The Merit of the Maker, and the Democracy of Ideas
If you’re writing, you’re publishing. If you’re publishing, you have critics. Here’s how to make peace with that on the front end. Hint: meritocracy is your friend.
I believe in the democracy of ideas. I believe that ideas get better when tested, then tested again.
I believe in meritocracy—the best ideas rise to the top, take hold of the imagination and change lives. This puts another shade on the democracy of ideas. It’s not about what’s popular. It’s about what has merit.
All makers have merit. I believe we all belong. If you’re a writer, then what you’re after is not popularity but excellence.
But when you’re writing, you’re taking a risk that not everyone will like what you write. Or worse, oppose it vehemently. Or worse than that: Won’t even care to read it.
Some of us are great with managing the thorny issue of critics, both external and internal—some let imagined critics hold us back from writing.
Who would read this, anyway?
Honestly, it’s the question that drives every question a new book coaching client asks me. I say the most valuable knowledge writers can have is to irrevocably know their creative process. Part of mastering your creative process is grappling with your relationship to the critics.
The question comes up when we do Idea-to-Outline coaching to refine the hook and develop the project. It comes up during the drafting and revision.
It takes the form of, “Who would read this, anyway?” Or the variation: “Would anyone ever publish me?”
Don’t let these questions daunt you. Instead, use them in your favor. Let the process of meritocracy refine you.
In this newsletter, I give tips on developing the skill of standing up to the process of meritocracy. Even if you’re just starting a writing project, it can be good to make peace with this question on the front end.
The public you vs. the true you
I’ve been writing for the public since I was seventeen. Before I was an author and a book coach, I was a journalist, then a magazine editor with my brand and my photo right next to my words. So everyone who agreed with me, and everyone who disagreed with me, knew who owned those ideas. During the accumulation of bylines over the decades, there have been ample opportunities for people to criticize.
When you write for the public, people get ideas about you. Their ideas are not true. They are not even about you.
If those ideas are not true, and they are not about you, then you don’t have to think about them.
Let’s say that out loud together:
If those ideas are not true, and they are not about you, then you don’t have to think about them.
How to create your own meritocracy
Early on in my career of writing for the public, I learned to be independent of the opinions of others.
The skill there is equanimity. Other people think what they think. Give them space to think what they think. To your readers, say, “You do you, I’ll do me.” There, I just gave you a course in equanimity in a nutshell.
[Buddhist teacher Tara Brach offers some of the best teachings and meditations on the practice of equanimity I know. She calls it non-reactive mindful presence. Which means you are still present to the criticism—more about that coming up, because criticism refines your ideas—but you are not reacting to it. Try it here: https://www.tarabrach.com/equanimity-gifts-presence/]
Not everyone has to like you. Here is common criticism I’ve received, from my days as editor-in-chief of a women’s magazine that may or may not have had a few feminist ideas:
“A woman shouldn’t write about that, think about that, have an idea about that, have an opinion about that.”
I am fond of quoting the writer Muriel Rukeyser, who once famously wrote that the world may split open if one woman spoke the truth.
The universe is made of stories, not of atoms. What would happen if one woman told the truth about her life? The world would split open.
~Muriel Rukeyser
People don’t come right out and say that. Usually, they nit and pick something else, because it’s too bold and raw to say the real reason they object. The more vehement the criticism, the deeper the reason.
You are not writing so you can express yourself in a way that no one will object to—which is something you cannot possibly divine ahead of time and will be so diluted that it is certainly not good writing.
You are writing so you can share an idea that you, uniquely, have. Your idea may do some good in this world.
Learn to discern. This is the refinement. The place where meritocracy goes to work. Some criticism is useful. Some criticism originates from the insecurities of others. Your ideas make them uncomfortable. Their agenda is to control you now. They want to shut down your voice so they don’t have to think about anything too disturbing.
Find the merit. Criticism fueled by insecurity or motivated by an agenda is not pure, but it can still have validity. Are your ideas good but perhaps not well-executed?
See what they fear. Let’s remember that critics become critics because they’re afraid of something. Someone told them to believe something once, and you are walking around in the world not-believing the same thing they believe. When you understand that fear, you are better equipped to persuade them or assist them in entertaining a new thought.
Remember, nothing others do is about you. It sure might seem like it’s about you, if someone is criticizing you. But really, it’s not about you. So…
Don’t take it personally. This is one of The Four Agreements, by Don Miguel Ruiz. The other three agreements are life-bolstering, too:
Be impeccable with your word.
Don’t take it personally.
Don’t make assumptions.
Always do your best.
Criticism’s healthy purpose is excellence—not annihilation
Criticism’s purpose is not to reject you. You already belong. If you are writing you are a writer. So that is not even a question.
Criticism’s purpose is to refine you. We say this early in our writing retreats [Stories + Songs in Italy, Story Catalyst retreats in Ireland and Taos, New Mexico]:
You are here because you’re investing in your writing. You’re not here to wonder if you are a writer. You’re writing. The only way you can not be a writer is if you don’t write.
Stop having this question.
It’s keeping you from seeing, hearing, touching, tasting and smelling the world through your unique viewpoint. We want your writing because it’s filtered through you.
That question is holding you out from fully participating in life, much less finishing that writing project.
If you want to move into your zone of genius, then fully welcome criticism into your excellence process.
Have you noticed that people respond to you—not just professionals like contest judges and acquisitions editors at big publishers—when your writing is real and refined? This is what George Saunders [Story Club newsletter on Substack] [Advice to graduates, NYTimes] means when he says that with each pass of revision, his aim is to make the writing “more honest and more vivid.”
The writer Lore Segal, with five novels (one of which was a Pulitzer finalist) and a long list of The New Yorker short stories, says that writing is her way of “being understood and understanding myself,” notes her publisher in a New York Times magazine piece today. “I consider it the most amazing thing one can do with one’s life, to find out what has actually happened.” [“A Master Storyteller, at the End of Her Story: At 96, Lore Segal is approaching death with the same startling powers of perception she brought to her fiction, NYTimes magazine, Oct. 6, 2024]
So, let’s go to the meritocracy lab to see what honest and vivid things we can come up with.
Practices to quell the Inner Critic
For more about grappling with your Inner Critic, consider becoming a paid subscriber. Behind this free post is a host of practices that will help you wrestle with this question so that your writing process can flow with the pure power of your voice.
You’ll find topics such as:
What to Do, In the Moment, When the Inner Critic Appears
How to Sort Out the Difference Between Your Inner Critic and Realistic Thinking
Somatic Tools for Removing the Inner Critic from the Scene (of Your Mind)
Time for a breakthrough? Book a time with me.
Looking for a breakthrough on this question of “what will people think if I write about…”? Sign up for a one-hour Inner Critic consultation with me here.
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