Overcoming Our Programming

I've talked before about how I got my start writing in text-based RPGs and fanfiction when I was a teenager, and how my interactions with people on the Internet were better teachers as to how grammar worked than my public high school education.

yep, that is a real post, by me, from May 2004. I was 13 at the time (the profile is a little outdated, as you can see)

It still took a long time for me to really decide that I wanted to chase my dream, and that's the focus of what this blog post will be about, to kind of combine last week's blog post and the first blog post.

I graduated high school with no real direction, no real understanding of what I wanted to "do" with my life. My career aptitudes and hopes for the future had taken a backseat to trying to navigate the whole ~gay~ thing. Of course, what I had always loved doing as a teenager was writing, even if it was just dumb role-playing (not the kinky kind) or writing fanfiction. I was still telling stories and people were reading them.

I wanted to explore that ability, or try to become better at writing. During my senior year, I had gotten a few offers to universities and schools with excellent writing programs. I couldn't tell you the names, but one was in New York, and one was a few hours away but still in the state of Texas.

I think some small part of me knew that I'd never be able to be who I was, or figure out who I was, living under my parents' roof. So I went to ask if I could at least go tour one of the schools, even if it was the one in Texas, to see if I liked it. Other classmates of mine were going to school in another country; wasn't going off to school somewhere like a rite of passage?

My mom said no.

She told me that I wouldn't like being away from home, away from all of my friends. I tried to argue, say that I would make new ones if I had the opportunity, and maybe it might be good for me to be on my own. She still said no.

So I settled for going to the community college in my home town. Don't get me wrong, I loved my time at South Plains College, but it was a school in my hometown. I was already familiar with the small-mindedness of small towns; I didn't need a refresher course. And, at least in my experience, people from small towns were primarily the kinds of students at SPC. It was high school all over again, except I had to pay for it.

I don't even know if SPC has a creative writing program or anything like that. My parents tried to shoehorn me into programs that would make the most money. My mom initially suggested nursing, my dad suggested I become a physical therapist. I was good in my science classes in high school, but science wasn't something I was interested in, and certainly couldn't see myself studying it for years at a time.

So I majored in General Studies, and I graduated with a degree in General Studies. I tried writing short stories, fanfiction, anything for me to be able to write the way I had when I was a teenager and free from worries of having a career. One of my best friends at the time read something I had written, and without an ounce of constructive criticism said that I should probably "work harder" in my writing if it was something I really wanted to do.

After graduating SPC, I got a full-time job in two different hotels, then at a financial aid office when Ryan and I moved to Clovis. Not any of those jobs were "General Studies" jobs, although I did use a lot of general knowledge in those positions, I suppose, and my job at Clovis Community College and my meeting with a student who was wanting the opportunity to be a writer is what pushed me over the edge to want to go back to school again, with the support of Ryan.

The irony, as it always happens, is that my mother, so against me going to school to be a writer because I wouldn't be able to afford a living, I wouldn't be happy being a writer...became a writer herself. She started a right-wing Christian inspiration blog, where she discussed her experiences with her "fear, anxiety, and agoraphobia" that she had suffered through from the time my brother and I were children until we were both adults. She told her readers that through the power of God and her belief in Him, that she had been healed of her pain and was now free from her anxiety.

When I tried to bring up that if she was healed of her anxiety, then why did she use it as an excuse to not be able to come to my wedding, that struck a nerve with her. But that's another story for another time.

Even my former best friend who offered no constructive criticism of my story 7+ years ago has tried to write romance novels, which is what she's wanted to do, and has even started creating artwork to sell to friends and family.

What I am trying to say from this long-winded story made up of smaller stories, is that people will try to program you and make you feel like you can't do whatever it is you want to do. There are the people who will ride the coattails of success, but more dangerous are the people who try to stop it from even happening. Because they rob you of your success before you even have a chance to attain it. Some even try to take it for themselves.

When I told my mom I was going back to school for creative writing, she smiled this devilish grin and said, "it's adorable, he wants to be a writer like his mom." Keep in mind, I was 24 at the time, well beyond the kind of condescending baby-talk she was trying to use on me. I almost broke something, I was so furious.

When I started college at Texas Tech, my first creative writing class had an assignment where we had to write ten pages of a short fiction story. I came home and told Ryan, "I can't do it, I'm going to fail. I've never written anything that long."

He told me, "you won't fail, and you can do it. Just try."

So, I did. And I passed that class, and many other classes, and will be graduating in December. A classmate suggested I turn one of my short stories into a novel, and I told her "I can't do it, I've never written a novel before."

While not a novel, I am working on the screenplay version of that story AND working on writing a novel at the same time (I'm close to the first 10,000 words of the latter).

I've replaced the naysayers in my life; the people who were telling me "You can't" have been replaced with people who say "Yes, you can." I send them a piece of my writing, and they say "This is excellent! Great job," or "Please, keep going!"

It's very simple, and I'm sure you've heard it dozens of times, but really it bears hearing again. Be careful the kinds of people you surround yourself with. There will always be people who try to take your success for your own, and think they're sneaky about doing it. But all the same, you will always find someone, at least ONE person, who is supportive and genuinely wants you to succeed.

If you're reading this, I genuinely hope you have the opportunity to follow your dreams before it's too late. I was able to go back to school and try out this whole writing thing within a few years of thinking I would never go back to school, and I know not everyone is lucky. Believe in yourself, even if you think no one else does. Break free of your programming.