Self-doubt

Nice! I particularly like the 'pimple rule'. :D

Self-doubt; it tends to hit me at two points - right in the middle of a novel, and again at editing phase. Inevitable, but useful, as it becomes the push to improve/work harder. Don't push it away, embrace the doubts and turn them into a tool. :)
 
I go through bouts of self-doubt. Came in 4th during a WotF quarter, FFS, and had three of the finalist judges tell me, "Go and publish. RIGHT NOW."

Worked in RPGs for years.

Published literary short pieces, one in a nice, reputable snobby magazine.

Even wrote a romance story under a pen name for fun and made $600 for 1.5 hours of work.

And yet, I still question myself. My mother passed in March and I'm still struggling to find my writing self again. What's helped me is re-reading stuff that I've written that I know is good, that I'm proud of. And I read it with an open heart and tell myself, "You did that."

Another thing that's helped is writing in other forms. I took a screenwriting class for fun. FUN! I knooow! Wow, wuut?

I also started another project that's fluffy supernatural romance.

Let yourself play.

Write a piece in 2nd person for the hell of it. (Or plural 1st person - the "We Collective.)

Write a sestina.

Write a one-act play. (Lots of contests out there now, looking for GOOD one-act plays!)

And above all else, remember who you are. I know I will. :)
 
Doz, I got a message saying that link was broken... I'll search for it on google.

Great article, Springs. I think the writer without self-doubt has to be arrogant and unprepared to listen to anything except their own ego. Like Martin Amis. Or Salman Rushdie - people so convinced of their own intellectual superiority and writing ability that any comment or criticism can be dismissed instantly. Sorry, that's probably a bit mean, but that's how they come over...
 
Oh, wow, what a panel, Doz. I think I'd have passed out being in the same room as them all! And yeah, Joe's spot on. I'm in the sentence 3 slump! Hee. :)

Thanks everyone, glad it's not just me! :)
 
Nice piece. Like Juliana, I like the Pimple Rule. I suffer with self-doubt myself, but I have to say I distrust people who have (or claim to have) no self-doubt. Just as bravery without fear cannot truly be bravery, I wonder if you can really grow without a bit of doubt and introspection to make you improve.

So, think of it as a drive to improve, springs, so long as you temper it with a realisation of what you have achieved. :)
 
Great link Springs, just what I needed. Now to deal with the monster in the box. First thought was to use a long stick and gently lift the lid, but now I think I'll rip it open and grab the blighter by the neck.
 
Yeah, Springs, this is a really good link. Thanks for posting this - all really good points, especially the prolific bit (though that should come with a health warning - lots of unpublished stuff can feel like a stack of rejection letters :eek: ).

I've been lucky (also unlucky) to be blessed with a stubborn inclination, which has largely removed any instance if self-doubt over being able to write. That doesn't mean I think I'm the finished article - hell no. I'm still an apprentice writer with much to learn (thankfully I'm learning all the time) but I don't let that stand in the way of my writing. I'm a practical writer. I know that if I continue writing I will continue learning. If I'm crippled by self-doubt I won't write as much, and I won't learn as much. That simple. So you could say I'm a prolific guy, as in point 4. I write lots.

However. That's not to say I haven't suffered self doubt over being published. Before I signed on with Pan Mac I believed I would never get into print and had largely given up on that score, deciding to write only for myself. Without putting pressure on myself and writing purely for the joy of it, that removed all self-doubt and gave me that head-space to write a book a publisher liked.

In my experience, ambition is a great driver, but a very bad yardstick too when it comes measuring achievements. A lot of writers get self doubt because they expect too much from themselves and expect success. That's natural but unfortunate. A lot of writers I know are quite inpatient impulsive creatures, which is not good considering this must be one of the slowest moving creative industries in the modern world, and the most frustrating!
 
Hi Springs, that link was spot-on. I bounce between self doubt and confidence several times each day.

Every time I start another chapter of my re-write I am bursting with confidence that by using everything I've learned (mostly on here!) I can make the novel not just good, but great. Then I re-read what I've just typed and realise that I'm as bad as ever, that I have no writing ability and that any self respecting agent or publisher wouldn't get past the first sentence before ceremonially burning my MSS.

I'm trying to get round this now by re-writing a new chapter and NOT READING IT. Instead I go off and write a short story or flash fiction on something way outside my comfort zone. Then I write the next chapter, only reading enough of the previous one to remind me where I'd got to.

So far, it's working. Sort of. But the novel is always there, lurking in the background, my 'Monster in a Box'...
 
Self doubt is the story of my life, unfortunately, and because writing is the really the only thing I care deeply about, it affects me most when I'm writing. I tend to have periods where I am happy with what I've written, only to re-read it a hundred times and pick it apart piece by piece. Literally, I keep going over and editing the same few chapters (or part chapters more commonly) and never writing anything new, and when I do, I do exactly the same thing. Then I go and read published work and get miserable that I'll never produce anything of the same level. It's very annoying :(
 
I think a certain amount of doubt is normal - too much and it's maybe a voice you need to fight against and make a little quieter.

For me, I've got sunk into my favourite world and characters to write and am feeling better - sometimes just reminding myself I like my stuff works. :)
 
I've found that it's very true that you can't please everyone, nor should you try.

I've posted my work in several forums and it's amazing how different the reviews can be.

One person will say that it's good but needs a little polish. But even so they would read the book and want to know what happens next.

The next person lights up the piece as having so many flaws it's laughable.

Write for yourself and there will be people that want to read it and who will love it.
 
