Hope Writes

I’ve seen it time and again: Writers who have absolutely zero confidence in their writing. In fact, I’ve experienced this more times personally than I care to admit, or remember.

Lack of self-confidence seems to be a common tie linking many writers. The daily drill of writing and perfecting your own writing, then submitting and/or selling your writing is challenging. It pushes your every limit, until sometimes it you reach a point where you say, “What’s the point?”

 

Confidence Can Be Learned

I was an abused child. I taught myself how to be defensive and mentally tough in order to protect myself from the physical and mental torture I had to endure. Nobody ever taught me how to love myself or be proud of my skills and talents though.

As an adult, through reading and educating myself, I began to learn how to nurture my inner self and develop specific talents that I’d never considered as such.

Believe it or not, you can foster confidence in yourself. You can give to yourself what no one else can give you–self-confidence. This especially applies to writing.

 

Stop Being So Harsh On Yourself

As a writer, you are naturally more critical of your own work. You spit shine every sentence and paragraph until you think you’ve plucked all the flaws. And yet you’re still not happy with the end result. Sound familiar?

Even though you need your editorial hawk-eyes, you have to be willing to cut yourself some slack. Nobody’s perfect. (Ask me, I should know!) Do you nit-pick your writing to its death? This should never happen. Be as kind to yourself as you would anyone else.

 

Never Stop Learning

One of the easiest ways to build your confidence is to further your education. I’m not talking about going back to college, necessarily, unless that’s what you want to do. But as a writer, you should never stop learning.

You can learn in many ways:

• Magazines
• Newspapers
• Library
• Internet
• Books
• Interviews

You should feel a constant thirst for more: more knowledge, more understanding, more practical usage of what you already know and what you’re learning.

 

Stop Second-Guessing Yourself

Just as you shouldn’t be so tough on yourself, you also shouldn’t second-guess yourself. If you do this a lot, you’re not alone…I do it all the time. (I’m preaching to the choir here.)

I can’t tell you how many times I’ve completed a project for a client, emailed it to them, then sat at my desk a nervous wreck, waiting for a response back. Even more, expecting a negative response.

My husband refuses to even entertain my whining anymore when I get like this. “You did fine, and you know you did,” he’ll say, as he rolls his eyes and shakes his head at me. “You always do this. You always second-guess yourself, but you’ve never gone wrong yet.”

I know this to be true, but yet my lack of confidence in my own writing at times causes me to second-guess the greatness of my work. Second guesses only lead to frustration and anxiety. Stop doing it. (That goes for me, too!)

 

Start Small, Work Your Way Up

To build your confidence as a writer, begin with what you know best. You can sit and fret over what to write all day long. Or, you can get up this very second and start a new draft. The easiest way to begin is with what you already know.

Try answering some of these questions to find a starting point:

• What do you enjoy doing in your free time?
• What do you talk about with friends, colleagues, or family?
• What kind of magazines do you buy or browse on the racks?
• What kind of books do you enjoy reading?
• What are your top 5 favorite websites?

I can tell you from personal experience that trying to build a writing career around niches you don’t know much about is not only tiring but it’s extremely unrewarding. It’s totally doable, but you get very little, if any, feeling of reward from your work.

Make a list of 10 topics you can pluck from the questions above. Then add three more to your list. Chances are, those last three will be the topics you enjoy the most. Use those as your starting point.

If you’re nervous about sending queries or looking for paying work, start by writing a few articles to include on your website as samples. Just by taking this small step, you’ll begin building your confidence because you’ll show yourself that you can write, and write well.

Keep practicing every day. Confidence isn’t created overnight. You have to work long and hard at it on a daily basis.

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This entry was posted on Tuesday, December 4th, 2007 at 5:12 am and is filed under Writing tips. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.