Is Your Writing Reader Ready?

We often learn the hard way the best window for feedback. When to allow other eyes on our work. When it’s too soon for anyone else to see it. When it’s almost too late.

I’ve lived through all these options with my own manuscripts. Seems like the best timing is when I feel almost detached from the writing, as I read it over. Feel as if someone else has written it.

Like one of my students, a memoir writer, told me, “If I’m excited about the story I write, it probably means that it’s still in healing and developing phase. It may not be time to share it yet.”

Sustainability in the creative life is all about timing. When are you incubating, when are you ready for encouragement, when is it time for critique?

Feedback versus creative collaboration

Early on, I’d ask for feedback whenever I got stuck or bored. I needed a jump start, a hand to lift me out of my mess. I wanted reassurance about a new approach or idea I was testing.

As I got more experience as a writer, as I worked more with professional editors when my books were published, I developed the ability to hold creative tension. I could wait through the messy stages and get myself out of the pit. I also grew my feedback relationships. Not just a writers group to read more finished work, not just an agent to see my finished manuscript, not just an editor to hire for final polishing. I found interim feedback partners, with whom I could share not-quite-there work.

Maybe you’re like my former student who worked in corporate collaboration (public policy advocacy) and shared drafts early in order to get the creative juices flowing. It took her some years to realize her writing was a different process. Not too many fellow writers will look at endless raw drafts without either losing their ability to comment or needing the same in return.

Those of us who are naturally collaborative, who love the synergy of group creative process, often make this mistake. We think our writing can be helped by many voices, perhaps? We want to test drive an idea before we’ve gotten deeply into it ourselves.

Creative tension

I’ve written often in these posts about something I call “creative tension.” The ferment of a creative idea can be intensely disturbing: it brings up doubt, bad memories of past failures, the critical voices in our minds.

I liken it to the surface tension on a very full glass. One small jiggle and it’s all over the place. Impossible to scoop back into its container.

Your ability to hold “creative tension,” as I mentioned above, around a writing project and not share it and still keep going is a valuable skill to hone. (Check out Ron Carlson’s little book, Ron Carlson Writes a Story, a great demonstration of what it takes to hold creative tension during one writing day.)

When my writing makes me itchy, nervous, anxious, sad, or mad—and this happens in many of my writing sessions!—I know that the feeling is a slackening of my creative tension. If I can sit with it, breathe through it, not drown it or distract myself, it usually leads to something much better.

Carlson’s theory: Stay in the chair, don’t call the friend or spouse and say, “Can I just read you this one thing?” You may not really need feedback just then. You may need to just keep writing.

But can you hold on too long?

Yes. Creative tension doesn’t bypass the window for feedback. If kept incubated too long, a manuscript can suffer too.

When feedback is not part of the writing process, you can fall asleep to your own repetitions.

We create similar story moments, without even realizing it. Usually this comes from fear, as well. We are afraid that someone else’s vision will interfere with the purity of ours. But it’s rare that a writer can sustain a manuscript through publication without any other eyes on it. Careful and kind readers (agent or writing partner or writers group or hired editor) can open our eyes to what we’ve missed. So beware of over-protection of the work.

What kind of feedback do you need?

Where is creative tension honored and fed? Where are doors opened for the writer, via feedback, rather than closed?

Some writers do well with feedback from trusted peers, such as a writers group or writing partner. It takes time to develop the trust and know what to ask your readers. When to share, to get the most useful comments.

Others need a more moderated forum, such as a classroom where the instructor manages the feedback process. Not all do well at this, by the way, so there’s a trust curve here too. But I’ve found a weekly rhythm of group feedback in a well-moderated class gives both safety and accountability as well as useful ideas, without taking away the writer’s agency.

“Last time I got feedback, it was devastating,” one writer told me. “I showed parts of my manuscript to a good friend, someone who reads a lot and whose opinion I really respect. She was noncommittal. Maybe my book idea wasn’t her style, but no response really hurt my feelings.” The writer decided to set her manuscript aside. “It really matters who you share with. And if it’s sensitive material, it helps to have a teacher or moderator, who can help with too-strong comments and questions.”

We all want kind, generous, insightful feedback. We want readers who take time to think about the piece and find something encouraging to say, along with critical comments.

Readers are powerful! And in my view, totally necessary. But good timing and good choice is the way to get what you need from feedback.

Your weekly writing exercise

Review your feedback process as a writer. How satisfied are you with it? Do you need more or better feedback? How might you foster readers who can deliver?

Pay attention this week to when you get frustrated or distracted during your writing process. Do you immediately want to share it, to get reassurance? How might you develop your ability to hold creative tension?

One idea is to keep going for ten more minutes, whenever you feel your writing energy wane and you start to think about getting out of the chair, as Carlson says. What happens in those additional ten minutes?

Often, it’s something quite magical.Photo by Elaine Casap on Unsplash