Hi,

It's one of the strange results of publishing, but my doubts have faded slowly. It's not that every review has been good - some have been absolute stinkers. But little by little these last few years I've come to realise that I can write a good book - not a masterpiece but then I don't aim for that. And I've also come to realise that I can deal with the negatives if and when they come - though I say that having just had four five star reviews.

I think doubt is more of a plague to those who haven't published. Who haven't put their work out there. Who then constantly sit there dreading that negative review. But put your work out there, take the slings and arrows, and sooner or later you realise that you can deal with criticism. That because your work may not be perfect - assuming that there is such a thing - that doesn't make it trash. That you can actually write. It's as though you have this voice in your head telling you that it can't possibly be any good at all, until finally the outside voices say well yes - I liked it.

Of course editing is still hell on Earth! Especially when your editor rings you up to say things like - have you gone completely bonkers?!!!

Cheers, Greg.
 
barrett1987 said:
darkranger is right. I find this forum far kunder than absolutewrite.
Click to expand...

There are some lovely people on Absolute Write, people who I've found to be a support. But it's much bigger and harder to be friends with people and get to know them on such a big forum.

psychotick said:
Hi,

I think doubt is more of a plague to those who haven't published. Who haven't put their work out there. Who then constantly sit there dreading that negative review. But put your work out there, take the slings and arrows, and sooner or later you realise that you can deal with criticism. That because your work may not be perfect - assuming that there is such a thing - that doesn't make it trash. That you can actually write. It's as though you have this voice in your head telling you that it can't possibly be any good at all, until finally the outside voices say well yes - I liked it.

Cheers, Greg.
Click to expand...

I'm not sure. I've had a lot of validation about my writing from editors, and from crit-partners, and from publishers (albeit I'm only published with shorts at the moment) and it still creeps in from time to time. I'd agree it becomes easier to knock it back when you have some sort of validation you're really not rubbish, but I think it's still part of the process of writing for some of us. And Boneman and Aber might well be right, that without that part of the process, it's harder to push ourselves to be better.
 
In my case, I think the self-doubt gets mixed up with a whole bunch of other things (normally poor justifications for not writing) so that it doesn't even feel like self doubt.
I've not done a thing on my current effort for at least a month now, even though it's basically finished. It just needs a bit of work on the last couple of chapters (essentially wrapping things up) and that's it. I even know what I'm going to do, I know what needs doing, I'm not pondering HOW to wrap it up at all. I just... don't... do it!

It's happened before, and I'm not sure what it is. As I said, it doesn't FEEL like self-doubt, as I'm actually pretty confident it's decent and has a fairly solid ending (obviously it'll need polish, editing, reworking, etc, but the central idea and story I'm pretty happy and confident about), I just can't seem to make myself do it. i get too easily distracted by something else, or 'stuff' gets in the way, so I put it off till tomorrow, or (etc etc)
I suspect it's habit-forming laziness above everything else...

And it's safe to say, this is a case when 'tomorrow' never comes.

Anyway, I think the only solution is just to set the time aside to DO it. No excuses, no distractions, to the exclusion of every other damn thing in your life if you have to, until it becomes 'natural' to write on a regular basis again. (which I resolved to do last night... then didn't do it because we had a guest over... ho hum. Tonight. Definitely tonight)
 
Self doubt is similar to fear. It's always there and has a purpose and has to be recognized quickly or it can lead to freezing up, which is counter intuitive to why it's there. The problem is that there are a variety of innocuous looking things that can lead to a freeze. It can be something that you read that is so good it makes your perception of your own writing into something mediocre. It can be the peer review that often makes you feel much smaller than you like. You need first to recognition of the source and then have a strategy for frontal attack.

This is why it's best to study as much as you can about writing to understand all the tools your are using; so when you bend the rules or ignore them you are aware and can evaluate the peer review as possibly someone not seeing what you are doing. Then you can decide if you need to change direction. Usually when something you miss falls in an area you are not familiar with you start to freeze and that's when you need to have the lines of defense worked so you know where to go to find the missing information.

One huge problem is when there are perceived rules or when someone starts creating their own terms for validation of their criticism. That's when it becomes important to know where to research to find out if there is any correlation between what they just said and reality. I can no longer count on one hand how many times someone has used a term that has no source and when I have politely asked them where they came up with that information they have been unable to point directly to the source.[Instead they do a lot of hand waving.] If you try to accept some of these things at face value it could lead to a lot of freeze-up.

Knowing what you are doing and knowing your limits can help regulate the self doubt created by external false indicators and allow you to realize when something actually does need to be addressed. That way instead of sinking into self doubt you dig into research to fill that void that someone just pointed out.
 
Self doubt is one of the writer's greatest distractions.

I would suggest removing whatever causes the self doubt; at least put it off to the side.
Take a good look at it and try to figure out which aspect of it makes you doubt yourself.
If it's something real then start working on finding everything on that subject and build your tool set, but most of the time it will be something that is far from real and rather some perception that has been overworked until you've let your mind be fooled into making it important.

I suppose this becomes more critical and insidious for a writer who only has writing to bring the bread to the table because at that point a writer has to take themselves serious and sometimes the doubt requires that we step back from the seriousness and relax a bit; because we're taking ourselves too serious.

The bottom line: after you get over it; is that you must build your tools and this is important for me because I can't sing; can't dance; can't act; and of those three I might be able to study enough to do one. So if I mean to do my best at something I need to hone my skills in writing.
 
I think that's much easier said than done, Tinker. Mine has passed, for now, but people have different mindsets. I am prone to anxious thoughts and sometimes I need to ride those periods out. There's no easy off-switch. For people not prone to that mindset, or feeling down, it's hard to conceive how real such periods of self-doubt can seem and how difficult it can be to simply remove the cause when it is buried.
 
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