As I ponder ways to spark your writing this March, I keep looking back over a dark February—Russia’s attack on Ukraine, my beloved sixteen-year-old cat’s passing, a few vague health issues on the periphery of my fiftieth year. So nothing on my mostly upbeat topic list feels quite right.
Instead, comedian Bill Hader’s creative process advice keeps running through my head: “It’s so much easier to come up with a fun goofball thing” than what’s underlying it—which may be darker, harder to face, and less fun. Kind of like this moment we find ourselves living in.
But when Hader comes up with that easy goofball idea, he doesn’t shelve it because it’s too facile. Or because it’s not deep enough. He pitches it to his writer’s room like it’s the greatest thing ever, all the while knowing it’s (probably) not.
That may sound like a joke. After all, he is a comedian who wrote and performed for SNL for eight years. But he also mentored at Pixar, and now stars in his own Emmy winning TV series on HBO (Barry), for which he’s creator and writer. So maybe it’s not so crazy after all? He’s found a way to make it work. And so has Pixar.
Think of it this way: when you’re coming up with an idea, it can be hard to know what might be great, or even good. And sometimes we just need to run with what comes to us. Rather than dither, Hader’s willing to “be wrong fast.”
When you’re wrong fast, it’s okay to stay in what might be wrong for a bit. Not weeks and months. But perhaps a few minutes. Maybe a few hours, even days. You can study that wrong-footedness, so you can get the feel for not just what’s wrong, but how what’s wrong can lead to what’s right.
And by being wrong fast—and wrong loudly, in front of others to boot, soliciting quick pushback from peers—you’re creating an opening.
By owning being wrong—or the possibility of it, even the joy of it—there’s no worry about being criticized for your snafu. You’re already okay with it being bad. Or good. Either is good, actually. Maybe even great.
He’s effectively opening up a judgement-free space in which to ask better questions, like, what am I avoiding? What’s underlying that kneejerk goofiness, or that cliché trope, or dull description of the cornfield in fall, or that one-note trait in my sidekick or antagonist.
What’s the good the bad covers over?
And the more you interrogate something that does feel goofy or cliché or bad, he says, the more you realize you’re avoiding certain things in the story or the character’s life the way you might avoid them in your personal life.
You know that feeling—that swerve we make to avoid something painful or uncomfortable. The swerve to the liquor cabinet, to Netflix, to our phones or the next vacation or escape hatch, as a way to avoid negative feelings.
Or even the swerve in the midst of an uncomfortable situation—that embarrassing moment at the grocery store when you realized you were pushing someone else’s cart, and rather than look up to see who’s missing theirs, you drop your hands fast and mosey on whistling (or maybe that’s just me…).
What if you’re doing that “swerve” with something that’s not quite right in your poem or story? You’re avoiding it. Maybe even willfully not seeing what’s really there.
And what if owning whatever bad thing you’ve written—and pitching it out loud, as if it’s the most amazing thing you’ve ever written—will help you dig in even more?
What’s that, you don’t have a writer’s room nestled in the Hollywood hills, peopled with peers, to bounce ideas off of? Neither do I. 😉 But I do have a writing buddy, and a group I meet with on Zoom. Maybe you have one or both, too.
You may be part of this trimester’s Writers’ Inlet Long Haul Cohort, where you’re meeting to talk creative process and practice. (Or you may want to join for the next run in the fall–send me a note to let me know and I’ll put you on the contact list.)
But if you don’t have a group or writing peer you may be able to pull aside a friend. Or simply talk out your pitch into an audio recorder. Then see what happens. How does it feel to own something “bad” and not be afraid of what comes next?
Though we’d rather write work that’s spot on all the time, the creative process includes writing into what’s not so great. A lot. So keep turning towards the goofy or difficult passage that isn’t quite right, even if it’s uncomfortable at first. Even if you’d rather swerve.
Instead, when you stay, you’re more likely to discover insights buried under the bad. And if you’re patient, and look carefully, you may find you give voice to something deep within that’s been waiting for the right moment to finally see the light.