative brains behind the Edison or Ford who finally makes money from a new invention.
Brava again, Anne, another “courage” column. I’m old enough to be raised in a society that felt analysis and therapy were stigma, and I’m still very cranky about it. I BELIEVE my upbringing was fortunate and hope that my unexamined assumptions are few(er). But who knows? And the big thing is, no need to be afraid.
Will–Having the courage to figure out why you believe something is a biggie. Most people never do. But it will open doors most people don’t know are there.
Great piece, Anne – as usual. I think a key factor making a writer productive is the strength of their belief system. Not only do you have to like what you’re producing, you have to believe you can do it. Whether it’s any good or not is up to the reader, but you first have to get it done. To do that, you need to believe you can complete what you start. Some people simply believe they can’t so it never gets done. It’s the old Henry Ford saying, “If you think you can or you think you can’t, either way you’re right”.
Garry–That’s exactly it. Some people believe they can’t write a whole novel. Some, like my late friend, believe they can’t even start one. The trick is figuring out WHY they believe this stuff so they can get out of that box.
Great post! It reminded me of what happened to me (which I may have mentioned here before) either in high school or one of my two years of college. When I expressed my wish for a word processor, a fellow classmate haughtily declared that those encouraged ‘sloppy writing’. So I wasted 30 years agonizing over every word, phrase, and grammar choice. Now that I know better, I’m over it. Mostly…
Dominque–“Haughty” Dunning-Kruger types can really mess with your head, can’t they? Thank goodness you finally got out of that box he built for you. I do relate to that “mostly” Some of those beliefs are hard to break out of.
As always, an interesting subject. Makes me feel like I’m in your living room, musing about existential problems. Very nice. Just missing a glass of red wine!
The subject of “unexamined beliefs” is of course spot on, the root of a lot of trouble for writers, I’m sure you’re right. But there’s also a terrifying side to it. Since they are “unexamined” how do we know they can hurt us? How do we even know that we should sit down and “re-examine” them?
In short, we take them for granted. They’re part of us. The way you have blue or brown eyes. Tough. Now you’ve got me wondering whether there’s anything wrong with me…Yeah, there’s plenty wrong – and I share your problem – or the problem you had – with the so-called “superiority” of literary fiction. A superiority I believe in. Truly. Until yesterday when I picked up the latest Booker Prize winner (there are exceptionally two winners this year, I won’t tell you which one, but I guess it’s easy to figure out…). Unreadable stuff. No period to close sentences. No capital letter at the start of sentences. Haphazard spacing and that’s only the start of it. Plus a multitude of POVs, one per chapter.
Yes, that sort of thing can cure you of any love for “literary fiction”. And the way out that you suggest makes a lot of sense: Think of having fun when you write and don’t worry about the rest. Damn right, good idea. And you know what? That’s what I’m doing (without realizing it). I’m writing children’s fiction for now, and having a WHALE of a good time…I’ve always enjoyed writers like Roald Dahl and of course comics like Tintin and Pogo…Never thought that was “serious” literature, so not really my goal in life. And yet…and yet…Yes! They should be! Children too deserve to be told fun tales! Tales that make them stop and think and wonder…
Claude–Congratulations on breaking free and writing what you love! Actually, children’s books have produced some of our most enduring classic literature. You may be creating “serious” literature and not even be aware of it.
I hear you about those”literary” books that have become increasingly unreadable. They are more like self-indulgent classroom exercises or MFA “in jokes”. I doubt those will be read in 10 years, or become real literature.
Wouldn’t it be lovely if we could discuss this in my living room with a glass of red wine!
Claude and Anne, I think the same thing happens with academic poetry (i.e., poetry written to impress other Poets in The Academy). If it’s impossibly obscure and syntactically unreadable, it must be good because only the cognoscenti can understand it. As for the prize-winning literary books you describe, it almost sounds like an Emperor-Has-No-Clothes phenomenon. No one of the cognoscenti wants to pipe up and say, Um, this book makes no sense at all.
Liz–I agree! There are way too many “naked emperors” dominating the academic world.
