~ Lessons Learned ~

I try my best not to look back, but our pasts are very much a part of who we are.  We lived a life before we became bloggers, husbands, wives, mothers, friends, and whatever roles we play in our lives.

Before I became a more confident writer, I was once a writer who took every criticism to heart.  I was a student who felt every worded blow like a whip against my skin.  As a friend, I felt like many of my friends didn’t care about my dream.  As a child, I wondered if my parents and the adults around me that praised what I wrote only said it was good because they loved me.  Oh, the doubts, delusions, misconceptions, and need for perfectionism could go on and on.  I could regale you with thousands of tales of woe is me, self-recriminations, and self-pitying statements.  I had them all.  I still live with self-doubt.  There are few writers alive that can say otherwise.

Most writers are sensitive creatures, and we put our hearts and souls into our work no matter if we’re literary gurus or free spirited genre writers, we put a part of ourselves into what we write from blog posts, Tweets, and Facebook shares to our novels, short stories, and poems we don’t intend to share with anyone.  We offer a part of who we are to our readers. 

Majority of the time, the reader only sees the characters, style of writing, and our use of words.  They don’t feel the angst of choosing that word they so loved that we put here or there.  They don’t understand why we chose to show a character feeling happy or solemn.  They have no clue what it took to get this or that scene just right, only to have a friend, professor, mentor, editor, agent or someone else tell us to cut that same scene we struggled over.  The blood, sweat, and tears are dripped heavily into every poem, short story, or novel; it’s just not visible to the naked eye.

My lessons learned over the years of writing, giving up, then writing again are vast.  The primary lesson I learned over the years is that people don’t say things to be cruel so much as to make us try harder.  The thing to remember and this is something I have had to learn over the years and I once taught to my mental health clients as a coping skill is to think of the source.  Think of the person who is offering criticism.  I must remember that often.  When I hear a negative remark about my writing or someone else’s.  Readers can be just as cruel as some of our colleagues, mentors, family members, and friends.  I have seen some of the meanest reviews on varying platforms.  However, sometimes the source is someone who doesn’t normally read in the genre I write, and the book has been recommended to them and created false expectations.  Another issue is that sometimes people find it easier to be harsh inn their feedback than complimentary.  We are left with the ability to take a person at face value, offer them the benefit of the doubt, or simply let go of something that has hurt our feelings.  Recently I attended a webinar where the writer stated that she received a cruel review.  She said she received a 1-star rating, and the review was just awful.  She stated that she simply clicked out of it, turned the computer off a while and went back to her work when she could.  She didn’t’ give up.  She didn’t let that one person’s review keep her from going back to what she loved.  I admire that, and hope that I can emulate this wisdom.

When I don’t win a contest, I remember to think positive.  At least, I put my work in the contest.  There was a time I wouldn’t have even tried.  When I receive a rejection now, I think, at least, I sent my work to them.  what can I do to be more prepared next time I submit?  It’s not that I did anything wrong so much as I may have skipped a step, maybe my work wasn’t what the publication was looking for, or maybe I chose the wrong magazine or publisher.  Now, back to the drawing board to do more research.

I attend webinars and read books specifically to learn more about the craft of writing and how to break into the publishing world.  I have gained confidence because I have learned to accept that I’m not perfect and that people offer advice because they care.  I try to look at something critically.  If I were a reader would I want to know this about that character.  If I were an editor, what would I be looking for.  Nope, this is passive instead of active, so I need to change it.  this person said this, why?  How can I make it more appealing?  This person said, that.  How can I keep it this good throughout the piece?  When I get down on myself, I try to find ways to bring myself back up.  Usually, I write a prose piece or a short story.  This helps my mood as well as reading a good novel.  I learn so much every day from the people I am around now.  My mother offers ideas and feedback when she reads my work.  My writing sister, Victoria Jurgens, is an awesome source of support and continued help with my work.  she beta reads all the time, offering her own brand of encouragement and critique.  The members of the writing group I am a member of, Writers’ Mastermind, are another source of encouragement and wonderful advisement.  As I said before, keeping positive people around me helps with those moments of self-doubt.  Having likeminded individuals in my life has enriched it with opportunities to grow confident in not only myself but the writing process and the writer’s life on a whole.

I hope that as you move along your journey, whatever it may be, that you surround yourself with likeminded people who will lift you up.  Be brave and encourage those who are around you to dream and dream big.

Stay well.  Happy reading, writing, & creating!

CSA

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