Self-doubt

My self doubt came from agent feedback. Until that point I knew it was quite good. I hadn't intended to write a novel, so any positive feedback was more than I ever hoped to achieve.

The fact I get agent feedback told me the story was good but I began to wonder after getting quite a few with personal feedback, but no request, if it was good but not good enough to be published. Even the ones who told me to keep going and not be demoralised because I had talent did not help. In some ways it was easier to get a form rejection because I could convince myself it wasn't their thing or they didn't like it. One or two objected to the present tense but when questioned about it said it was done very well just not their thing but they would take it if it moved to past tense. Several suggested they would take it if I made it medieval (I'd have to change the main character and several elements of the story). I tried writing it in past tense but decided I hated it and would rather write a completely new story than be miserable writing a series of my fantasy.

I know it sounds really silly but it has taken me a year to decide to mothball Mayhem and to focus on a new story with no controversial elements when it comes to selling it. When I did that I remembered I enjoyed writing and actually it doesn't matter if I never sell a novel.
 
Yes, in the self-publishing thread I've put up the agents' stage seems to be fuelling a determination to go it alone.

I know some agents have said they're frightened of giving personal feedback for some of the reasons you mentioned - they don't know how that feedback, given and recieved in a vacuum - will be received. We're so fixated on that book and that process that we forget no one I know was agented on their first book (anyone want to put their hand up and prove me wrong?) i was agented on my third. To get personal feedback on a first book is amazing but, without any parameter to compare ourselves against, how do we know that? How do we saw okay, I showed enough talent to keep going?

I'm not sure there is an easy answer. I don't think self-pubbing offers it, because there you can get reviews in that same vacuum, by people not caring what it does to the writer.

For me, in the hellish agent-seeking period (and I hate to say it, it's hellish after that period, too) the support of my peers was the only thing that kept any confidence up. And kept me writing. Which started to get more honed (I wouldn't say improved, exactly), which got requests. But for that, I'd have given up for sure.
 
I was lucky. Juliet Mushens sent my first rejection and it was lovely - the feedback just about perfect. It was enough on the money that I go back to it sometimes. There was enough in it to know she had read all three chapters which gave me a lot of hope. Then she encouraged me to continue and not give up. I actually wrote back and thanked her for it. Without it I am sure I'd have given up completely.

I think I've used too many of Mayhem's good phrases and sentences in my new one (which desperately needs a title other than New One) to self publish Mayhem which makes me sad because it's a good book.
 
As long as it doesn't go overboard, doubt is a strength, not a weakness. Doubt makes us willing to question what we're doing, willing to listen to advice, and want to improve. The counterpart sin is complacency, which entails less work but worse writing, and a moment of awful shock when your work is published and doesn't garner a hundred 5* ratings.
 
There is not doubt; self doubt does exist and I'm not trying to deny or minimize it. I am proposing that in many cases that there is a root cause of the self doubt and if you want to work out of it constructively you need to recognize the cause and causes to know whether you need to improve or you need to avoid some of the causes like a plague.

But I think, also, we need to realize that there are certain things in life that we can't control. One of those is that no matter how good or bad our writing is we have to accept the probability that when we publish it and it's out there for the general public we will get both negative and positive responses and if our doubt happens to play on all negative responses we are going to set ourselves up for some real problems with doubt.

This could include the whole phase of submitting work because the agents and editors and publishers are all a part of this public and they are expected to be the most severe and exacting in their view of your work.

The thing is that if you let the doubt eat at you until you do nothing then whatever it is that is eating at you wins. The bottom line is that you need to do the writing to find out if you can write. You need to learn how it's done and you need try try it out and see if you are good or mediocre or you genuinely suck at it and should let the professionals do it.

I had drywall that needed finishing one year so I learned all I could about drywalling and attempted it on my own. I did a mediocre job[I would have said perfect, but there were several folk who stopped by now and then to tell me what I was doing wrong (critics); mind you they were not helpful in showing me how to do it right, but they were never shy about telling me how wrong my work was going.] So I learned I could do the drywall, but if I had to please everyone I should leave it for the professional. Of this I have no doubt.

