Listening to Experts

Experts often don't know what they know.

Some of what they know they have known so long they can't remember that it needed to be learned, and praticed, and revised, and learned again until it was part of them, like throwing a baseball or flipping an egg.

Some of what they know always came naturally to them, so they think every other writer must be blessed with the same gift.  

Some of what they know they cannot communicate in any useful way.  The are, after all, authors and poets not teachers, although some teach classes as well as work at their craft.

Some of what they know applies exclusively to their own work.  

The benefits and difficulties in talking to successful writers are often the same as speaking with experts in any field.  

The benefits are many and sometimes seem miraculous.  Certain things that are wrong just jump right out to them.  They can zero in on concrete problems and solutions; sometimes changing "a" to "the" changes your writing world.  They can share that they, too, receive rejections and experience anxiety.  They can help you brush off unimportant crazy-making things and guide you to the core.

The difficulties are frustrating, often both for you and for them.  There are approaches they cannot recall not knowing, there are processes they have stopped using years ago because they did not find them either useful or necessary for them, they have tacit or instinctive knowledge about certain aspects of their work so they can't communicate it to others.

The Wonderful Thing About Hanging

As Samuel Johnson is reported to have said, “Depend upon it, Sir, when a man knows he is to be hanged in a fortnight, it concentrates his mind wonderfully.” 

I can now report the same thing, for me, may be said about preparing to make your first story submission.

Mr Writers' Group thought the story was good.  Check.  A prominent member of the WG suggested an online magazine.  Check.  I polished it a little bit with a quick update since it is a Trump satire.  Check.  

And I removed a small section - those who know me would know it was affectionate ribbing, not a bigoted attack.  Those who do not know me would send the vigilantes with a rope.  So, obvious lesson #1, don't rely on your personal reputation for assumed civility.  It was the reality of submitting the story outside my WG that brought this mundane insight to my brain with lightning bolts.  Another check.

Lesson #2 was that it is a satire of Donald Trump.  The same Donald Trump who likes to sue people.  

I will submit another story because now I think I'm ready.  Ready but chicken.

Build It & They Will Come

OK, so the title of this blog is a common misquote of "If you build it, he will come", referring to Shoeless Joe Jackson. However, in the movie, Terrance Mann does say, "Ray, people will come Ray.  They'll come to Iowa for reasons they can't even fathom."

Mann's pronouncement is a true reflection of the extreme version of the position many writers take.  "What you have to say is valuable.  If you learn to use your own voice to reveal the truth you carry, then people will be attracted to your writing.  Yes, you will need skills and likely help to polish and publish what you produce.  Polishing and publishing are usually critical aspects of making your voice heard, but first, you need to discover and hone your true voice.  What you do not want to try to do is figure out what people want to read and twist yourself into an unnatural shape to accommodate that.  You will likely fail.  You almost certainly will be dissatisfied."

The other point of view is quite business-y: "Figure out your target market and how you skills match up.  Do that."

It may be that the reality of writing as a blend of some version of these two, but that is seldom clear to the new writer overhearing these debates.  The passion on each side makes it sound like either-or.

Whatever you decide is best for you, there are in-between choices I think

Quick Break for Funny

Simon Rich's "The Ride Back to Beersheba" may be the funniest two pages I have ever read.  It can be found on various blogs and is part of his "Ant Farm and Other Desperate Situations" collection of stories.  Of them all, "Ride" is my favourite but am quick to admit that the others may suffer only by comparison with this genius work.

Tucked in among a waterfall of enthusiastic praise, I found one negative comment:  "I typically found myself puzzled as one incomprehensible piece gave way to the next. Maybe I'll wake up laughing tomorrow."

I do not wish to meet this person, have lunch with him, or even shake his hand.

About Over-thinking 3

It's clear I am a writing novice and, on this topic, a dog with a bone.

At the same time, I do know more than a little something about learning, talent and skill development.

