How To Gain Confidence In Your Writing

It can be tough to be a writer sometimes. For many of us, we face a daily battle with ourselves to try and keep going. Everything from rejection, procrastination to cringing as we read over our work can mean that we lose confidence as a writer, and for some, this means we eventually stop writing altogether.

Of course, it can happen in any profession, and even if we achieve a certain level of success, this doesn’t necessarily mean we will feel confident about our writing. But beating ourselves up about our mistakes and bullying ourselves into retreating is not the way we should live our lives!

Think about all the things you say to yourself that are negative, discouraging and downright mean? Would you ever dream of saying them to anyone else? We should start to change our attitudes about ourselves and realise that boosting our confidence and taking care of our happiness is a positive and helpful thing, not only for our self esteem and satisfaction but for those around us too.

So what can writer’s do to gain more confidence in their writing?

Tell yourself it’s not easy for anyone

When we aren’t feeling confident, we can feel quite isolated too. However, it’s imperative to try and put our feelings in perspective, remember that it is not that bad, and that pretty much every writer goes through the same thing.

Celebrate your terrible first draft

Everyone’s first draft is bad. But instead of focusing on that and wondering how you can possibly start to improve it, just take a moment to celebrate the fact that you actually finished it. Not many even get to this stage, and now you’ve got something, something exciting and real to work from - that is pretty awesome - so just take a moment to appreciate that.
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Take pride in being a risk taker (whatever the outcome)

Don’t be afraid to take risks in your writing. Even if you end up failing, knowing that you weren’t just following the crowd or copying someone else will feel great and should give your confidence a deserved boost.

Be passionate in everything you do

If you stay true to yourself and stick to your passions, this will come through in your writing, translate to your reader and feel good too. Remember that writing should be fun, it should be rewarding and satisfying so don’t be negative about it, instead celebrate that you are doing something creative and exciting with your time.

Remember that you don’t have to have anyone’s approval or permission to write

No one can tell you to stop writing, and no one’s opinion is important enough to make you feel you aren’t good enough. Remember not everyone can like the same thing, and it only takes one person to like your writing, to ‘get’ what you are trying to do to make all the difference!

Keep writing as much as you can

Writing is a muscle, and to make it stronger; you need to work it out! The more you write, the better you will become, and the better you become, the more confident you feel. It’s as simple as that. So just keep trying to write as much as you can, and you’ll soon see an improvement in your confidence.

To build confidence in writing, you need to embrace the unknown, to take risks, to stay passionate and focused and just keep going - even when you don’t feel like it. If you manage to do this, your confidence will inevitably grow, and you’ll feel so much better for it too!

Bethany Cadman -author of 'Doctor Vanilla's Sunflowers'

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