Okay, so, my previous blog posts have mentioned my general sense of anxiety towards the future. Still don't like talking about it. After doing the readings for last week and sitting in class on Monday, I thought I was starting to figure out what I wanted to do with myself. An MFA in creative writing sounded like exactly what I wanted. Mostly work shopping and honing my craft? It sounded wonderful. I started looking at the list of 385 Creative Writing Grad Degrees and clicked on some schools and I didn't totally freak out. Good, right?
But then I read some of the readings for this week, and, well, I may or may not be hyperventilating as I type this. That whole "Thesis Hatement" article has left me absolutely terrified. Then I read the response to it and, guess what? I'm still terrified. I guess the pieces did their jobs. I went and looked at the article titled "Bad reasons to go to grad school: Consider these red flags in your decision," and most of the reasons didn't apply to me. Except that I don't really know what I want to do with my life.
That's a lie. I know exactly what I want to do with my life. It's just that I've been told over and over again that it's now what I should do with my life. Writing my novels or trying to get into video game writing will be tedious and poorly paid. That's if I even manage to find even some success. I could always marry a promising engineer and have he or she support me while I write, but my pride doesn't like that idea too much.
One article that made me feel a bit better was "Do I Need a Creative Writing Degree?" I'm reasonably confident in my "talent" as a writer. I think I am or could be great. Still, I definitely need structure. I have to be forced into bettering myself and learning to better myself. I mean. before college, I probably never did an actual, substantial revision on any of my writing. Even now, I have a harder time with it than I'd like. So, yes, I think I'd like a creative writing degree.
Despite how terrifying all of it is, when I look through these MFA programs, when I look at their course offerings, it all seems so amazing. Yes. This is what I want from an education, desperately. The fact that I'm not in any workshop classes this semester is making me seriously twitchy. Spending an entire two years doing just that? I'm getting tingly just thinking about it. But the problem is whether or not it's practical.
I still have a lot of thinking to do.
But then I read some of the readings for this week, and, well, I may or may not be hyperventilating as I type this. That whole "Thesis Hatement" article has left me absolutely terrified. Then I read the response to it and, guess what? I'm still terrified. I guess the pieces did their jobs. I went and looked at the article titled "Bad reasons to go to grad school: Consider these red flags in your decision," and most of the reasons didn't apply to me. Except that I don't really know what I want to do with my life.
That's a lie. I know exactly what I want to do with my life. It's just that I've been told over and over again that it's now what I should do with my life. Writing my novels or trying to get into video game writing will be tedious and poorly paid. That's if I even manage to find even some success. I could always marry a promising engineer and have he or she support me while I write, but my pride doesn't like that idea too much.
One article that made me feel a bit better was "Do I Need a Creative Writing Degree?" I'm reasonably confident in my "talent" as a writer. I think I am or could be great. Still, I definitely need structure. I have to be forced into bettering myself and learning to better myself. I mean. before college, I probably never did an actual, substantial revision on any of my writing. Even now, I have a harder time with it than I'd like. So, yes, I think I'd like a creative writing degree.
Despite how terrifying all of it is, when I look through these MFA programs, when I look at their course offerings, it all seems so amazing. Yes. This is what I want from an education, desperately. The fact that I'm not in any workshop classes this semester is making me seriously twitchy. Spending an entire two years doing just that? I'm getting tingly just thinking about it. But the problem is whether or not it's practical.
I still have a lot of thinking to do.