Crying from your own work

[Five_Inch_Heels]

I started a 750 with a reference to a quiet morning, the only sound being distant sirens.

740 some words later ' ... the parade of red and white flashing lights began streaming in the driveway ... '

Just the thought of that story ....

 

[Duil2]

Oddly enough, the traumatic part isn't necessarily even the part I meant. I'm willing to share that part with any of my friends. When you said "a piece of you must be in it", I was thinking of the erotic fantasy parts. Everything I write gives people insight into my sexual psyche and some of it is stuff I fear people knowing and judging.

Ah right - okay, yes I get that. I have two older sisters and to be honest I would never dream of sharing what I write on Literotica with them or even a very close female friend I've had since childhood. That part is quite exposing. I think my comment about whether you want it to be part of your life with your friends or not, still applies. For me, it was a decision that I would be more comfortable having it separate from those relationships as I was fairly sure, in my case, that it would become something about me that just set me apart... again. I'm different enough within my family as it is, without adding anything more.

 

[TheExperimentalist]

Ah right - okay, yes I get that. I have two older sisters and to be honest I would never dream of sharing what I write on Literotica with them or even a very close female friend I've had since childhood. That part is quite exposing. I think my comment about whether you want it to be part of your life with your friends or not, still applies. For me, it was a decision that I would be more comfortable having it separate from those relationships as I was fairly sure, in my case, that it would become something about me that just set me apart... again. I'm different enough within my family as it is, without adding anything more.

I can relate to much of this. I've always felt like the outsider, wondering how 'normal people' operate.

 

[KittyOfSteele]

All the time, from the very first novel until today. I don't run from it when it happens. No, I make it worst.

 

[BeechLeaf]

I can relate to much of this. I've always felt like the outsider, wondering how 'normal people' operate.

For a while I've been wanting to do a survey, or just ask... Are there any... normal people in this forum? Not many, for sure. I can think of one who might be. The rest of us are... well...

 

[Duil2]

For a while I've been wanting to do a survey, or just ask... Are there any... normal people in this forum? Not many, for sure. I can think of one who might be. The rest of us are... well...

I'm so curious now to know which one you think is 'normal'.

At the end of the day it's just another label that can make you feel 'other' or 'outside'.

I've always been an advocate for people remembering that at the end of the day the one thing we all share, regardless of anything else, is our humanity and we should celebrate both the sameness of us all within the human condition, along with the differences that make us unique.

 

[BeechLeaf]

Yeah yeah, the hippy clappy thing that we're all different. But those of us who actually are different, and feel we're not normal, surely that's against a background feeling that most people are normal in some way that we're not. That's why we feel it. And (possibly, presumably) they don't.

To get back to the original thread, a normal person would read a story and might find it sad, but... actually cry? Wouldn't they look at you funny instead? Just cry at a story? (Guessing, I don't really know how normal people would react.)

And it just seems everyone in this forum, once they start explaining their failures and inabilities and all that, well they all seem to fall in the basket of people who can't quite do it the way normal people can. And I really can't tell how delusional that is.

 

[Five_Inch_Heels]

For a while I've been wanting to do a survey, or just ask... Are there any... normal people in this forum? Not many, for sure. I can think of one who might be. The rest of us are... well...

https://forum.literotica.com/threads/has-lit-corrupted-your-brain.1649565/

 

[7Locks]

I'm sitting here bawling my eyes out and needing a break after writing the most intensely emotional scene I've ever penned. In it, a character is confronting extreme trauma and abuse from their past. I was REALLY in the writing headspace, that perfect flow where the characters are almost writing you, rather than vice-versa. The zone every writer wishes they could summon at will.

Then, without even consciously planning it, a line popped out that stopped me dead. The classic line of pretty much every abuse victim: "It was my fault."

Now I'm sitting here thinking back on my own life, the abuses I myself suffered, and realizing just how much of my own self-blame remains unresolved. And I'm wondering how I got here from writing stupid porn stories that no one will really care about. Except that sometimes, those porn stories go deep, and sometimes, that depth confronts real feelings, at least for me.

The damndest part is I'm only halfway through the story, and I know there are at least two or three even more gut-wrenching scenes that still need to be written.

Has this ever happened to any of you?

I regularly sob as I type. I only hope that comes through for the reader.