I’ve been pretty good (knock on my computer table) not to get into any unexamined beliefs. if someone offered a bad opinion about my writing (e.g. I’ve been accused of writing porn from time to time), I simply doubled down, told the person why they were wrong, and continued on my merry way (note: porn/adult films actually do require some semblance of a storyline/plot that is woven in between the X-rated extracurricular activities).
The only personal belief that I’ve had to rein in from time to time was the artificially unrealistic deadlines I would put on myself to get a story 100% finished.
GB–The desire to keep a disciplined schedule is a good one, but if you’ve got an inner critic that’s pushing you to finish prematurely, that’s something to work on.
I love this post! I have shared it widely and have added it to my rotation of great posts, like so many of yours. Well done, thanks for the dive into the inner world.
Mark–Many thanks for all the shares!
Ah yes, the hours and years I wasted trying to be another Margaret Atwood, because a close friend of mine considered genre fiction trash. Some friend. I walked away from her, and started writing pretty good trash, according to the professional critics. But for years, I was in a box, Anne. Never again will I allow another person to dictate what I write. Thanks for this post.
Melodie–I wanted to be Margaret Atwood, too. And my literary snob bully was my mom. But finally I broke out and started writing mysteries…and then my mom did too! It took me breaking out of my box for her to break out of hers.
And yes, you write brilliant trash!!
Great post, so much truth here and the examples you use are amazing.
Beth–It’s kind of amazing how many people I used to know who were stifled creatives. Maybe the Universe was trying to tell me something. 🙂
A couple of years ago, I went back to teaching writing process after several years teaching critical inquiry, and I was nonplussed when fully half my class identified themselves as bad writers in their introductions. (They weren’t.) Once again I was left shaking my head and thinking, Where in the world did you get THAT idea?
Liz–There’s a lot of money to be made in making people doubt themselves. Make everybody believe they have bad breath and you can sell a lot of mouthwash. Make everybody believe they’re bad writers and you sell a lot of writing courses. I hate it, but negativity sells.
What’s doubly egregious is that the people selling the writing courses (or should I say “flogging” or “shilling” ) the writing courses are selling a magic formula to instant riches as a published author. GRRRRRR.
Liz–Those people make Ruth furious too. She’ll be talking about the problem next Sunday.
As Garry Rodgers said above, it amounts to believing you can do somethingt. I was scared to write my first novel but I thought I could do it. And I did. After that one novel, though I thought I’d never have anything more to write about, came seven other novels. Also, I have to add, that later in my writing career I found someone who knows what they’re talking about, who believed in me wholeheartedly. That helped me believe in myself even more.
Patricia–Not everybody can believe in themselves if they’ve been fed toxic beliefs about their own limitations. Often it takes an enthusiastic friend or mentor to bust through those barriers and examine the beliefs that held you back. We get by with a little help from our friends. 🙂
A heartening post, thanks Anne. I was encouraged to write from a young age (first paid article at 14) but making money was the box the parents put me into. So many comments started with, “When you make your first million, you can…” buy for them, do for them…until I put money first without even thinking about it. First jobs were in advertising and journalism because it could be a living. Later when I broke into fiction internationally, I somehow managed not to get rich, maybe because of the burden I perceived as going with that. Those boxes prove amazingly tough to escape from.
Valerie–A paid article at age 14! I thought I was doing well to get a poem in the school literary magazine (a mimeographed student-run operation) 🙂 The myth of the “billionaire author” persists, doesn’t it? The truth is there are maybe 25 of them in the world.
We need to make our expectations realistic. I don’t think that has to do with boxes. It has to do with facts. Very few authors support themselves 100% from writing. Authors who don’t have big Hollywood contracts are probably teaching, either at a University or on a lecture circuit, which pays much better.
So many thoughts from the post and the comments… I think so much stifling of writing enjoyment happens in school where a pages-long essay will be torn apart for a few mistakes. All three of my sons thought they were terrible writers because of the sometimes caustic criticism they received from teachers. They only found confidence from history essays and other exams where they were graded mostly on content. I was a public school teacher for over thirty years and so many students are turned off to writing in our current curriculum. Sorry, my two cents on where many of us starting building the walls of those boxes. I’m not even blaming teachers so much as the over the top testing and standards set my non-educators.
