The Best Writing Advice I've Ever Received Was From a Dead Man

There are a few pieces of writing advice that I keep around me whenever I'm writing. This is one of the best.

The inner editor is my own personal demon. He gnaws on my creative bones and sucks out the marrow. He sits back on his haunches and picks at the meat of my story. He mocks my prose. He does a very good job of trying to stop me from writing. 

I repeat this phrase all the way through a first draft. I'm a great starter, but a terrible finisher in pretty much all projects. My hard drive is littered with the bodies of formerly good ideas, shot down by the inner editor until I'm too paralyzed to start again. 

So, I recite this mantra as I write, whispered out on my creative Japa Mala. 


It seems to help. Mostly, to keep my vision looking forward. One of these days, I'll drag my inner editor into an alley and leave his body in a dumpster.

In the meantime, I would really like to find someone with cross stitching skills who could make me a nice little Hemingway with that quote up there. 

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