One of the most difficult positions to fill successfully in organizations is sales.  There are some telling similarities between selling and writing.  

First, a top notch sales representative is almost certainly 'born' with talent, identified early as a 'naturally' persuasive person.  For instance, many of us can be better at sales than we are now.  However, without some early signs of talent, we are unlikely to develop into the poster child for sales representative of the decade.   Possibly, but not likely.  It is the same for writing.  Anybody might have one hit book if the subject is interesting enough, but sustained demonstration of high performance over time is unlikely.

Second, sales is a creative activity.  Like authors and poets, salespersons need to adjust their performance in tune with their intended audience.  A writer of childrens' books has specialized skills as does the writer of mysteries.

Third, there is more than one approach to sales, the same as there is more than one approach to writing.  There are always Jack Kerouac type exceptions but writing a novel usually requires more planning than writing a short story, for instance.  Selling pots and pans is different than selling consulting services is different than retailing clothing.   Hard to say if born-in talent is as specific as that.  It is more likely to assume that motivation and enthusiasm for as certain audience or product or genre is more important.

Forth, there is character.  Both occupations, regardless of level of success require oodles of grit over the long term.

Fifth, there is an openness to seeing where you have been wrong and correcting it in future.  This is a characteristic not shared by many administrators or others who spend their lives defending actions and opinions that are less than dazzling successes.

So, all in all, any 'how to' writing book may provide you with useful guidance from time to time, but for it to claim any level of revealed authority is incorrect.

Avoid drinking their Kool-Aid.

About Over-thinking 2

There is an old saying that goes something like this: "If one person tells you you're drunk and you feel fine, ignore that person.  If seven people tell you you're drunk, lie down."

The original source cited varies from Russia to Central America, and the number ranges from three to ten.  And while some list the source as 'The Walking Dead', no one claims the activating number of observers to be two.  And yet . . .

A few days ago, two people, two published writers reacted to my ranting about 'voice' and 'tempo' with very similar words.  ". . . you're overthinking the whole thing," and "You probably shouldn't be trying to think about it so much."

And, their offered solutions, both referring to short fiction or stories, were pretty much the same, though for slightly different reasons.

"Just write."

About Over-thinking 1

Along this journey of my renewing my writing, I have found a few side roads that look interesting, travelled down some of them and was variably happy for the trip or grumpy about what I saw as wasting time.  There are also billboards advertising the what they say is the right answer.  Notwithstanding my staying away from those that sound like snake oil miracle cures, I have nevertheless discovered few that stand up to any kind of cross-examination.  Some of the pronouncements were even worse.  Not only do they usually lack any semblance of rigour, they strike me as some combination of mysterious, imprecise and hairbrained.

The best of the lot by far so far has been Writing Down the Bones by Natalie Goldberg.  She has the impeccable good grace to say the reader may find some counsel in one place that seems to contradictory advice in another place.

I am trying to absorb that as an observation that is of any real use to me.

Newsflash: Writing is Hard Work

And frustrating. And annoying. And, from time to time, the best thing ever.

Famously, Hemmingway once said; 
or Hemmingway once famously said; 
or Hemmingway once said famously: 
"There is nothing to writing. All you do is sit down at a typewriter and bleed."

If you read the books of advice to writers, the process seems as though it should be so orderly; or at least describable.

It ain't.  At least not for me.  Not if I am trying to write something true.  Or surprising.  Or something that someone, if they happened to come upon in accidentally, would say "You know, I'm glad I saw that and read it."

Just trying to get most things finished, a short story or a chapter or whatever, is hard.  So far, with me, it is an iterative process --  I begin with excellent intentions and finish with something that looks only vaguely like what I started out to do.

Often, though, better.  Not always, but often.

To paraphrase another Hemmingway quote, this from 'A Moveable Feast': Do not worry.  You have written before, and you will write again.

