Without a doubt, I would have to say self-doubt is my biggest emotional challenge.
I constantly question my capabilities and accomplishments. Surely this isn’t good enough. Surely no one cares. Why would anyone pay to read MY stories?
On the very first day I held the hard copy of my novel, I cried. I could only think of everything not yet done: the other books in the series that could never be as good, the marketing to be done that needed to be better, faster, stronger, NOW. I could never do it all. Impossible. Hopeless.
I cried when I held my book in my hands, because all I held felt like failure.
Some Feelings Defy All Definition
My husband was my rock. He talked me through my feelings no matter how winding their paths and helped me calm down.
Lots of hugs from my kids, too. Even if I couldn’t quite explain what pained me inside, I could tell them how much I loved them and needed them. Their hugs in those dark moments meant so bloody much, I cannot describe it.
A silly irony, considering words and descriptions are supposed to be my thing, but it’s true. Some feelings, especially the feelings between a parent and a child, defy all definition.
Writing Led to Wrist Pain
Oh, I face physical struggles on two fronts. The first and less troublesome of the two comes with the wrist.
Extensive writing and teaching led to my ligaments getting pretty inflamed in my right hand, causing blood flow to lessen and my ulna nerve to go all wonky. Physical therapy provided me some great stretches to utilize to help “reset the ligaments,” as it were, and I’ve now got two wrist braces as well as two wrist cushions to help support my hand while I write.
I know some people love dictation software, but I can’t let go of the physical joy of typing, if that makes sense.
I’m Calmly Writing One Minute, and Facing a Panic Attack the Next
The other physical issue: anxiety and panic attacks are bloody awful. I could be calmly working one minute, and the next feel my heart racing, my head go dizzy, and freak out inside of tunnel vision.
When I can’t talk to my husband to calm down, I’ll use other forms of sensory distraction: scented candles and essential oils, special tea with passionflower and lavender, and music—lots of music!
I love having music to help me write, so it’s no small leap to also hunt songs that beat back anxiety. I also take Vitamin D and magnesium supplements, as they’ve also been shown to tackle anxiety internally.
Children Inspire and Interrupt My Creativity
My children are the key to my creativity—and they can also ruin creativity!
Their imaginations are each of them unique. They see the world in ways I think we lose with our grown-up eyes.
My youngest son in particular breathes life into the simplest things…and breathes trouble into the quietest moments, too.
Nothing kills creativity like yet another phone call from a school principal. It is struggle day to day, week to week. But he and I—well, all the children and I—we keep on keeping on.
If That’s What People Like to Read, Someone Else Can Write It
I’d have to say my darkest moment was back in graduate school.
I was ready to amaze the world with edgy sci-fi fiction cast with dark characters with even darker philosophies…but then I was told this sort of thing isn’t marketable.
The market should dictate the storytelling. The market says readers want likeable characters. The market says readers want those characters to live in misery because happiness doesn’t sell well. Happiness isn’t drama.
I couldn’t wrap my head around it. Who only wants to read the likes of Angela’s Ashes or Bastard Out of Carolina? Don’t readers want OTHER stories? Yet this is what we were shown was considered “strong” literary fiction, the kind that gets published.
Screw it, I thought. If that’s what people like to read, then someone else can write it.
How NaNoWriMo Brought Me Back from Postpartum Depression
My greatest triumph: three years after graduate school.
My daughter was born, and I had sunk into a nasty postpartum depression. I felt very cut-off from life. I couldn’t feel the joy of motherhood. I found myself often staring out a window, trapped in walls yet somehow exiled outside of feeling.
I’d look upon my sleeping baby and feel nothing but guilt because I couldn’t feel complete with motherhood.
Then a friend introduced me to the awesome challenge that is National Novel Writing Month. From November 1st -30th, you are to write 50,000 words of a story not yet started—that’s cheating. Outlines are permissible, though.
The story may need more than 50K words, but what matters is that you reach that length in thirty days. I swung it that year, and felt AMAZING.
I was escaping the trap, driven to feel with characters outside of this world. I couldn’t just sit and dwell on individual lines or plot points—I had to keep going, and because I had to march on in the narrative, I found myself marching on in real life, too.
I wasn’t staring out the window waiting for minutes to pass. I was…I was back, you know? I felt a part of life again, enjoying the touch of my daughter’s tiny hands around my finger and her boundless grey-blue eyes. I reveled in these things. I felt…complete.
Love of Storytelling Keeps Me On My Path
Oh, there is a love, a love indeed that keeps me on my path. It is as motley and beautiful as a stained glass window.
First, there is the love of storytelling. I see this in my youngest child. A story wells up so hard and that he has to share it. He’s gone on for half an hour sometimes with adventuring Transformers, rescue helicopters, superhero bunnies, or doctor owls. He can’t not tell their stories.
That same love burns in me. Before I could make the letters to my name, I was drawing pictures depicting stories. No matter how dire things became in my childhood, I could escape with adventures upon a dragon’s back.
When I got older I used stories to vent my depression before it could injure my heart. Of all things, my studies in writing broke that love of writing in me. Only the love of my friends and family could bring me back to the page, and to dare walk into my imagination once again.
Advice for a Young Writer: Never Let Those Embers Within You Die Out
Stories are the fire that warms the soul. They melt fear, ignite hope, and spark relationships like nothing else.
Never let those embers within you die out. No. Send your fire’s sparks flying like so many fireflies into summer’s night, and invite more out of the cold darkness.
* * *
Jean Lee started telling stories before she knew how to write them, filling pages with pictures and audio cassettes with words. This passion for storytelling grew every year to become not only her focus of graduate study, but an escape and savior from postpartum depression.
That savior has since transformed into the young adult fantasy Fallen Princeborn: Stolen [Aionios Books, 2018]. She continues to write more installments in the Fallen Princeborn Omnibus while teaching and raising her family in Wisconsin.
For more information on Jean and her work, please see her website and Amazon author page, or connect with her on Twitter and Instagram.
Fallen Princeborn: Stolen: Desperate, they breached the Wall to hunt humans. But they made one critical mistake. They took her sister.
In rural Wisconsin, an old stone wall is all that separates the world of magic from the world of man—a wall that keeps the shapeshifters inside. When something gets out, people disappear. Completely.
Escaping from an abusive uncle, eighteen-year-old Charlotte runs away. She takes her younger sister Anna with her, swearing to protect her. Their bus breaks down by a creepy old farm, and Anna is wiped from human memory.
But something inside Charlotte remembers. So she goes over the Wall in a frantic rescue attempt, accidentally awakening a once cruel but still dangerous prince, and gaining control of a powerful weapon, his magic dagger.
Charlotte’s only chance to save Anna hinges on her courage and an uneasy alliance with some of the very monsters that feed on humanity.
Welcome to River Vine, a shrouded hinterland where dark magic devours and ancient shifters feed.
Available at Amazon.
Tales of the River Vine: A series of six FREE short stories to accompany the Fallen Princeborn Omnibus.
Escape. Adventure. Strength. Heartbreak. Family. Hope. Every character has a story in River Vine.
Each installment follows one of the characters in Fallen Princeborn: Stolen before the fateful day Charlotte and her sister take a bus into Wisconsin.
Available at Amazon.
Thank you so much for having me, Colleen!
Thank you, Jean. Lovely to hear your thoughts on writing. :O)