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Write Every Day: 08 November 02019
Nov. 8th, 2019 07:54 pmGreetings! This is the Write Every Day Check-In Post for 8 November 02019.
Have you ever been in a situation where you don't realize how much skill and ability you have amassed until someone else puts it into relief for you? The kind of thing where since you are the only reference point you know, you assume that you are average at things, if not below average, because you know that there are always going to be people better than you? (I am given to understand this is not the case for the meme-worthy "mediocre white man," but let's leave him aside for a moment.) The kind of skills that come from a long amount of practice, some study, and the occasional fight with a search engine to get it to tell you something useful. Where when you say something like "Yes, I have a functioning Linux system and have been running one for years," people stare at you like you have become a technical wizard capable of impossible feats. Even though, these days, there are systems that are built to be friendly to people who have no Linux experience at all?
Yeah, that's my workplace. Given that the entire profession mostly operates on the only permanent rule of Calvinball, there are times where someone asks a question, you say "I don't know off the top of my head, but let's take a look," tap a few words into your search engine of choice, and produce answers or relevant results. And then get stared at, because in a few keystrokes, you have done better than their frustrated searching for the last block of time. It's not magic, it just looks like it.
I am coming into this phase regarding a project I am running at work. I do not have any official experience or training to be a project manager. I have sat on other projects, herded people, produced results, and done other things that are important to project and committee work, but I haven't actually ever been trained on how to run the thing myself. Apparently, since I've been working in my capacity for as long as I have, the organization seems to think I've picked up the necessary skills through osmosis. And, really, unless I do something that clearly shows I should have been trained on that, they probably will continue to think that. And I'd like to believe I'm at least average at my work, so I won't make that kind of mistake. And the cycle perpetuates. I have a feeling, however, that if I explained what I was doing to someone just starting out in the profession, unless they had specifically taken coursework on managing people and projects, what I was saying was casually part of my day would seem like fantastic magic to them. Because everyone else around me is good at what they do, I am, too, but it doesn't seem like it. The level has been raised so much that the extraordinary becomes ordinary.
I sometimes wonder if this applies to aspects of my writing as well. I mean, I'm still new to transformative fanworks (except I'm not, not really, there's a throughline of transformative works wherever I go, and I should acknowledge that), but I've been told by others that what I think of as a normal juggling load of exchanges is not normal at all, and I suspect, again, that if someone just coming to fandom were to look at my collection of works, they might think I have more skill than I think I have.
I'm not sure if there's a way of figuring out how to get out of my own head and to see myself through the eyes of a newcomer, to understand how far I've come from my origin point, even as I'm gesturing at ever higher mountains and luminaries in the distance and saying "no, no, they're good. Just look at those works!"
If you have a beginner handy, maybe they can help give you some perspective.
Today, in writing, completion was on my mind, as I tried to get a few stories to complete draft status so that they could be shipped off to betas or otherwise be out of the "Panic!" mode that often accompanies a work that's not at least at the minimum threshold and drawn to a conclusion of some sort that will work. Yes, even though there are still weeks ahead, that's all revision time, and time that I can use for drafting on the next assignment that's come in. Layering exchanges on top of each other is a hobby of mine, even though that sometimes means I don't write as many treats as I probably should. (Strange word, should. Often indicates an obligation that goes unfulfilled and induces guilt rather than helping someone usefully look at what they are doing and already have done.)
Here's the tally so far:
( Rally-ho! )
Have you ever been in a situation where you don't realize how much skill and ability you have amassed until someone else puts it into relief for you? The kind of thing where since you are the only reference point you know, you assume that you are average at things, if not below average, because you know that there are always going to be people better than you? (I am given to understand this is not the case for the meme-worthy "mediocre white man," but let's leave him aside for a moment.) The kind of skills that come from a long amount of practice, some study, and the occasional fight with a search engine to get it to tell you something useful. Where when you say something like "Yes, I have a functioning Linux system and have been running one for years," people stare at you like you have become a technical wizard capable of impossible feats. Even though, these days, there are systems that are built to be friendly to people who have no Linux experience at all?
Yeah, that's my workplace. Given that the entire profession mostly operates on the only permanent rule of Calvinball, there are times where someone asks a question, you say "I don't know off the top of my head, but let's take a look," tap a few words into your search engine of choice, and produce answers or relevant results. And then get stared at, because in a few keystrokes, you have done better than their frustrated searching for the last block of time. It's not magic, it just looks like it.
I am coming into this phase regarding a project I am running at work. I do not have any official experience or training to be a project manager. I have sat on other projects, herded people, produced results, and done other things that are important to project and committee work, but I haven't actually ever been trained on how to run the thing myself. Apparently, since I've been working in my capacity for as long as I have, the organization seems to think I've picked up the necessary skills through osmosis. And, really, unless I do something that clearly shows I should have been trained on that, they probably will continue to think that. And I'd like to believe I'm at least average at my work, so I won't make that kind of mistake. And the cycle perpetuates. I have a feeling, however, that if I explained what I was doing to someone just starting out in the profession, unless they had specifically taken coursework on managing people and projects, what I was saying was casually part of my day would seem like fantastic magic to them. Because everyone else around me is good at what they do, I am, too, but it doesn't seem like it. The level has been raised so much that the extraordinary becomes ordinary.
I sometimes wonder if this applies to aspects of my writing as well. I mean, I'm still new to transformative fanworks (except I'm not, not really, there's a throughline of transformative works wherever I go, and I should acknowledge that), but I've been told by others that what I think of as a normal juggling load of exchanges is not normal at all, and I suspect, again, that if someone just coming to fandom were to look at my collection of works, they might think I have more skill than I think I have.
I'm not sure if there's a way of figuring out how to get out of my own head and to see myself through the eyes of a newcomer, to understand how far I've come from my origin point, even as I'm gesturing at ever higher mountains and luminaries in the distance and saying "no, no, they're good. Just look at those works!"
If you have a beginner handy, maybe they can help give you some perspective.
Today, in writing, completion was on my mind, as I tried to get a few stories to complete draft status so that they could be shipped off to betas or otherwise be out of the "Panic!" mode that often accompanies a work that's not at least at the minimum threshold and drawn to a conclusion of some sort that will work. Yes, even though there are still weeks ahead, that's all revision time, and time that I can use for drafting on the next assignment that's come in. Layering exchanges on top of each other is a hobby of mine, even though that sometimes means I don't write as many treats as I probably should. (Strange word, should. Often indicates an obligation that goes unfulfilled and induces guilt rather than helping someone usefully look at what they are doing and already have done.)
Here's the tally so far:
( Rally-ho! )
