Sometimes we say a writer’s ego is a fragile thing. But in reality, we writers put our art out there to live and die by the criticism of others. Even the most positive review will often contain criticisms, and somehow that’s the only part that sticks with us. It’s little wonder sometimes we writers suffer from crises of confidence!
While sometimes negative feedback can help us learn and grow, sometimes it has the opposite effect (especially when the work being criticized is, you know, already published.)
I’m susceptible to this, too. Reading bad reviews can ruin my whole day. Not only are they upsetting, but they can stifle your creativity, making it hard to push forward on other projects, too. Even if you’re not published yet, it’s easy to get down about your work when it falls short of your vision or feedback goes from helpful to hurtful.
Finally, I stumbled across a solution: a feel-good file. I wanted a place to collect all the things that make me happy to write. So I pulled together story ideas and inspiration, encouragement from critique partners, notes from readers and glowing reviews like this one from the Deseret News (yay!).
Right before that great review came in, I stumbled across a couple that weren’t “bad,” per se, but they didn’t make me feel good, either. I had only four chapters left on the rewrites of the next novel, and suddenly I wasn’t sure I wanted to bother going on. My mind started down that slippery slope to a pity party, thinking of other disappointments, frustrations and doubts.
And then I remembered my feel-good file. I flipped it open and within half a dozen items, I really was feeling better. It worked!
Make your own feel-good file
I searched through my email for anything that stood out in my memory, even if it was from four years ago. Anything writing-related that made me smile went into the feel-good file: praise from a beta reader, notes of appreciation from contest winners, review requests, the first email I got about an award.
Once you’ve collected the starting set, whenever someone sends you a nice note or you come across some encouragement, you can add them. Now I add Facebook messages, special Tweets, email requests, and whatever else makes me happy as it comes in. After just a few months, I’ve got hours of instant smiles on tap.
It isn’t gloating—it’s gaining perspective. One bad or mediocre set of feedback isn’t the sum total of your career or the only measure of your talent. Reminding yourself of that can help you keep going.
And of course, the best solution when you’re getting down? Succeeding at something new: nailing the next scene, fixing a story problem or brainstorming something shiny and novel.
What do you think? How do you bounce back from negative feedback?
