Tag: success

Making My Own Luck

Can we really make our own luck?

Lately I’ve been reading The Business of Being a Writer by Jane Friedman. If you’ve never heard of Jane Friedman, I’d definitely suggest looking her up, particularly if you want to make writing a career. She’s got some great advice and information for the business side of things.

Anyway, one of the things she talks about early in the book is the idea that part of success is luck. Well, yeah, we already talked about that back in March.

But more than that, she cited a study from the University of Hertfordshire (look up Richard Wiseman and The Luck Factor) that looked at people’s perceptions of their own luck. Basically, what it came down to was that if a person considered themselves unlucky, they were more apt to miss opportunities or to skip trying for certain opportunities whereas someone who viewed themselves as lucky stayed more open and were more likely to see opportunities as they arose.

It was all about mindset.

And isn’t that so true? How many times have you skipped applying for something or submitting something because you were convinced you wouldn’t get it? I know I’ve given up on my share of opportunities for that reason.

But we can make our own luck. We see it time and again, how our mindset about our chances of success can be predictive. If you really want it to happen, if you expect it to happen, you’ll see more of the opportunities and take more chances to make it happen… and that can increase your chance for success.

Now, of course I’m not saying that positive thinking will make you a bestselling author.

No, what I’m saying is that we need to evaluate ourselves. How is our outlook on our career affecting us? Does it affect our mental health? Is it limiting us?

Or is it helping us to expand our horizons, take chances, and really put ourselves out there?

If your answer is that you are limiting yourself, that’s okay. I limit myself, too. But let’s use this as a springboard to recognize those times when we’re cutting ourselves off at the knees. Let’s use it to encourage ourselves to move forward and take a few risks. And let’s find the people who will let us know when we’re selling ourselves short.

One step at a time, let’s change our outlook on our careers. Let’s make our own luck.

And let’s keep writing.

Impostor! Impostor Syndrome and You

Have you ever felt like you don’t actually deserve the attention or success you have had? Do you ever feel like the good things that happen are because of something outside of your control or a mistake someone else made regarding you? Do you feel like if people actually knew and understood, they would take away those successes?

Well, my friend, you just may be suffering from Impostor Syndrome. And let me tell you, it’s not the most fun thing in the world.

Impostor Syndrome is defined as a persistent, internalized fear that you will be exposed as a fraud, that your successes come from external sources rather than your own abilities and self-worth (source). It is a trick that causes us to doubt the worth of our work and our successes and feel as if we don’t deserve the good things that happen to us.

And it’s often our brains lying to us.

Unfortunately, this is a common feeling among high-achievers, particularly women (though this idea may be incorrect… some emerging evidence suggests it affects men and women equally). I first encountered this idea while I was in grad school, and I think it’s pretty relevant to writers, too. We can experience this feeling when we receive compliments or awards or publications, any time our work achieves some level of success or recognition. It keeps us from ever feeling like we have made progress in our skill, talent, and career. Even the greats, like Stephen King, will tell you they still don’t feel like masters (see his book, On Writing). Many writers who have “made it” still feel like impostors. Just like us.

You see, we consistently put our souls out for the world to see whenever we share our writing. It is easy to think that people who say negative things are correct while those who say positive things are just “being nice” or have fallen for a “trick” of some sort. We attribute what success or acclaim we gain to luck rather than our hard work or our talents.

And this is unfair to us and our readers. Let me tell you why I think this.

When we shrug off a compliment and tell ourselves it’s not because of anything we did, that people will figure out soon enough that what we did isn’t worthy of attention or adoration by anyone, we prevent ourselves from taking pride in a job that not everyone can or will do. Writing is hard business. And by ignoring or downplaying the compliments or good reviews because of our feelings, we are invalidating our worth and the worth of our work. That’s not fair to you.

On the other side of the coin, when you ignore or shrug off a compliment, readers do not find it attractive or humble. It can be just as invalidating to them. You are telling them that their opinion doesn’t affect you at all, which can translate to you not caring about their opinion. And as writers, our life and the life of our stories depends on readers. We need connections, and we need to make our audience feel appreciated. If they took the time to write to you or leave a review, your work affected them. End of story. Say thank you and accept the praise.

