Showing Up For Work

"I love the writer William Stafford's advice. Someone asked him, 'What do you do about writer's block?' Stafford said, 'Lower my standards and keep on going.' That's such beautiful advice. What you get done doesn't have to do with how gifted you are or how much ability you have; it has to do with your attitude toward it. If your attitude is 'This is my work: this is what I do every day, and I don't have any expectations except that I will have worked today,' then you will get a tremendous amount done. Some of it will be good. Some of it won't be so good. But you're showing up for work, putting in the hours. And, anyway, perfection is an illusion. I don't teach writing. I teach patience and toughness, stubbornness and willingness to make the mistakes and go on. And the willingness to look like an idiot sometimes. That's the only way any good thing ever gets done."

RICHARD BAUSCH
in Novel Voices, edited by Jennifer Levasseur and Kevin Rabalais