I spent all of my grade school and higher school year repeatedly learning that I could neither play music nor sing. I have every appearance of being tone deaf. I always thought I did quite well until my last year when I was finally convinced by consensus opinion that I simply suck at music. I always let the pros do the music. Of this I have no doubt.

I don't dance, I have tried with some moderate success, but I've never tried seriously and generally avoid dancing; though it might be that my lack of musical prowess contributes to this lack of ability, it is mostly letting doubt win that keeps me from doing this. If I wanted to remove doubt I think dancing lessons would do that and I've chosen to let doubt win for now.

Clearly in these instances I have a choice: I can chose to learn everything I can and discover if I can do something well enough or if I suck at it, or I can let doubt creep in and take over and never know for sure.

But I should mention one more thing, I have a fear of heights so no matter what I learn about certain subjects if it involves climbing on roofs or up tall ladders I probably won't be able to do it. This is an irrational fear that freezes me.

If your doubt is less doubt and more irrational fear then that will be more difficult to work around.
 
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I have completely the opposite problem - too much confidence.

So my challenge has been not to believe everything I do is great - but instead, learn where I go wrong.

That's why I especially benefit reading books about writing - I need to know what I should be doing, rather than blindly string words together.

Teresa's editing has been especially wonderful for revealing my faults.

Yet, even though I think I've now found my voice, I cannot presume I always write with it. Editing makes it sharper, but I still need to be aware that there's always something to learn.
 
Heh. For me Teresa's (and Jeff's) edits were great for building confidence. Which isn't to say I didn't get lots of stuff to fix and work on but I'd expected much, much worse. :)
 
For me as a writer I think self-doubt can be very useful - without it you are not going to push yourself to get better and put the hard graft in to improve. And conversely without an ego full of confidence occasionally, you are not going to submit any work to anywhere!

The trick, I suppose, is not to have too much of either and trying to be constructive with both states (till you can write flawless perfect stories of course ;-) )

Getting rid of 'super-ego' is pretty easy (just try submitting or giving your draft to a vicious beta reader!). If I get weighed under with too many irrational negative self-doubt thoughts I like to pick out my favourite books by other authors, the ones that really changed me as a person and I thought were dazzling, brilliant and inspiring. Then I go to Amazon or other book review sites and see how many people hate it or think that it is terrible. The point of this? To continually show me that even if I were to write what I think might be perfect or just bust a gut and try my utmost to author a manuscript that I would be proud of, it will never please everyone and some will just not like it*. If it happens to the giants of the field (and it most certainly does) it will definitely happen to all of us.

So I take comfort that the there is a degree of 'level playing field' with respect to this and that as long as you strive to improve your writing all the time there will be an audience out there for it.

At least I hope so!

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* What's the old adage? Opinions are like Ar******s, everyone's got one. Although on the internet there is a tendency to find quite a few opinionated Ar******s.
 
Boneman said:
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...
Click to expand...

I often wonder if this is not virtually inevitable at some point. It happened to Rushdie, Gore Vidal, and a slew of others. Once someone is told they are that good by every sphere (public, academic, etc.) they seem to start believing it after a while. It seems very rare that someone like DFW comes along and seems to hang on to genuine humility throughout the whole ordeal.
 
Hi Tinker,

Just to add to my previous post - I also have a crippling fear of heights. And you're right phobias and self doubt as a writer do have some commonalities. But probably the most important is in the way you deal with them. I have never and will never overcome my fear of heights - it's just who I am. But when I was twenty eight - ish my work required me to climb to the top of a fourty metre high grain silo, and I did it. My legs shook and cramped, I was completely sick afterwards, and it was almost impossible to think. But still I forced myself to do what I had to do, and got through it. Now, even though I am still deathly afraid of heights, I know I can do things like that again if I have to.

It's the same with writing and publishing. I've done it. I've been nervous. I've suffered criticism. Gone up and down on the emotional rollercoaster. Learned to dread and love feedback. But the most important thing is that I've learned I can do it. That I can weather the storm of condemnation if and when it comes. I can learn to take what is useful from a criticism, and push aside the rest as useless.

It's not so much about confidence that my work is brilliant. (Arrogance.) It's confidence that my work is of a standard and that I can do it. That is one of the reasons that I think publishing, forgood or ill, is so important for a writer's development.

Cheers, Greg.
 
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