Every baby is beautiful...

Nobody likes to be told their baby is ugly. The reality is that we all want to believe that our baby is beautiful. We wear blinkers and only see the inner beauty in our baby, none of the faults or problems are visible.

I’m not talking about the skin and bones, crying kind of baby. I’m talking about our life’s dream, our personal creation – be it novel, painting, creative work, clothing design; whatever it may be it's that thing that we’ve sweated over and spend endless hours on, something that we’ve put our heart and our soul into.

In other words it’s our ‘baby’, or our creation. I once heard this comparison in reference to a Manager and the ‘wonderful idea’ that he had. He thought it was fantastic idea and none of us knew how to politely tell him that in reality his idea stunk and thus the question was born ‘how do you tell someone their baby is ugly?’

Why am I talking about ugly babies? There’s a reason for it of course. 

See, my baby, my firstborn creation is about 81,000 words long and is currently residing in my bedside drawer (and backed up on my computer and portable hard drive) It’s my first novel, which has been in my head for roughly 25 of my 40 years. My mother and my sister-in-law who both love me have both read some of it and as an extension of that love would probably never tell me my baby was ugly.

Well doh you say, that’s why you write a novel don’t you, for people to read? Mmmm maybe. Half the reason I wrote it was to prove to myself that I could actually do it. So many times, over so many years I’ve started writing a book and then got sidetracked or talked myself out of it.

See I want everyone to love my baby as much as I do, but the reality is my baby might not be as great as I think it is, it may actually be really ugly. 

We all experience moments when we doubt whether we’re seeing our baby as it truly is, and we want to protect it from people who might be cruel and say they don’t really think our baby is all that beautiful. The thing is, ugly ducklings can grow into beautiful birds and ugly babies can be nurtured and groomed into beautiful works of art.

So I plan on pulling my baby out of the bedside drawer and sprucing her up for two reasons – 1) to give to a friend to read and 2) to enter into a writing competition that I’ve discovered. I’ll never, never know, if I don’t at least try. 

So are you hiding your talent for fear someone might say your ‘baby’ is ugly? Be brave, be bold, and bring that baby out on show. After all, nobody ever died from being told their baby was ugly did they?

Cheers, Fi