Musings from #oldguywritesbooks (a series)
The orange cube in the picture is a stumbling block. Because it is cube-shaped, it has six sides. Imagine that each side has a different word or phrase imprinted on it. Most are predicated on something I wrote about previously, fear. Here are some of the phrases that were on my stumbling block when I started as an author:
- I’m just pretending to be an author
- I have nothing to offer readers
- I can’t because I have no experience
- Fake and phony
- Just trying to stroke my ego
- I’ll only write junk
My stumbling block wasn’t static. It was very fluid. A whole cacophony of words and phrases constantly clamored to park themselves as the kingpin of my stumbling block and get my attention. A part of my mind tried to convince me that I could never be an author. In conversations with several successful authors, I found that stumbling blocks like this are an illness most new authors have. It’s called Imposter’s Syndrome. In my case, it was a voice within saying to me, “Who am I to think I have what it takes to author a book”? Perhaps that is the same voice you hear speaking to you when the thought of writing a book comes across your mind.
If there’s a book that you want to read, but it hasn’t been written yet, then you must write it.
That appropriate quote is by Toni Morrison, an avid author, who, like all of us, had at one time never authored a book. And I bet if anyone were to ask her she would say that she too once had Imposter’s Syndrome.
It’s action time. How about you kick that can, er, stumbling block, to the curb once and for all? In doing so, you will begin the journey of giving yourself credit where credit is due. Allow that book inside you to rise up out of the ashes of who you thought you were (an imposter) and reflect the person you really are, a capable person who can.
well said!