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This is Terror Week! Day One: Overcoming Fear

Added 2024-09-02 11:36:02 +0000 UTC

Most industries require workers to learn facts and formulate strategies based on those facts. Writing is an entirely different matter. It certainly puts you in touch with facts and strategies, but it also requires you to reveal your most intimate secrets. It requires courage and integrity. You must grow as a person while simultaneously finding your creative spirit. Undeveloped personalities produce undeveloped writing. Even if you can capture something as illusive as inspiration, it will never be enough. You will often fail just as we all often fail.

Failure is built into every single day of my life as a full-time writer, even 28 years after I started writing. You will receive rejection letters just as I do. You will spend many months or years receiving hurtful feedback from editors and publishers just as I do. You will become discouraged sometimes, just as I am.

You can’t be your most creative self if you’re steeped in fear, so you must find ways to overcome it. You must infuse your words with the only unique thing you have to offer: Yourself. You are the strongest tool you’ll ever have, so self-discovery is the most important way to find your voice. T.S. Eliot once said, “My advice to “up and coming writers” is don’t write at first for anyone but yourself. It doesn’t matter how many or how few universities one goes to, what matters is that one learns.”

All writers must learn how to paint themselves onto the page. Fear and exposure are difficult partners, and the only way to expose yourself is to address fear, so this week we’re going to focus on fear and insecurities. More importantly, we’re going to focus on your fear and insecurities.

I’m not going to ask you to do an exercise today, but I would like it if you told the workshop about your fears at this stage of your journey. You can post about them here or in their own thread. It’s up to you. During the week we'll cover some strategies for overcoming fear.