protecting your work from the hawk

I got a beautiful bird feeder for my birthday, back in December. It's state of the art--squirrel proof (really!), perches that are supposed to encourage both small and big songbirds, and full of premium black sunflower seed. My father carefully hung it up at the edge of the yard, in a sheltered spot, so I could see the birds while I worked.

There haven't been many customers. A chickadee here, a finch there. But there has been this big, bold cardinal who's stopped by a number of times. I like watching him. The seed is barely gone, but at least those few birds have been happy.

But then Diana came back.

Diana, who I named after the famed huntress. Diana, the juvenvile hawk who first appeared after wild windstorms right after Christmas. She ate three of our squirrels and was never seen again.

Until today. High winds. And now, Diana.

Diana plucked my cardinal friend from the feeder. Then she sat the fence and had a long and thorough feast. I couldn't look and I couldn't look away. My sole flashy birdfeeder friend had met his end. And why? Because I invited him there.

I killed my dinner guest.

So how does this relate to writing? It makes me think of what we writers do to our ideas. We try to get our lives and our minds open to ideas: we buy the feeder, we hang it, we fill it with the best seed. And then we are overjoyed when even the most drab chickadee shows up. It's something! And sooner or later, we hope flocks of songbirds visit.

But what if just one cardinal shows up? One brilliant idea, something you know you can develop into a special story. What happens when you, yourself, devour that idea?

What happens when you unloose your own personal Diana--your own inner critic?

How do you protect your ideas from your inner critic? You need a critical eye to make your work shine--at least eventually. But how do you let that cardinal flit around the yard before unleashing the hawk?

Better yet--is there some way to outfit your cardinal with some kind of anti-hawk missile? A way to make sure that critic doesn't destroy him?

These questions are on my mind because I recently let me own hawk eat a good idea. I worked it to death without writing a chapter. And now I'm so sick of it, and it's such a mess, that I had to set it aside. Happily another idea arrived. But I'm afraid I'll do the same thing all over again.

Maybe I just need to find a way to cage up my hawk...