Shitty First Drafts

This week my teacher asked me to write about a chapter from a book we read in class named "Bird by Bird" by Anne Lamott. The book is about writing instructions and the chapter name is "Shitty First Drafts".

When we see a beautiful piece of artwork or a very good piece of article or a very good book, we usually think that the artist or the author who has created it must be a genius. That is half true, but if you think carefully, what you always skip while admiring it is the process of making that piece of work. Another half of the truth is that great works are consist of inspiration and the most important thing, the effort.

The writer asserts that a genius writer who has his/her idea flow smoothly is super super rare. If you want to do something you shouldn't be afraid to start. I know how it feels when you see a very nice work. It terrifies you. When I saw a very nice piece of work from my friend. I always felt wow, I wouldn't be able to do something like that. I did skip another half part of the truth that if I tried hard enough, I would have done something good like him/her.

Most of people hate making mistakes and hate the fact that they would look stupid in others' views. I am one of them, I always wanted to look cool by trying to make everything good in the first time. However, concentrating on making it looks good to the others' eyes makes my work become worse. 

While we are working, those noises of self-consciousness and paranoia thoughts are always keep saying something in our head. Something like, this is not good enough! You should be ashamed of expressing this idea! or people are not gonna like this work! The writer suggests that we should keep those noises in a jar and close the lid so that we don't hear what they are saying. Pretend that you are alone in this world and are free to do anything, even the craziest things. By this way you will be able to expand your creativity and create a great work!

"All the good writing begins with terrible first efforts" (Anne Lamott, 1995). I agree with the author that we all should have the shitty first drafts, not just in writing but in everything we do.