Don’t even get me started on how schools turn students off to reading.
Susan–I agree that it’s the endless testing that stifles the creativity of young minds. Teachers don’t have much leeway to allow kids to grow.
But even back in my day, schools did a lot to turn kids off reading. When I got to first grade, I was already an avid reader. So when they handed out the Dick, Jane and Sally books, and it took forever to divide us into reading groups, I read the whole book while I was waiting. So for the rest of the year I was punished by having to sit in the corner doing nothing during reading period. Some sick thinking going on there. But they didn’t stop me from reading, in spite of the cruelty.
Some nice stories here. The Emily Dickinson one, and I liked the story of the struggling writer becoming a successful artist.
Ned–I hadn’t thought of this in terms of stories, but I guess the examples are kind of at the heart of the piece. Thanks!
This. Brilliantly articulated, Anne. I’d already decided to do NaNoWriMo this year in order to see where my writing head is really at these days, and then I read this post. Terribly gratifying, of course 😉 . The whole lit-fic shaming bugaboo played in my life, too, only from my ex-husband and his friends and colleagues. Also went through this with art–drove myself nuts trying to push creative barriers making “worthy” pieces, but then remarried, to an artist, who helped me to get past all the academic b.s. that was choking me. Had fun and even sold quite a few paintings. But writing, which I really wanted to do, was a little more complicated. I think I’m finally ready to examine those underlying beliefs now and have some fun next month. Onward and upward. Thanks ever so much for this post.
Meg–That academic stuff does choke creativity, doesn’t it? I cringe at the pretentious junk I wrote in college. There are so many things we need to unlearn to create good, original art. I hope NaNo helps you do some productive unlearning!
Wow. I’m kind of reeling – and thinking. This made me realize I’ve had more than a few haughty people download their beliefs into my brain and I’ve been battling them without realizing it. Hmmm. Lots to think about – thanks!
Jemi–I love your phrase “download their beliefs into my brain.” That’s exactly what they’re doing. It’s like you get infected with a virus. Time to get well!
Agreed! And working on it! 🙂
Brilliant blog, Anne. I have so many of those misbeliefs I could fill a book with them. The inner editor who seeds my mind with perfectionism is the most dastardly of them all. I wasn’t going to do NaNoWriMo this year as I hadn’t found it all that productive in the past, but as my writers’ group decided to have a go, I will too. I’ve planned things a little more than in previous years so that should help. I’m attempting a mystery of sorts – with fun elements – so your post is heartening. I might actually be on the right track :). Thank you for your wisdom and insight.
Susan–I’m glad this could help you stand back and look at what beliefs are holding you back. I hope that this year’s NaNo can help you break through those walls you’ve built for yourself. Funny mysteries are my favorite genre. Have fun with it!
Wow did this ersonagte with me. My Grandfather owned a newspaper and wrote for the major dailies in London. It’s all I ever wanted to do. Byut my mother sneered at my early attempts and i backed away. It wasn’t ungtil my late 30’s that I ‘fell’ into writing for a career. Then after retirement I was passionate about the books I write set in Africa. I wanted to enlighten people to the real ife ther and entertsin agt the same time (a lot of my later work had been ‘propaganda’ often of the good kind). I’ve since learned that some readers simple know better as they have seen the truth on the TV – I know nothnig despite living in Africa for almost 40 years. Yes minsets are set and run deep and seldom changed. Fantastic post.
Lucinda–So much damage can be done to the fledgling mind with a few discouraging remarks. It’s fantastic that your need to write overcame the negativity. But you’re right that even the most “open” minds can be locked shut on certain topics. We all have to keep working at being open to new and “other’ ideas. Thanks!
I’ve just discovered your blog and I’m working my way through the posts. You’ve hit the nail on the head. I can see now that I’ve been programmed by negative comments (about me and my writing) and its affected the way I market my work (I don’t). As you rightly say, you don’t see what it’s done to you until someone points it out. Which you do brilliantly here.
Richard–You’re exactly the kind of writer I hoped to reach with this post. I hope now you’ll be able to fight through that fog of negativity and successfully market your work!
Thanks, I’m sure I’ll get there.