I've been having a crisis of faith in my writing and my work as an artist. I struggle to say that my work is good because I am not really selling any of it. I struggle to say that my work is good because I don't have big readership numbers on my blog posts. It doesn't help anything that I am coming down off of a mixed episode and sliding towards depression. That tends to skew my view on everything.
I tell myself that I shouldn't worry about how popular my books are. I shouldn't be worried about how well they'll sell because my focus really should be on just getting this damn series written and out of my head. It's hard to keep that focus because I feel like I'm working in a void. I struggle to motivate myself to work when there is an echoing silence. In that echoing silence, I have myself and my thoughts and memories to contend with. Unfortunately, this means I am wrestling with my mental illnesses and traumatic memories on a regular basis.
No amount of positive affirmations can quite break through the message that was hammered into my head when I was young that my value was based on what I could contribute and that meant how much money I could make. And that I was never going to be good enough, no matter how hard I worked or how much I contributed. Being told things like 'You're a failed abortion.' and 'There's nothing you can do that will be good enough for your father and I." during your formative years is really harsh. Being told those things on a daily basis and hearing their prognostications that my life was going to amount to nothing despite how hard I was working to make something of myself left some scars behind that run soul deep.
I sit here and can almost hear my parents telling me that no one is going to want to read what I write. I can almost hear them cracking jokes about how I was their investment because of how expensive my birth was. And then listening to those jokes become a theme through out the years, perhaps an earnest statement even. Only to have them tell me that my college education was a failed investment (which meant that I was a failed investment) because it didn't net me a big paying job right out the gate. The mockery of my writing and being told it was a waste of time because they never expected me to make any money off of it, as if a book contract was the reason why anyone writes, echoes in my head when things are quiet.
When I self-published my first few books, my parents (from whom I am estranged) came by sniffing for money. Apparently they decided that since my name was actually in print, perhaps I had a book contract and that they could get some 'dividends' off of their 'investment.' I've been so tempted to send them exactly one penny and a note stating that it was their dividend off of their investment in my education and existence. It's spiteful and bitter. It also would open up the lines of communication for them to resume their barrage of psychological torment. So, I haven't done it. But, the thought hits me from time to time.
The fact that I am writing means that I am not a failure. The fact that I finished college and worked in a career that I loved until I had my first child means that I am not a failure. The fact that I use my degree every day answering questions from the kids and doing my writing means that I am not a failure. The fact that I haven't given up means I am not a failure.
But it doesn't stop me from feeling like one on days where my brain chemistry isn't quite right and the voices of the past echo really loudly in my ears.
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