So next time you’re feeling like a failure, remember that it might not be true. Take a few minutes to step back and look at your feedback. Don’t dwell on the negative reviews (people tend to remember the negative over the positive, no matter the difference in numbers). Realize that not everyone is going to like your work, but that doesn’t say anything about you as a writer. Take pride in your successes, accept the accolades you receive, and most of all, keep writing no matter what your mind tries to tell you.

Because as long as you keep creating, these feelings lose.

Your turn: Do you have any suggestions for dealing with impostor syndrome? Anything to add? Tell me in the comments below!

The Comparison Conundrum

So today I got an email.

Nothing special there, right? I mean, I get at least a hundred emails per day, mostly because of my problem with subscribing to too many author newletters. But this email wasn’t one of those. No, it was a Goodreads email, a monthly YA newsletter.  I scrolled through like normal, then I got to an author profile. “Oh, cool!” I thought to myself. “This is kinda like me. PhD student to writer.”

I kept reading. Not only was this person a PhD student, but she wrote her debut novel while at MIT. Awesome for her! But it didn’t stop there. She was a neuroscientist.

I stopped reading, and all my feelings changed. Instead of the connection and interest I had felt at seeing someone like me, it shifted to jealousy and a case of “why not me?”

You see, I wrote my first novel (well, my first completed and polished novel) while I was in grad school. For neuroscience. But unlike her, no one offered to represent my book. It sat in the query spiral for two to three years before I finally decided to pull it and publish it on Wattpad (you can read it here. I’m publishing it in serial form, which you can read about here).

Let me tell you, it is not a good feeling to see someone like you, only better (at least in your mind), succeeding at your dream. And not only that, but she used her science, like me, to influence her writing. I felt like my identity as a writer had been stolen.

Side note: if we, as writers, are truly honest with ourselves, jealousy is a very real issue that we all face at some point in our careers. It’s okay to feel jealous, as long as you don’t act inappropriately because of it and as long as you strive to get past it.

Here’s where the comparison gets deadly. It would be so easy for me to just quit trying at this point, to say that my voice can’t possibly matter because someone like me did better. To say that my voice has already been heard.

But that isn’t true. Even if you find an author similar to you, who did the things you did, even if they seemingly did better at it, that doesn’t mean your voice shouldn’t be heard or that you aren’t succeeding at life. It also doesn’t mean that their story is the same, and by its very nature, that means your storytelling is different.

Success is relative, my friends. For me, grad school was a monster with teeth and poison, and I had to deal with that while pulling myself out of it and completing my degree. That severely and negatively impacted not only my health but also my productivity and creativity. But I graduated, and at that time, that was a huge success.

I found a science job I love, and I excel at it. That is also success.

I love to write. I’ve written a total of four complete novels in the last five years and have polished, cleaned, and queried one of them. I’ve entered two short story contests and was a finalist in one (the other one is still pending).

This is my success, and all of these things are my story. No one else has exactly my story, though it’s the relatability of my story that can connect to others.

I love to write and I keep sharing it with others. Putting my dream into perspective, that’s what I wanted all along. I wanted to share my work, to make connections with people. And I’m doing that. Yes, I also want to be a published author, so very much, but just because the book I queried wasn’t right for the publishing world at this time doesn’t mean it’s a bad book or that I’m a bad writer. On the contrary, I’ve gotten a number of compliments on my writing and on that book, from beta readers, other writers, and industry professionals. As writers, we need to separate our ability and skill from the publishing market, because the market is fickle and relies on what the publishers decide is marketable…not on how good a book is.

I know it’s hard to avoid, but comparison is the killer of dreams. Once you start going down that alley, it’s a quick spiral into “not good enough”s and “why bother”s.

But here’s the truth of it: no matter what someone else has done, no one else can tell your stories that way you can. And no one should. Don’t let self-doubt and criticism and jealousy win. Write. Listen to the criticism of others. Rejoice in the success of others. Let your doubt make you more determined, and let your voice be one well-regarded and respected among your peers, no matter how well you are achieving your dreams. Don’t give up on those dreams.

Keep writing, and keep telling the stories the way only you can.