There have been many times over my writing career where I have lost confidence in my skill, doubted myself, and wondered if I’m even good enough for this to be worth it. Below are two exercises I have done that have helped me remind myself that I am making progress and help keep my confidence intact.
Look Back at Your Old Work
As your writing years go by and you continue to develop your skill, it can be a refreshing experience to look back at old pieces of work. Your initial work in particular can give you an idea of how far you’ve come and can be great motivation to continue working towards your goals. I decided to try this exercise and read over my first ever short story, and although it was tough, it was rewarding. Here is what I found.
The first thing I noticed was that I was still a good writer, and this one really surprised me. I imagined I would be reading through something messy and incoherent, but I found that I really liked my story and my writing for the most part. At first this had me worried that I hadn’t improved much since then, but then I kept on reading. Although I was a good writer back then, I made some novice mistakes, there were a lot of cliché’s, and over describing. Looking at individual sentences or even paragraphs made me think my writing was great but looking at the story I saw where my flaws were, and I’m happy to say that those flaws are greatly limited as of today.
The main thing I took away from doing this was seeing how far I’ve come and using that to encourage me to continue going farther. There have been times I’ve looked at my current work and wondered if I’m getting better, wondered if all the time I’ve spent has been worth it, and looking back at my old work was confirmation that it has.
Read an E-Book
This title might confuse a few people at first, what could reading an e-book have to do with your confidence? But let me explain. The difference between an e-book and hard-copy is obvious, one is on paper and one is online, but the reason reading an online copy can help you feel confident is because your writing (unless you solely write by hand) is also online.
When you’re in the middle of an e-book, the pages are online, and they will look just like the pages you write in whatever program you’re using. This takes away that special “published book” feeling that comes with having a paperback and seeing the words printed out and in your hands. It’s the reason people will always prefer hard-copies over electronic, but it’s also a great way to look at a story subjectively.
I’ll read an e-book and picture it as something I wrote and converted to a PDF, and most times it will feel like something I could write. It helps to pick authors and novels that resemble your own writing and skill level. This exercise isn’t perfect, but it’s a good way to compare your writing to other already published works.
If you try either of these exercises I’d love to hear how it goes in the comments below, especially if you have suggestions on how they can be improved. As always thanks for reading, and I’ll see you next week!