Write Like an Idiot

Unhinged thoughts on "best of" lists and a cure for writers' block

It’s that time of year again, the worst time, the one with all the lists.

In my 9-part series on rejection, I revealed that my book endured the ultimate humiliation. I wrote and published my literal soul, and it made 0 of the thousands of “best books of 2022” lists. My feminist book failed to appeal to the masses who hate women who write about how people hate women. How? Why? WHAT?

That’s how I chose to interpret those lists. I forgot every single thing I knew to be true, everything I’d learned in therapy and in yoga and from working in publishing and from reading Pema Chödrön and from watching The Human Centipede.

Now I’m about to talk about art and The Human Centipede at the same time.

In the first The Human Centipede, a man (of course) joins three people surgically, mouth to anus, to form a “100% medically accurate” human centipede. In the sequel, another man joins twelve people, mouth-hole to butthole, to form a “100% medically inaccurate” human centipede. In The Human Centipede III, two men join 500 men, lips to tush, to form a human millipede.

Three to twelve to 500 — it’s artless. And it’s art.

It’s not high holy art but the dictionary definition of art: “the expression or application of human creative skill and imagination” that provokes a reaction and reaches and rearranges us without touching us.

And The Human ‘Pede film franchise is artless because it’s about 512 butts sewn onto 512 faces.*

It’s the actual worst, and it’s my favorite.

Best, worst, beautiful, disgusting: these will always be subjective, political, and irrelevant. These adjectives are meaningless — until we give them meaning or buy into the meaning that strangers give them.

Before The Human Centipede, I didn’t want to write a book if it wasn’t the best.

“Best” promised everything but delivered nothing.

It’s true that best is the enemy of good, and perfect is the enemy of done/progress/action/sanity/rizz. Perfectionism is the greatest, longest con. Pursuing it made me feel powerless.

Feminist interlude

Women especially spend/waste our time obsessing over being the best and saying the perfect thing perfectly. A lot of us cope by saying not one thing.

A lot of us don’t want to risk, and writers must risk, and risk looking like an idiot, to start or finish anything

If perfectionism silences, then imperfectionism liberates. I’m pretty sure.

Tongue-to-taint x 515 — isn’t that, disturbingly, something? That it’s possible to execute a dream, literally any dream, even the stupidest?

As that man Samuel Beckett said, “Fail better.” To me, this means to let yourself suck and look like a sicko, a fool, an imposter, a hack, a shrew, a nerd, a loser, a disappointment, a ding-dong, a failure. (See: “lowest expectations.”)

At the end of Târ, Lydia Tár commits herself to art-garbage. She makes garbage art. If she didn’t, then she could not survive. Her conducting literally anything was a spiritual, sexual, survival practice. She’s a bad man, and I love her.

In my award-snubbed essay “When Your OCD Therapy Is Also a Treatment for Writers’ Block” I wrote about techniques to get out of your own way, e.g. set time limits; make quick decisions; delete without looking back; and write like an idiot. That is, lean into discomfort and let yourself suck. In the middle of writing, whenever you doubt yourself, agree with your doubt. For example, say to yourself:

• “Maybe this sucks.”

• “Maybe I’m embarrassing myself.”

• “Maybe semicolons make me an asshole.”

• “Maybe no one will care.”

• “Maybe no one will understand this/me.”

• “Maybe everyone will criticize this/me. Or worse, maybe ignore this/me.”

Once you agree, you can move on.

Say, “Maybe this sentence is bad,” and then move onto the next.

Say, “Maybe this book is bad,” and then move onto the next.

Once you agree to suck and to lean into uncertainty and to agree vs. argue with your inner or outer critic, you can:

• think without spiraling

• not get stuck trying to prove otherwise, which you won’t/can’t

• do what you’re doing

Also: Writing like an idiot is how you make it to the next level. We must be terrible to become good. There is no other pipeline.

In conclusion: What is Best? What is Idiot? No one knows, not even you. So, do your ““worst.”” Write your The Human Centipede.

*Correction: An earlier version of this piece mistakenly counted 515 butts to 515 faces, but a reader pointed out, “In a three-person centipede, it’s two butts sewn to two faces. So I’m counting 512 butts to 512 faces, unless you sew them up ouroboros-style.” I regret this error and have corrected it.

What were the best books of 2022? JK.

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NEW SEMINAR: How to Write a Tragicomic Memoir

• February 4th (Sunday)

• 3-6pm EST

• Online, via Lighthouse Writers Workshop

Learn to make readers laugh while RIPPING OUT THEIR HEARTS in a sad, funny book about you, your exes/parents, and your society. There will be a life-changing lecture, foolproof writing prompts, infinity handouts, an AMA, and more, a lot more.

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ICYMI: I’m Elissa Bassist, and I teach short conceptual humor/satire writing, funny personal essays, tragicomic memoir, emotional emails, and that’s it. I edit the “Funny Women” column on The Rumpus, and I wrote the award-deserving book Hysterical.

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