When are you done and HOW can you know it?

This is a common question that writers ask themselves, and guess what? It’s the easiest to answer:

YOU JUST DO.

Most people believe that when you’re writing a story or a book, or whatever it is, you’ll get to the last sentence of it knowing that it’s all about to end. They believe you’ll write this sentence with a sense of happiness and closure, glad to be finally done… But let me tell ya, most of the time (as to not say ALL THE TIME) this is not the way it works. Even after editing your piece one thousand times, to the point where you can almost recite it, there will always be more that you can do. However, like Anne Lamott would say, “You have to remind yourself that perfectionism is the voice of the oppressor.”

There’s always going to be that one character that you feel you could describe more, or make more interesting, or that one scene that you don’t know if it fits with the rest of the story. And how about you just make a few tweaks to whip it all back into shape... Every time you read your piece, you will find something that you could change because, as the author and creator of it, you’ll always see it as a work in progress. As your baby. And you might never feel 100% confident to put your pencil down and say “It is ready” but along the way, after having many others edit your piece, after taking these critiques and making something meaningful out of them, after personally going through it many, many times, you will get to a point in which something inside you will finally realize that you have done the best you can do for now and that its time to let go and move on to the next thing. And you’ll have to embrace this and learn, like a parent who’s leaving its child to nursery school the first day, that indeed, it is time.