Overcoming the confidence block
When you sit down to write, are you sometimes overcome with the thought that you can’t possibly have anything to say or add to an over-saturated market? That your life isn’t exciting enough to be interesting to anyone? That you have nothing of value to offer a public audience? Do you often put yourself and your writing down (“I’m a terrible writer,” “This [piece you are currently working on] sucks.”
If this sounds familiar, then you suffer from a confidence block.
This is a terrible and self-defeating feeling, but if you are willing to ignore it, there is a way to overcome it: Practice.
And practice in this case means writing and submitting your work again and again and again. Take an active stand in your own defense. If YOU don’t think you have anything to offer, why would anyone else think so? YOU are the one who must first believe that your writing has value.
Editors like to work with confident writers. Think about it – if you don’t present yourself as confident in your writing and your pitch, why would any editor want to take a chance on you? She has to believe that you have what it takes to see this project through.
Think about this in another context: The job interview.
When you apply for a job, do you pepper your cover letter with self-deprecation and doubt? Of course not. Because if you did, you’d never land an interview. Okay. So you’ve presented as a confident and experienced potential employee. Now how do you talk about yourself during the interview? Do you put yourself down and talk about how much you don’t know? Of course not. Because if you did, you wouldn’t have a job. Employers hire confident people who appear to be able to handle the job. Editors want the same thing.
You may not suddenly have confidence in your own work, but please stop saying such things out loud. Write your stories, submit over and over and over until an editor says yes, and build your confidence through methodical practice. There is no magic, or voodoo, or magic pixie dust that separates you from that confident writer whom you admire. The only difference is that person decided to feel unsure and write/submit her work anyway.
You can do this, too. Approach your writing like a job and practice until you feel the confidence you crave.
Amanda Morris, Ph.D. 