When you tailspin after sharing work publicly

How friends can help: Joy Ride vol 17

We loved reading your comments on our last post (and getting your emails and texts and tags inside our Brainstorm Road community too). Thanks so much for joining – and deepening – the conversation.

Oliver shared this and I keep thinking about it:

There's something here for me also about how to handle the inner diva ... when the outbursts are 'merely' intrusive thoughts that never make it out for anyone else to see, let alone someone compassionate and empathic (like Margo in this case). Someone who just by bearing witness to the tail spin allowed those thoughts to pass.

"the spin-out began and I let it happen."

For me, there is something here about feeling my feelings. good or bad. Shining a compassionate light on them and welcoming all parts of myself.

It reminds me of that phrase, wherever you go there you are. 

As our girl Liz Lemon would say, blergh.

When we create, we keep running into ourselves and sometimes we don’t like what we find.

When I tailspin after sharing work publicly (Was it terrible? Am I terrible? Why am I even doing this?), I feel embarrassed that I feel embarrassed. It’s a double whammy.

I so badly want to be cool, calm, and collected. I so badly want to be invulnerable to outcome. I so badly want to be able to do this all by myself. 

Or at least I used to. Slowly (very slowly) I am learning that the truth is that we need one another. Writing, Dream Projects, heck, this thing called life – we don’t have to prove we can go it alone. 

Of course, I have to write the words. It is my fingers that have to type, but I don’t have to contain the entire experience. I don’t have to exhibit rugged individualism to make my effort more valid. I can ask for help. I can tell a friend when I need an atta girl and I can text Margo when I feel like quitting. And sometimes I have the joy of being on the receiving end of messages like those from my buddies who write.

Let’s make things we care about and let’s be human about it. Messy, tail spin-y humans. We feel the feelings and we let them pass. There’s space for all of it and it’s way more fun when we do it together.

Speaking of needing one another…

Brainstorm Road is a community of everyday people getting better at sharing our creative work in public. If you tailspin after sharing your work, our members get it. They’ll help you get the encouragement, support, and accountability you need to finish your Dream Projects and put them out into the world.

Learn more about our members here.

Do you like daily writing prompts?

When you become a paid Substack subscriber, you’ll get new daily writing prompts each month, in addition to monthly meet-ups (on Zoom) and exclusive High Five Friday threads where you can meet people who will encourage your creative pursuits and celebrate what you got done that week.

Our very first thread just went live for paid subscribers and we’d love to have you join the conversation.