inner critic

As an Amazon Associate I earn from qualifying purchases.

POINT OF VIEW: Beating Up My Inner Asshole

by
inner asshole critic - deposit photos

Almost every writer has what’s called an inner critic – a voice inside their heads that ridicules their work, tells them they’re not good enough, and generally makes their writing lives a living hell. It’s like your high school bully took up residence inside your head, where it’s really easy for him to figure out which buttons to push. I don’t buy it. The word “critic” implies that this jerk has some kind of actual, factual basis he uses for critiquing my work. Mine doesn’t – he’s just an asshole. This week, I’m diving into the second draft (or the … Read more

As an Amazon Associate I earn from qualifying purchases.

POINT OF VIEW: Managing Imposter Syndrome

by
Imposter Syndrome / Mask - deposit Photos

I try to stay strong. I try to project optimism into the world, because that’s what I want to come back to me. But damn, sometime’s it’s hard. Today I am struggling with my IC – my inner critic, but rather than wallow in all the messages it’s giving me, I thought it would be better to share the ways in which I deal with it when I’m feeling like the fake-est phony who ever lived. So here are my strategies for coping with imposter syndrome, in no particular order. I hope they’re helpful to you, too: Reread Some (Good) … Read more

As an Amazon Associate I earn from qualifying purchases.

POINT OF VIEW: The Roller Coaster and the Inner Critic

by
critic - pixabay

Hey all, As anyone who knows me or follows this column knows, it’s been a wild month. It was just about a month ago that we discovered how much GDPR (the new EU privacy law) would require of us as a company, and how little time (3 weeks!!!) we had to accomplish it. It also landed squarely in the lead-up to the release of “The River City Chronicles,” my first self-published work. It also happened to be the month when I was due to finish writing Ithani, and one of my beta readers threw me a (much needed) curve ball … Read more

As an Amazon Associate I earn from qualifying purchases.

POINT OF VIEW: The Icky Part

by
J. Scott Coatsworth

Hey all, I’m at that part of the story on “Lander” that I always hit, about this far in. I’m probably three quarters finished, and all I can see is suck and ick. The writing sucks. The story is pedestrian. The threads of it are all over the place, and there’s NO WAY I am ever going to find a way to bring them altogether. It sucks. I suck. I am a horrible writer. Everyone’s going to find out. I will fail. Instead, I just sit back and laugh. You see, every one of us writers has this little internal critic. … Read more