Gobsmacked

I am still adjusting to the revelation from an experienced writer that one of his own favourite short stories has been his most rejected story over the course of a few years.  This person keeps polishing it and re-submitting to other publishers.  For a few years.

He believes in this story and is simply trying to identify (for a few years, did I mention that?)  (He also advised me against the over-use of parentheses) for the right publisher.

If you're searching for someone with grace and commitment in addition to talent, I can testify there is at least one out there.  Do I have the right stuff for that kind of thing?  Do you?

The Chronology of Writing a Short Story

For me, it's helpful to begin with a structure or approach in mind.  This may or may not be true for you as well.  Currently, I am focusing on the beginning, the pre-launch and launch so to speak.  Goodness knows, everything else could use work as well but I am coming to the understanding that this constant self-doubt and continuous learning and skill-building is as true at ten, twenty and thirty years experience as it is at a few months.

Here is my current situation. I am writing about a historic person and series of incidents I know something, but precious little, about.  My first instinct was to master the topic. Wrong Bob.  Or, at least, not entirely right.

On reflection, I have discovered that the correct order is to get a kind of scanned idea of the person, the period and the situation and then write the story; and then go back and correct any facts that, represented incorrectly, would alienate readers.  And to fix the language, and so forth.  I am not writing a history book, I am writing a story.

This is not an easy lesson for me to learn.  How about you?

Mercifully Short Again

Re: June 6th Post

• Book of Short Pieces - Still under consideration
• Anachronisms - Out

That post sounded too much like "This is what I had for breakfast" except it demonstrates you are not the only new or renewing - or even experienced -- writer with temporarily brilliant and invigorating ideas that you can hardly wait to share with others and ignore the courteous people surreptitiously rolling their eyes.

John Grisham’s Do’s and Don’ts for Writing Popular Fiction

This article appeared in the New York Times and can be found on their site. I paste it below only for convenience.  For my own next story, even though it will likely be either a postcard story or, almost certainly, less than 1,000 words, I am going to work hard on #2.

https://www.nytimes.com/2017/05/31/books/review/john-grishams-tips-how-to-write-fiction.html?_r=0

By JOHN GRISHAMMAY 31, 2017

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Since advice is usually ignored and rules are routinely broken, I refer to these little pearls as merely “suggestions.”

There is nothing original about this list. It has all been said before by writers much smarter than me. I’ve just arranged things differently, and I keep changing them as the years go by. There’s nothing binding here. All suggestions can be ignored when necessary. I do it all the time. However, I write each day with these habits ingrained. — J.G.

1. DO — WRITE A PAGE EVERY DAY

That’s about 200 words, or 1,000 words a week. Do that for two years and you’ll have a novel that’s long enough.  Nothing will happen until you are producing at least one page per day.

2. DON’T — WRITE THE FIRST SCENE UNTIL YOU KNOW THE LAST 

This necessitates the use of a dreaded device commonly called an outline. Virtually all writers hate that word. I have yet to meet one who admits to using an outline.

Plotting takes careful planning. Writers waste years pursuing stories that eventually don’t work.

3. DO — WRITE YOUR ONE PAGE EACH DAY AT THE SAME PLACE AND TIME

Early morning, lunch break, on the train, late at night — it doesn’t matter. Find the extra hour, go to the same place, shut the door. No exceptions, no excuses.

4. DON’T — WRITE A PROLOGUE

Prologues are usually gimmicks to hook the reader. Avoid them. Plan your story (see No. 2) and start with Chapter 1.

5. DO — USE QUOTATION MARKS WITH DIALOGUE

Please do this. It’s rather basic.

6. DON’T — KEEP A THESAURUS WITHIN REACHING DISTANCE

I know, I know, there’s one at your fingertips.

There are three types of words: (1) words we know; (2) words we should know; (3) words nobody knows. Forget those in the third category and use restraint with those in the second.  A common mistake by fledgling authors is using jaw-breaking vocabulary. It’s frustrating and phony.

