Lick Your Butt: Writing Lessons From the Cat

I’m SURE Kate has already posted something correlating cats and writing. I’m not even going to bother check. I adopted my first kitten ever (with her help!) on August fifth and OMGKITTEN. :ahem: Sorry, got a little sidetracked. That is to say, since welcoming this wee thing into my home, I have learned some useful things about writing from him. (Yes, that is an actual picture of him, all dressed up for his Internet debut. Thanks for the tie, Kate!)

1. Fail spectacularly… My kitten, Rachmaninov (but you can call him Noodle), fails on a daily basis. Spectacularly. I was Skyping my husband once and started choking with laughter and almost disconnected the call because Noodle had jumped from the bed straight into the wall. There was no window, nothing he could possibly have been aiming at. He just splatted onto the wall, bounced off, and shot out of the bedroom. It was epic.

That is what how we need to approach our writing. Don’t be afraid to splat on the wall. Try something that seems crazy. Hell, just do something. Don’t worry about what it looks like.

3. …then brush it off. When Noodle fails particularly hard, he always immediately sits down and licks his paws with the most blase indifferent attitude I have ever seen. And then he scampers off, sassily, on his next adventure. So after you splat into the wall (which needs to be code for “write yourself into a corner”) just pick yourself up and do something else. Try again. Don’t linger in your failures–but learn your lesson first (or try to). (Okay, that part is definitely not a Noodle-ism. He splats all the time. But still!) The trick is to not identify ourselves as our failures.

Brene Brown has some great discussions on guilt and shame but what struck me is the difference in their definitions. Guilt says you’re sorry for something you’ve done; shame says you’re sorry for something you are. So: our failures are something we do, not something we are. Do something else. If we keep ourselves trapped in the mindset of failure, we will never get past it. Deep thoughts from a kitten who licks his butt all the time, right?

3. And about the butt licking… Noodle really likes to be clean. Really. He will lick and lick and lick. His paws. His stomach. His butt. Yeah. Once as I watched him meticulously clean between his claws I thought, you know, that is really unsavory, but what’s the alternative, staying dirty? We have to clean ourselves up. Writers tend to know when they’re copping out or taking a short-cut in their work. We all have that one part of the story we hope our CP’s won’t comment on (and do you notice how it never works, by the way? They notice it seems weak because it is weak, duh.) Anyway, all that to say, if we don’t take responsibility for licking our butts, our stories will get really rank. So do everyone a favor and revise the parts you know need work.

4. Snuggle. Okay, I know a lot of cats aren’t the love-on type, but Noodle is a real cuddlebug. In fact, I can guarantee you that every day around 3 o’clock, I will be lying on the bed with the kitten on my face (*not a euphemism*) because that is how he likes to spend every day around 3 o’clock. He will come over and mewl plaintively until I snuggle him, and he will not stop unless we go lie down and have a real cuddlefest. (TMI? Crazy cat lady? You decide.)

The thing is, it’s really easy for cats to be stuck up. A lot are. Just like it’s really easy for writers to be…disdainful. Of other writers. Of reviewers. Of readers. We’re the genius creators who should be worshipped, right? But whereas at least cats have a precedence for that (Kate, you should’ve lived in ancient Egypt), writers don’t. So get off your pedestal, put down the chip on your shoulder, and interact a bit. With everyone. Anyone. Don’t be afraid to give readers what they want. (Not the same as catering or writing to the market, by the way!) But I have encountered orneryness that resist the idea of being likable. (Okay, this may apply more to literary/adult writers than YA but whatever.) Give a little, get a little, that’s all I’m saying. Publishing is, after all, an industry.

5. Be yourself. Noodle is so full of personality. He’s a charmer and a skirt-chaser, a purrmonster and a cuddlebug. He’s my favorite kitten. He spends most of his time sleeping somewhere near me while I work, but can be counted on to go into what my husband dubbed “spasticat” mode a few times a day. Those times are pretty much the same every day too, same as our cuddle session. Noodle knows what works for him.

And so should you. Not an outliner? Don’t outline. Need playlists or a pinterest board completed for a project before you can write? Do that. Your process is your own and don’t let anyone tell you there’s a One True Way to write. Whatever gets you from page one to the end. Unless it’s licking your butt, because then we need to talk.

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