 

[TheExperimentalist]

Yeah yeah, the hippy clappy thing that we're all different. But those of us who actually are different, and feel we're not normal, surely that's against a background feeling that most people are normal in some way that we're not. That's why we feel it. And (possibly, presumably) they don't.

To get back to the original thread, a normal person would read a story and might find it sad, but... actually cry? Wouldn't they look at you funny instead? Just cry at a story? (Guessing, I don't really know how normal people would react.)

And it just seems everyone in this forum, once they start explaining their failures and inabilities and all that, well they all seem to fall in the basket of people who can't quite do it the way normal people can. And I really can't tell how delusional that is.

"Normal is what everyone else is and you are not." I've always loved this line from Star Trek. Everyone has some aspects of themselves that aren't in line with everyone else, so perhaps everyone feels not normal in some respects? I don't know. I don't have any other set of experience to compare to.

 

[consistentlyrepudiated]

To get back to the original thread, a normal person would read a story and might find it sad, but... actually cry? Wouldn't they look at you funny instead? Just cry at a story? (Guessing, I don't really know how normal people would react.)

Only psychopaths and sociopaths don't shed tears; they lack the empathy needed. Luckily, they are less than 5% of the population. Though psychopaths are quite useful in any society: surgeons, generals, leaders can operate very well under stress and take hard decisions without being hindered by emotions. Sadly, some of them write too.

 

[Duil2]

Yeah yeah, the hippy clappy thing that we're all different. But those of us who actually are different, and feel we're not normal, surely that's against a background feeling that most people are normal in some way that we're not. That's why we feel it. And (possibly, presumably) they don't.

To get back to the original thread, a normal person would read a story and might find it sad, but... actually cry? Wouldn't they look at you funny instead? Just cry at a story? (Guessing, I don't really know how normal people would react.)

And it just seems everyone in this forum, once they start explaining their failures and inabilities and all that, well they all seem to fall in the basket of people who can't quite do it the way normal people can. And I really can't tell how delusional that is.

I'm not sure if this was in response to my response to your question/survey and I'm trying my best not to feel a bit slapped down by your opening sentence, if it is directed to my response. Like come on, man, I might have been born in 1972 but I don't think that makes me a hippy.

You make a valid point. I do have people in my family that would be considered 'normal' and now that I think about it, I've never heard them say that reading a book or watching a movie had actually moved them enough for them to cry. They might say it was touching or evocative but as you ask actually cry? No.

Once again my penchant for crying at the drop of a hat or any sentimental scene in a movie etc etc was seen as an odd trait by my family.

 

[BeechLeaf]

No, Duil2, sincerely, it wasn't for you, it was just a general observation of how we in these forums react to things. My apologies if it looked like a response to you.

 

[Duil2]

No, Duil2, sincerely, it wasn't for you, it was just a general observation of how we in these forums react to things. My apologies if it looked like a response to you.

Ah that's grand. Thanks for coming back to me. My skin is a bit thin today so all's good - and there again a likely 'not normal' reaction.
Note to self - the world does not revolve around you, Duil2

 

[TheExperimentalist]

No, Duil2, sincerely, it wasn't for you, it was just a general observation of how we in these forums react to things. My apologies if it looked like a response to you.

Ah that's grand. Thanks for coming back to me. My skin is a bit thin today so all's good - and there again a likely 'not normal' reaction.
Note to self - the world does not revolve around you, Duil2

This is one of the few times I've seen an exchange like that NOT blow up into a huge flame war. Bring it in, everyone! Group hug!

 

[Duil2]

This is one of the few times I've seen an exchange like that NOT blow up into a huge flame war. Bring it in, everyone! Group hug!

- see hippy free loving for all... within reason. I am a lover not a fighter if I can possibly manage it.

 

[Duil2]

And now I want to cry - but happy tears.

 

[MrPixel]

I might have been born in 1972 but I don't think that makes me a hippy.

It doesn't. Maybe a child of hippies (a la Dharma and Greg). Peak hippie was the summer of love, 1969. Only true Boomers (1946-1951) qualify as hippies. My wife (1947) is/was one. I (1954) missed it ==> <== by that much.

 

[Duil2]

It doesn't. Maybe a child of hippies (a la Dharma and Greg). Peak hippie was the summer of love, 1969. Only true Boomers (1946-1951) qualify as hippies. My wife (1947) is/was one. I (1954) missed it ==> <== by that much.

