I dedicate this book to all my haters. I only got this far outta spite.
--Bethany Baptiste, dedication in her YA fantasy The Poisons We Drink
I’m never more talented than when I’m working out of spite.
--Nina Viel, author of Listen to Your Sister, in an article for Writer's Digest
Be self-righteous with your spite. Use it to point yourself in the right direction, toward the person you want to be.
--Sarah Springer in her article On Living Out of Spite on Medium
Spite to me is the feeling of motivation to prove someone wrong. Someone says I'm not good enough to do something, and I'll be like, "Let me show you how wrong you are!" And then I work hard, out of spite, to succeed.
I have a personal credo, "The best revenge is success," and that usually comes out of spite. You doubt me? You don't think I have what it takes? I'll show you!
Since writing is my life, that's the slant I'm going to take for this post, even though the title says "live well." I'm more like, "write well."
I'm lucky that most of my life I've had support from teachers, family, and friends when it comes to my writing. But there are a few people who hate me, or actively discouraged me and shut me down, that I want to take vengeance on through success...wholly out of spite.
The big one comes from a professor at my undergraduate alma mater, Capital University. I had been a playwright for several years, writing three productions that were all mounted. He kindly agreed to look at my most recent one, and his only notes were post-its with spelling and grammar corrections, meaning, very few notes.
I met with him in his office to go over his feedback and I told him I wanted to publish it and how to go about doing it. He gave me this look and said it wasn't good enough. Then he proceeded to rip it apart, telling me I was "taking joy away from actors." I didn't say anything while he talked to me, and when he was done, I just got up out of the chair and left. But it discouraged me enough I didn't try to publish the play. I did, however, rewrite it for more mature audiences and it was produced at OSU-Mansfield after I graduated. It was a hit. So there!
During college, I also came to this same professor wanting to write an original work for Capital. Several students had done this before and I wanted to write a story set in an asylum (this later became my musical Melancholia). He hemmed and hawed, telling me that it would be difficult and I'd have to take an independent study course which would be a pain (the other students didn't have to do this), and once again, I walked away from him. Later this would be a hit show once again at OSU-Mansfield after I graduated.
The last time he really let me down was after I graduated from Capital. I applied to NYU's MFA in Writing for Musical Theater program and needed theater professors for recommendations. I only had the one from OSU and I needed more. This was in 2008, three years after graduating. I asked him for a rec and he said "too much time had passed" and that he didn't remember me, but later when I saw a play at the college as an alumni, he was all like, "Hey, Kristina!" Anyway, without his endorsement, I ended up flying to NYC after being chosen for the Applicant's Weekend and was good enough to be waitlisted (although I asked to be taken off after some thought). I got really far in the process in a competitive program based entirely on my own talent. So there!
I was still intent on going to graduate school for writing, and I thought that it was high time I write fiction and wind down writing for the stage. I was accepted into Seton Hill's Writing Popular Fiction program in 2010, graduated in 2013 with a book in hand, and did this once again through my own talent.
And now I have a book out with an amazing publisher, and incredible agent, and more good news coming (like the audiobook!). So...basically that professor lied when he said my writing wasn't good enough. I wanted to prove him wrong, and although a lot of things fueled my writing, spite was definitely one of them.
I don't think about this teacher very often anymore. Sometimes he pops up in my mind when I'm questioning my abilities and have self-doubt, and then I remember that I succeeded despite him trying to shut me down.
I have other haters--people who didn't want to see me get better after my bipolar diagnosis, for example, or an evil college student who said I was the worst teacher ever even though she skipped class all the time--and for all of them, I'm succeeding, fueled in part by spite.
You can't let spite poison you, though (and I think my relationship with it is relatively benign). If you only credit your success to spite, you can forget that your own talent, hard work, and dedication played a major role in it. You want to be careful that your choices don't hurt yourself or other people.
It turns out that spite can be a force for good. It can help us excel. It can help us create. And it does not necessarily threaten cooperation. In fact, paradoxically, it may spur it. Spite does not inevitably produce injustice. In fact, it may be one of our most powerful tools for preventing it. As long as injustice and inequitable inequality persist, we may need spite.
--Simon McCarthy Jones in an article for Lit Hub
What do you think? Have you ever lived your life "out of spite?" Does spite motivate you to succeed? Let me know in the comments.
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