As humans, we often want others to believe in us more than we do. We want others to be more patient with us than we are with ourselves. We want others to see more possibility in us than we do in ourselves. There’s that saying, “Treat others the way you want to be treated.” I’ll add to that, “Treat yourself the way you want to be treated.”

Do you want to be nurtured and supported? What would it look like if you nurtured and supported yourself? Do you want someone to take a chance on you and give you the space to develop your gifts? What would it look like if you gave yourself the space to develop your gifts? Do you want someone to trust that you can pick up new skills? What would it look like if you trusted yourself?

It sometimes feels like our minds are built for self-criticism. For whatever reason, it is extremely easy to invalidate ourselves and talk ourselves out of self-development. We interpret struggle to mean failure and uncertainty as a sign that we’ll never succeed. Success is a lot messier and indirect than it looks. Because perfection does not exist, we have to make space for our imperfections. We have to accept our fumbles with grace and embrace the challenges of growth and development, because if we don’t go through growing pains, if we don’t go through the imperfection of being a beginner, we will never grow.

It takes real guts and grit to simply be who we are, to accept and acknowledge where we are on the learning curve. As I wrote in How Old Are You?, we often want to accelerate our standing. We are so uncomfortable with being a learner, with being a beginner, with making mistakes, with being in the dark about how to master our crafts, that we pretend to ourselves and others that we are further ahead than we are. The danger of that is then it is easy to berate ourselves for not keeping up with the lie.

Being who we are is really our only choice. Subterfuge does not serve us. No matter what the public believes or our self-critics believe, we are enough as we are. Whether you are a beginning writer, an emerging writer, a mid-career writer or a master writer, you are a writer on a journey developing a craft. There’s no destination to get to, no place that you arrive, you are always reaching toward your next best self and developing the skills you need to actualize your vision for yourself as a writer.

Goal Check-In:

• Much like June, July has been a month of writer administration. The editors were not fans of my second draft and are looking back longingly at the first draft. We are working on what’s next. I predict I’ll be back to writing by mid-to-late August. In the meantime, I am still blissfully enjoying life with no deadlines.
• I wrote a picture book manuscript and sent it to my agent. It’s something COMPLETELY new for me.—and I’m not sure how it turned out. I’m waiting for word.
• My nonfiction book pitch is still underway. It can only progress as quickly as four collaborators can carry it. And with summer travel, there have been delays. Yet progress continues, so it is still on my goals list.
• I also gave a workshop in June: Writing What Scares You. It was wonderful and there was so much authentic participation. The participants shared gems as they talked through the process. And tears were shed as we shifted mindsets and moved past/through fear. So inspired.
• We can embrace ourselves exactly as we are. We are not required to berate ourselves for being a beginner or for struggling with the same writing issues over the years. We are allowed to embrace our imperfect efforts and congratulate ourselves for caring on. Power to your writing hand!

Onward!