Creativity Is Not A Competition

Someone else making a thing doesn't mean you lose

Welcome back to the Writer’s Secret Weapon. I’m John, I’m glad you’re here.

Maybe you’re like me — blessed with a terrible competitive streak but double-blessed with a sense of inadequacy that tells you everyone will always be better than you by default.

I can’t remember my first competitive experience. I assume it was probably a race on the playground, one spot to another. I’m pretty confident I lost in all things physical as a kid, I was the -est: smallest, slowest, weakest.

That kind of thing sticks. I remember being picked last, being out-performed, and I remember deciding early that if they were going to outdo me with their bodies, I’d outdo them with my mind. I was that obnoxious curve-wrecking student whose work got copied.

And that competitive streak, as it always does, spread everywhere. It sits in me now — a little furnace that kicks up when I scroll and see other coaches crowing about their wealth, or see people I went to school with talking about their big purchase or their huge success.

Inadequacy always seems to be the Robin to competition’s Batman. As if there’s only ever one winner and everything else falls spectacularly short.

Know what I mean?

Creativity isn’t a competition

All across social media, writers mention piles of books they’re meaning to read and stacks of journals they’re meaning to write in. People get to talking, and people get to comparing.

I want to flip that whole need for hierarchy on its ear: competing with other writers is always going to backfire on you, you don’t need to do it, and you’d be better served putting that same energy into your own work.

Being creative isn’t a competition because there isn’t one prize — there are prizes. It’s more like a game show than a sporting event. You can be rewarded with multiple things: a publishing deal, money, an audiobook, a readership that actually shows up, whatever. And the prizes are variable, relative to what each person is doing. We’re not all competing for the same thing.

I’m not looking for a traditional publishing contract, you might be. Maybe you just want 10 readers by the end of the year. I want to coach writers, write essays, and occasionally say something true enough that it changes how someone sees their work. I’m not competing with other writing coaches, just like you’re not competing with me for a publishing deal since I don’t want one.

Creative competition always backfires

When I bring up competition, writers get resistant and defensive. They’ll tell me I’m totally wrong because of “the market” (those quotes are going to get a hernia from lifting all that bullshit), or that other people are better writers, or that they have to hurry to get published, even when they never tell me why they’re in a rush.

What writers love to do is externalize their competition. They say they’re competing against other people — maybe one specifically, but more likely a collective “other” representing everyone writing in their genre, or writing at all.

This is the trap. Someone tell Admiral Ackbar.

It’s a trap because there will always be more writers than there are more yous. You’re one person. They’re eleventy bajillion people.

It’s a trap because in those numbers, someone somewhere is going to produce work faster or with less apparent effort. Too many writers read that speed as superiority — but that’s like saying a car doing 60 miles an hour is doing “better” than a car doing 59. Eventually all cars get where they’re going.

Don’t get lost in that aggressive comparative thinking. You’re outnumbered, but you’re not out-gunned. Keep doing what you’re doing, get better at it as you go, and you’ll get where you need to be.

You don’t need to compete

Right now, as I write this, there’s a book being written somewhere that will change someone’s life more profoundly than this essay will change yours. I’m okay with that. I’m excited for that person to have art move them so substantially.

Do I wish my writing did that to people? Sometimes. And sometimes I know it does — people have told me something I wrote changed something for them. Do I wish that was every time? Sure. But do I need it to be?

When I was younger and always proving myself, yes. Time’s passed, I’ve developed loads more things, even though I still feel like I’m proving myself to everyone and their mom. I’ve outlasted most of the people I used to go up against, and there’s a whole new batch to reckon with — though mostly they’re grifters and bullshit artists who say nothing while charging an arm and a leg.

Competing doesn’t help you write better. It doesn’t teach you how to build a character or weave a theme through an arc. It doesn’t help you know when to cut a comma splice and when to leave it in for effect. It’s extra weight. Baggage you don’t need to carry. It’s vestigial to your ability to be creative, like a little toe or the concept of markets and debt.

The idea that there’s a finite number of readers and you have to get your work in front of them right now falls apart the moment you look at anyone’s to-be-read pile. Those books just sit there in a stack. People buy loads of books, often more than one at a time. So what’s the hurry?

People can always buy another book. Your book. Maybe not today — maybe they’re waiting for payday, or the week before vacation. You can’t control when they do it no matter how badly you want to see the numbers move. This isn’t musical chairs. There’s always room for another chair.

Put the energy where it matters

Writing takes time and effort. You have to get your ass in the chair and do the work — it doesn’t miracle itself onto the page.

You build skills not all at once, but over time, through repeated use. If you really need to compete with something, compete with yourself. Not over word count — over motivation. Ask yourself every day whether today’s the day you make progress, or the day you let your goal get just a little further past you.

Discipline chases energy, so see what you’re actually doing versus what you say you’re going to be doing under some not-yet-met conditions. If you find yourself churning out excuses instead of pages, it might be time to examine not just what motivates you, but why you want to write and why you want to be read in the first place.

Focus on the work. Show up for yourself and for your art. This isn’t a race. Your job is to deliver the best work you can, when you can, however you can. The audience is always there — you’re the only one who can make your work your way, and they’re waiting for you.

Love you. Talk soon.