Forgetting an (extremely) Old Shame

We all know our Old Shame fanfiction (or whatever it was you wrote when you were a teenager [or younger teen, in my case] and cringe about now). My particular case of Old Shame keeps coming back to haunt me with random lines, paragraphs, or scenes that I especially hated. Lack of characterization, Plot What Plot, and Woobie Wangst abound. Essentially, I need Brain Bleach, and badly.

Sadly, I can't burn the thing because I no longer have access to it. Which might not be such a bad thing, if it weren't so absolutely horrid. How do you propose I "delete" it from my brain cells? I've forgiven myself, as it were, for writing it, so why in the name of good writing can't I forget it? I'm not frustrated, simply very, very annoyed that it has turned into {{Why Won't You Die}} - for a fanfiction.

How have you forgotten (or at least forgiven) your Old Shame? Any Brain Bleaching solutions you have? Please?

This might also help other writers, too, itching to forget their Eldritch Abomination.

Turn it into something good. Example, The story in my signature link started out as your generic Mary Sue character for an online RPG.

"Growing up and getting over it" works pretty well.

In my case, I contented myself with making sure none of my old fanfiction was available on the internet, though I keep a personal archive around because I don't delete anything I create. Sometimes my old shit, for as bad as it is, has an idea or concept that is actually novel and I don't mind recycling those.

Write more. Cleanse your mental palate with new stuff, and eventually you'll forget the old. If the scenes/lines/paragraphs still won't leave alone, consider why they won't— if they're that persistent, there might be something compelling in them that's worth keeping.

Or just learn to laugh about it. Don't take it so seriously. You're a better writer now, and that's what matters.

Show us. How bad could it be?

edited 22nd Feb '11 5:51:40 PM by carbon-mantis

THAT, my nightmareish teletubby friend, is NOT going to help the healing process!

I will say that keeping your old work is a good idea, as there is nearly allways something intresting in your old crap.

...matter of fact, some of my old drawings are better than what I make now...

I started writing a fantasy novel when I was 14. It sucked really bad. That was evident to me even back then, so I never finished it. Still I'd love to read it again, you know, since it's a part of my history. Unfortunately it's lost forever.

Actually I plan on incorporating some good parts of it into something else in the future. That's what you could do. If there's a good idea at the core or the basis for some interesting characters, you can still work with that. Mabe it won't haunt you anymore if you just go with it for a while?

The first thing I ever came up with was essentially a Mega Crossover with a Jerk/God Mode Sue as the protagonist before I even knew what fanfiction and Mary Sues were. When I was about eight years old, essentially. The protagonist was horribly cruel to people who did so much as look at her the wrong way, yet was idealized and everything by everyone who watched her fight off Eldritch Abominations, annoying kids, and the government with her hacked Charizard.

None of it ever got down on paper, thankfully.

However, oddly enough, I did not feel like vomiting after I wrote that, maybe because that was half of my life ago. (I'm going to be sixteen in April.) I do remember not writing anything for a couple years until I found this place. But, as horrible and shameful as it was, it gave one element that has stuck in my mind ever since- superpowered immortals.

I think maybe if you want to wash your hands of it, maybe try out some new shows or comics or books or something that's different from whatever your Old Shame was about. Other than the stuff that people suggested before, that's pretty much all I can come up with now.

edited 23rd Feb '11 6:50:15 AM by CrystalGlacia

The root of what I'm writing now has its most primitive origins in some rather, questionable fanfiction concepts I had a long, long time ago which I knew would ultimately not have worked in the situation I was in.

Actually, I consider the period in which I wrote just about any fanfiction the equivalent to Old Shame. It's not quite that, as my writing was decent and my ideas were cool, but the very idea of writing it just kind of... bores me, at this point. I mean, there's some fanfiction that I really like, but it really has to be something original in spirit, which is tough to pull off.

It's unavoidable. When you start out writing, you will suck at it. When you started walking and talking, you weren't very good at those, either, but you practiced and you got better.

One day I got together all my stories, put them in a box, and set them on fire. Years later I did the same thing again. I saw them as funerals of a sort, and it helped to think of those early works as dead and gone.

You will get past your Old Shames when you learn to laugh at them and at yourself. You will never forget them, they are like children, so it does no good to try.

I had a similar problem to the OP. Though my hatred of the fics in question is because it was the result of me trying to be as 'dark' and 'edgy' as possible.

It shocks me that I could be so warped.

But the posters above me speak wise words. You've gotten older and grown out of that stage. Most writers have an Old Shame or two. It's all part of the process. Also, most people have a tendency to be their own worst critics.