The other day I was talking to a friend of mine and this
person confided that she was afraid she didn’t have what it takes to be a
writer. “I’m just not good enough to get
a book published, and I don’t know if I ever will be.”
“Welcome to the club,” I told her.
My answer wasn’t what she expected. She had forgotten
something we had heard together at a conference many years ago. We’d been
listening to an established author talk about his own fear and inadequacies. He
told the audience that every time he sits down to write a new book, the fears
resurface and he’s certain he no longer has what it takes to make it in
publishing.
Hearing him confess his own fears gave me hope. Beyond that,
it brought home an important fact. Being published—no matter if it’s a single
book or a hundred—won’t necessarily make the fear disappear.
So what’s a writer to do?