7. DO — READ EACH SENTENCE AT LEAST THREE TIMES IN SEARCH OF WORDS TO CUT

Most writers use too many words, and why not? We have unlimited space and few constraints.

8. DON’T — INTRODUCE 20 CHARACTERS IN THE FIRST CHAPTER

Another rookie mistake. Your readers are eager to get started. Don’t bombard them with a barrage of names from four generations of the same family. Five names are enough to get started.

Mercifully Shorter Entry

I have written an 'astonishing' (a member's word) variety of pieces to share at my Writers' Group.  Not good or bad, mind you.  Just various.

Now that I have 'sharpened the saw' a little bit, I am considering writing for awhile as though I were producing a book of short pieces called "Letters and Other Anachronisms".  I'll let you know.

Excruciatingly Long Story

I never intended to publish here any story I have written.  My purpose is to share my experience so other new and renewing writers can better understand their own journey, share their thoughts, as they make their own unique path.
After some nagging general encouragement (thanks Don), I decided to demonstrate what for me is my most complicated effort after 18 weeks of practice.  Many thanks to Paul for his editorial comments, all welcome.  Just ran out of energy to implement them.  Didn't disagree with anything.

Below is the story I invested my head and heart in.  You might well say "All this fuss about that?" Or: "Send that to the New Yorker right away."  I don't know.  I do know I'm headed back to shorter forms.  I got too hung up on structure with this length of story at this point of my efforts.

BUGS IN THE GRASS

PART ONE – THE BEGINNING

He had been told by his Field colleagues in the Service that it was funny, not ha ha funny, you understand, but peculiar funny, how different things look when you have every reason to believe your brains are about to be splattered to smithereens all over the new not-even-paid-for-yet kitchen cupboards.
Jim was standing spreadeagled and semi-upright, his legs kicked apart, his hands wired behind his back, his head pushed half over the sink, sweating, yes, looking wide-eyed over the top of his glasses, through the large kitchen window, at the garden in back. This was an unplanned interruption, fr certain not how he’d planned to spend his Saturday. To put it all in priority order, he would rather, you know, contemplate gardening possibilities on the internet where it’s clean and interesting, not crawl around the garden out there, where it’s dirty and creepy among the bugs. On the internet, you could just, you know, look it up. But, he would far rather, you bet, be crawling around in the weeds than be held hostage.


“This situation in here”, thought Jim “was a lot more dirty real than out there, by a long shot.” The chunky one, the one with the big gun, nattered on and on about next steps and what he referred to as tactical issues. The skinny one munched on a Snickers bar, and provided an unconvincing impression of listening. Jim felt maybe he had, at least a moment or two, or maybe not, to think about what his original Saturday plans had been before he thought he’d be, you know, dead. Expired. Defunct. “D-e-d” as his father used to say. “D-e-d, Jimmy boy. D-e-d.”

Jim’s next thought was about the gun pushing cold against his head. Naturally, and stupidly enough, he recalled Dirty Harry saying, “This is a.44 Magnum, the most powerful handgun in the world, and would blow your head clean off, you’ve got to ask yourself one question:
“Do I feel lucky?”     “No”, thought Jim, “Nope. Negatory. Not lucky.”