I see - not a child of hippies either as my parents were born in the 1930's.

 

[RetroFan]

I've got one where the main middle aged male character is platonic best friends with a much younger woman aged in her mid-20s. But in a twist in the middle part of the story, she is revealed to be his late fiancee who died suddenly from a brain aneurism a few weeks before their wedding years earlier and is dead all along. Whether she is a ghost or a figment of his subconscious I leave for the reader to decide for themselves, but I do leave some small subtle clues about what is to happen, for example her clothes are a bit outdated, no other character sees or speaks to her and she sort of flashes in and out of the story before the reveal. But every time I re-read the story I always feel choked up, even though it was published in 2018.

Talking of ghosts, believe it or not I've actually managed to scare myself with one of my own stories which brushed with the supernatural. In the story a real estate agent is trying to sell a house rumored to be haunted, and all sorts of eerie things happen when she is showing it to potential buyers. I really got into writing some of these haunting scenes one evening and stayed up well into the night typing out paragraph after paragraph. But when it was time to turn out the lights and go to bed, I felt well and truly spooked. Has anyone else ever scared themselves with their own writing?

 

[MrPixel]

Has anyone else ever scared themselves with their own writing?

Yes. Twice in the same story. FMC was at risk of being discovered as a snitch in a cult situation and had to be rescued by the MMC, with a cliff-hanger escape by private jet. Then there's a chase scene where the fugitive antagonists had a super-modified car and were chasing down the FMC and her lover. Still makes me flinch.

 

[TheWritingGroup]

I don't really weep, but I have shed tears. The strongest example (if I may use that adjective) was a happy scene, a character realizing her long terrible journey through metaphoric hell was finally ending.

 

[anthrodisiac]

If it doesn't move you, who will it move?

Only psychopaths and sociopaths don't shed tears; they lack the empathy needed. Luckily, they are less than 5% of the population. Though psychopaths are quite useful in any society: surgeons, generals, leaders can operate very well under stress and take hard decisions without being hindered by emotions. Sadly, some of them write too.

Oh boy, this is one of those fun conversations where everyone's pretty much in the same boat, and I'm sitting in a tiny dinghy built for a weirdo of one

Feels pretty similar to when I asked if people empathize with their characters, and everyone basically said, "Yes, and it's impossible for someone who doesn't or can't to do anything but write absolute shit and the most dull and uninteresting characters." In case you hadn't figured it out by now, I'm almost completely incapable of empathy. As for whether I'm even remotely capable of writing anything approaching an "interesting character" or not "absolute shit" I suppose is up to other people.

So no, I've never cried at any of my stories. Slightly emotional? Sure. Moderately emotional? Once or twice. Am I emotionally invested in my stories? Absolutely. Do they make me feel things? Really only laughing at my own jokes that nobody else think are funny, pride in doing well, horror at doing poorly, and annoyed as fuck when I spot typos.

Now, I think I need a second oar, because I'm paddling in circles over here! Who thought a dinghy with one oar was a good idea? Seriously...

 

[Cagivagurl]

I'm sitting here bawling my eyes out and needing a break after writing the most intensely emotional scene I've ever penned. In it, a character is confronting extreme trauma and abuse from their past. I was REALLY in the writing headspace, that perfect flow where the characters are almost writing you, rather than vice-versa. The zone every writer wishes they could summon at will.

Then, without even consciously planning it, a line popped out that stopped me dead. The classic line of pretty much every abuse victim: "It was my fault."

Now I'm sitting here thinking back on my own life, the abuses I myself suffered, and realizing just how much of my own self-blame remains unresolved. And I'm wondering how I got here from writing stupid porn stories that no one will really care about. Except that sometimes, those porn stories go deep, and sometimes, that depth confronts real feelings, at least for me.

The damndest part is I'm only halfway through the story, and I know there are at least two or three even more gut-wrenching scenes that still need to be written.

Has this ever happened to any of you?

It's not until I start the edit process that the tears arrive....
THat's the time the horror sets in and I say to myself...

"Are you really that stupid?"....

The panic sets in and I sigh in defeat... The answer staring back up at me... "Yes."

 

[NotWise]

Oh boy, this is one of those fun conversations where everyone's pretty much in the same boat, and I'm sitting in a tiny dinghy built for a weirdo of one

Moving the reader isn't always a goal, and it doesn't have to be a goal in good writing.