Resisting the Urge to Explain

“The woman who doesn’t need validation from anyone is the most feared individual on the planet.” 

Mohadesa Najumi

Hi, fellow Scribblies,

We’ve been talking since the beginning of the year about our intentions for the writerly life that is unique to each of us. You know, those beautiful longings that move us forward into ever more authentic writing and living. 

As in authentic writing and living that is ours to do. Period. Full stop. No further discussion needed. 

We’ll get to that part. First, I’m going to hearken back to the past.

When I was writing my second or third novel for women, I saw a margin notation from my editor that I wasn’t familiar with. R.U.E. At first I thought, huh, why my last name? Then I thought—narcissistically so—he must be pointing out signature Rue writing that’s blowing him away. (You’re so vain, I bet you think this song is about you, right?) Yeah, when I asked him, he explained it stood for Resist the Urge to Explain.

Oh. 

Come to find out, R.U.E is commonly used by editors to point out things like:

When he walked in the door, she dropped both her tea cup and her jaw. She was stunned. Shocked. Taken aback. 

Um…du-uh. The reader can tell she’s stunned—also shocked and taken aback—because she’s has already shown that. Nothing says stunned like smashed china and a jaw drop. 

I think R.U.E. has an even broader application to our whole writerly lives—in three ways.

Resist the urge to explain IN our writing

• We can relax and let the characters show the story. If we describe their actions and reactions, we don’t have to explain them. 

Rather than: He was angry. Very angry. And anger wasn’t something he enjoyed.

We write: He found himself clenching his fists until his nails dug into his palms. An unfamiliar hot energy surged in his chest. And he was sickened by it. 

• We can sit back and let the plot reveal the theme. Ever get impatient in a novel when just as the climax of the thing is about to be reached, the author stops the action and gives a two-paragraph summary of what the character is learning right now? Here’s the deal: when the character takes an action that is wiser or more compassionate than he would have in the beginning, we know what he’s learned. (In the podcast, I tell a story about this.)

•  We can make it easier on ourselves and avoid the info dump. Donald Maass says no backstory in the first 30 pages, 60 if we can manage it. The reader doesn’t have to know the protagonist’s entire history before the current story can move forward. We do better to release information on a need to know basis. 

• Basically, we need to trust our readers. Give them credit for being able to pick up what we’re putting down. Get ourselves out of the way and let them engage with the story from their own perspective. We just show what happens, within and without, and forego the sermon, the moral at the end. We’re not Aesop, right? 

Resist the urge to explain ABOUT our writing

• When it comes to pitching our book at a writer’s conference or in a query letter or even to the innocent friend who says, “So, what’s your book about?”—it all comes under the umbrella of elevator pitch. Y’know, you talk about it for as long as it takes for the elevator to get from the fifth floor to the lobby without stopping. It’s not that long.
• So we find the essence of the project. That’s what we reveal and only that. Otherwise, it’s like that movie preview that gives so much away, you hardly even need to see the film. Same goes for back cover copy that’s actually a synopsis. 
• Yeah, verbal processing with a trusted fellow creative can be helpful but we need to beware of talking about it so much we never get around to writing it, expounding on it to the point that we get bored with the whole thing and don’t want to write it, and listening to so many other people’s ideas about it that the story looks like the late Joan Rivers. (For those of you too young to get that reference: too many facelifts.)  

Resist the urge to explain the very fact THAT we write

Maybe ponder whether you find yourself:

• Defending the amount of time you spend with your stories
• Rationalizing the lack of R.O.I. (return on investment) 
• Giving a preamble before you read something to your writing group: It’s still rough. It’ll probably never get published, blah, blah, blah.

Absolutely we sometimes need to stay stuff out loud so we know what we think, especially those of us who are extroverts. What we do NOT need is:

PERMISSION

APPROVAL

THE GRANTING OF FREEDOM

before we can embrace the writerly life. THAT is where we need to resist the urge explain.

Creative resistance

We need to discover authentically delicious ways to:

• Give ourselves permission to use the gifts we’ve been given as a way to love and serve the world
• Approve of ourselves as we delightfully do what is ours to do
• Grant ourselves the freedom to dream, explore, be curious, plan or not plan, shape, show up, and lose ourselves in Kairos time. 

THAT REQUIRES NO EXPLANATION

Let’s make a pact

Let’s each own our beautiful writerly intentions, no matter what anyone else says or thinks or shows with the prune-like lips of disapproval. 

Let’s support each other in that. For no explicable reason except that we are The Scribbling Women.

Until next time, Scribblies…

Scribble On!