Speaking of dead, if he twisted just a little without annoying his visitors, over to the far left Jim could see the place where he had removed the two dead juniper bushes a couple of years ago. He had meant to replace them right away. Behind that spot, closer to the street, stood the three white pines all in a row, He always wished he could describe them as ‘majestic’ but they were mostly skinny. And precariously slanted. Still, they stayed standing and green in winter.
Then, just past that, a peony bush that blossomed faithfully every spring. Jim couldn’t remember if this one was the peony bush with the red flowers or the pink ones. Would he be given the opportunity to find out? More than likely not, he thought.
He decided, not for the first time, true enough, to focus. He should, you know, concentrate, focus, get some discipline into his life. “Think, my Jimmy boy, think.” Well, for instance, he thought, of his brains as one of his best features when they were all together in one place, inside his skull and not splattered all around, hither and yon. Likely his very best feature.
The chunky guy with the gun, yanked Jim’s head so he was looking directly in front of him again. “Stay freakin’ still, my friend, if you want to see tomorrow.”
Now once again straight ahead in front of him, yes still there, was the long stretch of garden backed by the tall whitewashed stockade board fence. This was the section of the garden over by the sandbox. I would be fair to say that Jim’s memory of even this familiar slice of the garden was mostly about weeding, and about finding a place with enough sun to grow the tomatoes, for himself, and his wife, and the pumpkins for their four-year-old grandson. The weeds did just fine in the shade, thank you very much. Their leaves were dotted with holes, food for the caterpillars, who in turn were food for the birds. Not many caterpillars had the chance to become butterflies.
Next, around what was euphemistically called the ‘water feature’, the ground was covered in periwinkle. This was the only part of the garden plot that Jim’s wife liked and but which Jim thought was expendable. Forgetting that she liked that area just the way it was, Jim kept suggesting alternate uses for it. You can get to a certain age together and still disagree on so many small, but still irritating, things. He wondered if after his, as they say, passing, she might plant forget-me-nots there in the middle as a kind of memorial. Not likely. Sentimentality was never one of her primary attributes. Up until now, he had hoped there was still time left between them to work out more of their nagging differences.
He wouldn't bet on it now. ‘Tempus’ was ‘fugitting’.tempus fugit. Time flies. Life ebbs. “Tick tock”, Jimmy my boy, he said, half out loud, “Tick tock”.
Over on the other side of the house, past the struggling crimson maple, was the pathway the two had used, running from the street to Jim’s back yard, then to the deck, where they sliced through the sliding screen door into the house. Jim regretted chopping down the waist-high thistles that had been along that side path earlier until just early that morning. That would have given them pause, you bet.
Amazing. Chopping the thistles, a gardening project he had actually completed, OK after many reminders from his wife, and it was killing him. “There’s a memorial for you,” Jim thought. Life mostly droned on and on but then so much could change in just a few minutes.

Gentle Reader:
Here’s a tip. Too late for Jim but here’s a tip you may be able to use for yourself. A locked screen door means nothing when encountering a Bowie knife, especially the deluxe model. Cuts open that screen like tissue paper so, for instance, two insignificant nickel-and-diners can escalate their otherwise mundane little adventure to a lights-flashing sirens-sounding symphony.
And then where would you be? Well, if you’re like Jim, you’re bent over the kitchen sink looking out the window with the muzzle of a handgun at your temple and the point of a Bowie knife in the small of your back.

PART TWO

THE END OF THE BEGINNING

“This time the eagle had really pooped”, thought Tom. “This freakin’ freaker’s really freaked” He turned his eyes toward Jerry, pressing his Colt Cobra 38 Special harder against Jim’s misérable freakin’ head. “Look at you. How can you eat at a time like this?” How many of those have you eaten, anyway?”

Jerry paused his chewing for a moment, stared off into the middle distance, and reflected. “Three”, he said. “I think. This could be number four.”

“Jerry with a J” even though, what he calls. his real name is “Gerald with a G”, a long string bean of a guy. Jerry with a J had a dreamy heart, maybe a brain in there somewhere, and a beautiful voice. Tom often said, “That bugger could fit right into heaven’s angel choir.”
Also, the man could eat Snickers, and freakin’ well did, until the cows came home and never gained a pound. Not an ounce. Not a, whatchamacallit, not a gram.
Jerry often sang and ate Snickers, while he checked out The Shopping Channel. Tom showed him how to make 900 calls and, just the other day, watched Jerry order what he said was ‘this neat Bowie knife’, along with a bunch of other ‘really neat’ Collector knives.

