Perfection

The MFA program consisted of workshops and forms classes. One of the most useful things I learned in the forms classes was that no work is perfect. We read award-winning novels with POV problems, characters that suddenly appear late in the game and other issues that, if workshopped, critiquers would have jumped all over. The lesson being that if it works, it works. Story trumps all.

Seeing this in writing I liked was incredibly freeing. It doesn't mean I give myself permission to plot or write sloppily, but it does mean that I can trust my story more.