Laura's Tales #4 - The Hate Letter

Love letters are cool, but have you ever tried writing a hate letter...to yourself?

Photo by Kate Macate on Unsplash

A couple of weeks ago, I wrote a hate letter to myself, and it saved me.

Yes, you read that right. A hate letter. Not love, not gratitude. Just hate.

A few months ago, I decided I was going to write a book. I had an idea of what I wanted it to be, but I didn’t have the chapter-by-chapter breakdown.

I decided to go at it “Pantser” style. I’m not really much of a Plotter, so Pantser felt more natural. If this is the first time you’re hearing these terms, a Pantser is a writer who writes without an outline. The Plotter is, obviously, the opposite.

A few stories came, and I wrote each and every one down. And then…there was silence. 

The silence let through a different voice. The panic, the anxiety, the doubt.

I can’t write this book. This is stupid, why did I ever announce it? I’ll look like an idiot who can’t even finish what she starts.

Why did I ever think I could write a memoir? Me…the most boring human on the planet, with a boring, plain existence. It doesn’t belong in books. Nothing I did in this life belongs in books.

For days, I tried to do what every therapist and coach under the sun would tell you. Focus on good things, be grateful, journal, and think about nice things. Write a list of why you’re writing the book, and the reasons that made you start, so you could get back on track.

I also tried to go by the advice that, if I’m not mistaken, can be found in Playing Big, by Tara Mohr, which says to write a letter to your inner critic, thanking it for its worry, and then moving on to more positive thoughts.

I tried a bit of all of that.

But it all felt…pathetic, meaningless, and weird. Just as meaningless as my intention to write a book.

One evening, I decided to just journal for a bit. Write whatever thoughts come to mind without judgment. I thought I’d write about my day, the heat, the traffic, the usual crap that can come up in a random journaling session.

Instead…

I wrote a hate letter to myself.

All the thoughts that had been going through my mind about how I shouldn’t be writing a book? On paper.

All the thoughts about how meaningless it all is in the current geo-economical context? On paper.

Words like stupid, pathetic, poor writer, and much more? On paper.

All the reasons why all the above thoughts are stupid and pathetic? On paper.

The more I wrote hateful words about myself, the freer I felt. The more meaning everything got. And the less absurd it all became.

With hatred, I told myself why I shouldn’t be doing the thing I wanted to do. And with even more hatred, I told myself why not doing it and feeling anxious about the results was incredibly stupid.

With hatred, I told myself how stupid I was. And with even more hatred, I told myself that was all very ridiculous and I was wasting time that I could be using for better things, and hey, that might actually prove that I’m lazy and stupid, but does it really matter?!

Once I had finally shown myself more hatred than anyone in the world has ever shown me and will probably ever show me, I was free.

I turned around, opened a blank Google Doc, and began writing. In about a week, I wrote 11,000 words on my book, a few Substack essays, and some LinkedIn posts, one of which so happened to be my first-ever viral post.

That one extremely hateful letter to myself was the key to unlocking more creativity than I ever had.

But…why?

One theory that popped into my mind was my upbringing. Growing up in post-communist Romania in the 90s and early 2000s, many parents and teachers had this idea that calling a child stupid and showcasing their mistakes was a great motivator.

I was no different, and this was part of my education early on. Feeling like you can’t study something? Well, of course, you can’t, you’re stupid.

And so I learned to use that word as a motivator. The default belief was that I was, indeed, stupid, and it was up to me to prove the contrary.

Had I simply applied that treatment to myself and it had worked just like it had worked so many times when I was a kid?

Or was there another explanation? Namely that, by putting all that on paper, I had finally let all that negativity go. It was finally not bubbled up within me, but on paper, out into the world.

Whatever the reason was…it worked. And in all fairness, that’s all that matters.

What is the lesson behind this tale? Other than the fact that Laura’s brain can sometimes be motivated by negativity?

Perhaps it’s that sometimes the thing that works for everyone, won’t work for you.

Or that sometimes, you have to do what feels right for you, even if it seems counterintuitive. You never know when that counterintuitive thing might become the most freeing thing you’ve ever offered yourself.