This morning, together, the two of them, had robbed a convenience store, waving the Colt 38, and that Bowie knife. They had scored a grand freakin’ total of $47 plus a twelve pack of Snickers, and two packages of cigarettes tucked up the sleeves of their T-shirts.

$47, cigarettes, Snickers, now a crowd of police cars with flashing lights, loudspeakers, a gun, a knife, Jerry and Tom, and a hostage in the kitchen. That about summed it up.

Gentle Reader

Here’s another tip for you. Free of charge, no cost, no obligation, If you ever decide to rob a convenience store, not that I recommend it you understand, but if you do decide to do it, do not, under any circumstances, take Jerry,

PART THREE

THE BEGINNING OF THE END

Jim’s back was starting to seriously hurt. He thought of his wife and the way she corrects his grammar. His wife would tell him to say “starting to hurt seriously” but that way didn’t sound emphatic enough. He’d mention that to her next time. 

Then he heard the loudspeaker and saw the lights. Maybe this was a good thing, he thought, maybe not. If it was a good thing, it would be the first good thing for awhile. If he could just shift a bit to relieve his back without, of course, losing his brains.
“Come out with your hands up”, there was that announcement, sounding just like in the movies that Jim streamed. “We know you’re in there. You have been surrounded. You can’t get away.” There were throbbing red lights, loudspeakers crackling with threats, and yelled conversations. Jim was suitably impressed but his bladder betrayed him a little. More than a little. On his way back from the bathroom, he noticed the footprints on the new carpet. Somehow this will be my fault, Jim thought.
Next thing Jim knew, Mr. Chunky was whispering to Mr. Three-Maybe-Four, then the gun and knife stopped poking his head and back. Jim could slip the wire off his wrists and move back forth and around for relief. He looked out and saw movement on the lawn, just in front of the periwinkles.
Jim blinked. Yes, there they were all right, the two arch-criminals spread out on the lawn, just beyond the patio with the ant hills that appeared every night overnight between the chipped stones and on the clipped lawn.
Jim had dug and scraped and poked and sprayed again, again, and then some more. He tried piling icing sugar around the semi-legal killer ant spray he used. They ate the sugar all right, gobbled it right up, but continued merrily breeding without pause. Maybe the spray was the ants’ Viagra. No mention of ant aphrodisiacs when Jim looked it up on the internet.

Gentle Reader:
Here’s a little unexpected education, on the house. Bear with me.  Ready?
By using non-lead bullets hunters can make sure that ants and other bugs who feast on the blood of wounded things won’t ingest poison. It is also true that non-lead bullets do not typically break apart on impact, so they smash further through flesh and bone and often leave an impressively large exit wound.
Here’s why it matters to our two desperadoes.
Officer Kay, the police sharpshooter, used non-lead bullets when hunting deer, which she was doing that very afternoon, opening day of the season, right when she received the call. She had a choice to make. Either stop off at her house to pick up her police-issued firearm or simply take along her single-action long-barrel hunting revolver that could drop an elephant at 100 yards with its non-lead bullets.  Officer Kay chose urgency.  She headed straight for the crime scene, heavily armed, steely-eyed and flush red angry about losing her favourite day off.

PART FOUR

THE END

“Could it get any freakin’ worse than this?”, Tom said. They’d had a hard time for a long time, the two of them. No money. No house. No garden. No drugs, though. That’s one thing. Not anything serious anyway, thanks for that. Mostly beer. A little marijuana. Hash a couple of times.
This time, though, it was more than one of life’s little fender benders. This time it was them together in the grass with the other bugs.

He looked over at Jerry, lying there in the freakin’ grass. With lights flashing, sirens whooping, and cops threatening something or other on their bullhorns, Jerry, in his galloping stupidity, was, can you freakin’ believe it, eating more Snickers and playing with his new knife. Flipping it up higher and higher in the air to see how many times it would turn over and still stick in the ground when it landed. He was, Jerry said, up to four.

Except, this last time it stuck in his freakin’ thigh. And when he took it out, it made a gash that bled like a son of a gun.
Tom stared and sighed and wiped his eyes and said, “You’re not going anywhere with that, except the hospital.” Already, there was a trail of ants trooping toward the wound. “I’ll look after you somehow. Promise.” He gathered himself and ran. Just ran. Jerry, surrounded by dirt, blood, ants, noise and chaos, that lovely loving man waved, reached for his half-eaten Snickers bar.
“Wonderful beautiful stupid man,” Tom said. “Love of my life,” Tom said. “Love of my eternal freakin’ life.”

Gentle Reader

Just a few final notes.
Kay’s hunting pistol managed to blow away most of Tom’s left arm below the shoulder except for a bit of hanging skin holding it in place. He did not look so much surprised as resigned. He joined Jerry in the Emergency Ward, together again on Earth for a short time.

Tom died, no surprise there, and Jerry was going to sing at his funeral. He had the hymn picked out:

Going up home to live in green pastures    Where we shall live and die never more    Even the Lord will be in that number    When we shall reach that Heavenly Shore

Kay, now Sergeant Kay, received a reprimand and a promotion. She took Jerry’s Bowie knife and Tom’s Colt 38 to be stored in custody, but they both disappeared and the court never was able to locate them.

Jim’s wife Pamela, not Pam, Pamela, hugged him hard when she arrived home. “Boy”, thought Jim, “She is really strong.” Sometimes he forgot just how strong she was. True, she glanced at the dirt on the rug, OK twice, but she didn’t say a word about it. Just hung onto him harder.
Jim’s tomato plants didn’t do any better or worse this year than last year, or the year before last for that matter. Once again, his pumpkins were more vine than pumpkin. The ant hills returned. The peony’s colour turned out to be something called coral.
The convenience store owner became something of a local celebrity, with people in the neighbourhood having their pictures taken with him. For years he was pointed to, as the man, unarmed mind you, who stood up to the wrong end of a gun and a knife.
Yet, believe me, you can search the internet for a very long time, with every combination and keyword you can think of, and find no reference at all to the incident in Jim and Pamela's grass, or to Jerry and Tom. It’s as though they never existed. Enter Tom and Jerry and you will find something totally completely one hundred per cent different.
You could look it up.

Chasing Two -- or More-- Rabbits

To say I have given up any pretence of writing this blog in some logical explicative order would be overstating the situation, my motivation, my hope to be helpful, and a personality earned and celebrated by my ego over many years.   

In that spirit, though, let's get back to "Why Join a Writers Group". Confucious is reported to have declared "The man who chases two rabbits catches neither."  

Here is one strong reason that will apply to everyone: You will learn something, something you value, something critical to your technique or mental health, that you would have been extraordinarily fortunate to have learned any other way.

For example, one experienced WG participant suggested "Writing Down the Bones" by Natalie Goldberg as a useful book for an aspiring writer.  I read an excerpt online, thought it was more or less hippie-dippie hoo-haw but, eventually brought home a copy of the book. Without her recommendation, and especially after having read the online excerpt, the likelihood of my reading it would be zero per cent in one million years.

Let me tell you, I now have no hesitation in shouting that this is one very valuable book for new and renewing (and, I'm guessing, all) writers.  Do I agree with, or even relate to, everything in it?  Nope.  Not by a long shot.  Not yet anyway.

At the same time, certain of Natalie's observations fall on my head from high above like a ton of exclamation points.  

Yes, yes, that's me.  That's how I feel. That's what I have been trying to put into words.  So that's what that means.  Ah yes, I get that.  So I won't worry about that anymore so much, it's normal.  Etc.

The point here is not to read good old Nat's book (read it!) but that your WG colleagues, if you let them, will bring you a little cool water along your hot journey.