 Hello, hello writers. I'm Kristin Kiefer, author of fantasy fiction and creative writing resources. And you are listening to the Well-Sturried podcast, where I share insights, encouragement, and actionable advice designed to help you craft sensational novels and build your best writing life. Always in 30 minutes or less, so you can get back to writing, of course. Ready for the show? Let's get talking. Alright, let's get settled in, and here we go. Friends, hello, and welcome once again to the Well-Sturried podcast. Thank you for joining me today. We are getting pretty personal today on the podcast, which is a bit exhilarating and a bit nerve-wracking, but today we are talking about the topic that you see in today's episode title. Feel like you're falling behind in your writing life? So in today's episode, I have some confessions to make. Specifically, I kind of talk a lot about the creative mindset at Well-Sturried, yet my own creative mindset is something that I struggle with quite a bit. I've been wrestling with a lot of fears, especially the fear that I'm falling behind in my writing life, that I'm somehow not keeping up with what everyone else is doing and that I'm going to disappoint people. I've been wrestling with that for many years now. And fear can be so debilitating. It can stop you in your tracks. You can want something so, so much and yet struggle so hard to sit down and do what you love because of fear. And my own fears have been something that I've had to work hard to continue working through. Like I said for several years now, I'm still very much a work in progress, but I've come a long way. I've done a lot of work to improve my writing mindset, my creative mindset, and I feel like I've learned a lot that I want to share with you. And so in today's episode, I am sharing a little bit with you about my own fiction writing journey, as well as five hard truths I've learned that have helped me stop feeling like I'm falling behind in my writing life and start owning my own work, my worth as a writer, and the pace at which I'm working. So if you are someone who's also struggled kind of with the fear of missing out or the fear that you're somehow not living up to your creative potential, this is the one for you. But before we dive in, I would love to take you behind the scenes and share an update of what's going on at Well-Storied. As many of you may know, I have been working on the first draft of my very first ever full-length non-fiction book on writing. It's called Build Your Best Writing Life and I started writing this first draft right at the beginning of February and I anticipated having the first draft complete by about mid-March and then struggled so terribly much with this first draft because it was a project. I've never attempted a project like this before. I didn't quite know what I was doing. I thought it would be pretty similar to writing a novel, which I've done several times over now. I thought it would kind of, writing each chapter would be kind of similar to writing a blog post and with that in mind, I thought I kind of had this first draft in the bag and then it was just struggle after struggle after struggle, especially right there in the beginning weeks of working on this draft. And then I eventually found my groove and the end of March into April went a lot better and I am pleased to announce that as of about almost two weeks ago from the time that this podcast episode will be coming out, I have completed the first draft of Build Your Best Writing Life. Hooray! And so I'll be talking a little bit more about Build Your Best Writing Life at the end of this episode, including giving you a link to where you can sign up to be the first to know when the book goes live later this year and to receive monthly email updates about how I'm doing or if you want to go ahead and sign up for that now, you can find the link in today's episode description. But like I said, more on that later. I would also like to give a quick shout out to the two new guest posts that are currently live over on the Well Story blog. The first is How to Beat Writers Block by Kate Johnston. As a published author, Kate runs a story coaching business where she helps aspiring authors bust through Writers Block so they can write on a regular basis, finish their projects, and get their work into the hands of rabbit readers. So Kate was not only so generous and kind in writing this article on beating Writers Block for the Well Story blog, but she also included a link to her free download, The Savvy Writers Guide to Busting through Writers Block, in that article. So I will leave that link to her guest post for you in today's episode description. You can also find it directly on the Well Story blog by heading on over to www.well-story.com.blog. The second guest post that is now live on the blog comes from Jackie Kangro and it's five tips and four myths about the editing process. Jackie is a book editor, a creative writing instructor, and a writing coach with 20 years of experience in working at Penguin Random House. So that's pretty neat. Jackie also helps writers develop the confidence and skills they need to get their stories on the page, and so she has a lot of experience specifically with writing and editing, and so that's what makes her article on the five tips and the four myths about the editing process just such a good piece that I am so thrilled to be able to host on the Well Story blog. So if you'd like to check that one out, make sure to head on over to www.well-story.com.blog. You can also find that link as always in today's episode description. Now to give a quick shout out to some of the awesome people who have encouraged me in my work here at Well Story on the podcast and on the website. Specifically I have two blurbs from different emails today that came from readers who really enjoyed our most recent article and podcast episode on how to utilize motifs in your fiction. The first comes from Lita who said, Wow, what a useful article. Thank you so much, Kristen. When I come to revising this novel I shall be able to see if I have a hidden motif and if so how to polish it. And then Manor said, Thank you so much for this article. I absolutely loved it and all the examples were on point. I've got so many brilliant ideas for refining the motifs in my novel now and best of luck for yours. Thanks again. I would like to give a big thank you in return. I really, really appreciate the words of love, the words of encouragement that you guys send my way. Whether you send it to my email or whether you give me a shout out on social media or just leave a review for the podcast wherever you're listening in from. I really appreciate it specifically because being someone who creates on the internet you're opening yourself up to all sorts of criticism that you didn't ask for and then even to trolling and hate mail. And it can be so easy to get caught up in the harsh words that come your way and forget just how much good you're doing, how much your work is genuinely appreciated. And so that's one reason why I really love starting to do this particular segment here on the podcast because it forces me to sit down and really take in the lovely, encouraging words that you guys send my way. But it's also nice to send that love right on back and to make sure that you guys know how much I appreciate what you're sending my way. So thank you once again to Lida and Manor. If you would like to go ahead and leave specifically a quick rating or review for the podcast that goes a long way towards helping the podcast grow and reach new readers and I would really, really appreciate it. Thank you. Alright, today's episode of the podcast translates the latest article from the Well-Stored blog into audio. Titled, Feel Like You're Falling Behind in Your Writing Life you can find the article that also serves as the episode transcript at www.well-stored.com slash falling behind. Now, let's dive in. Feel like you're falling behind in your writing life? As someone who blogs about writing fiction, I'm often asked about the fiction I write. How are your projects coming along? What kind of stories do you write? Are you published yet? Where can I find your books online? I'm always honored and encouraged when someone expresses interest in my work. But I'll be honest, as a sort of public writing figure, I often feel a lot of pressure to excel in my personal storytelling, and that pressure can weigh heavy. When confronted with the fact that I haven't yet published my work, that pressure compounds until I fear that I'm falling behind in my writing life. This is a reality that I've dealt with for years, but now I'm gratified to realize that all the hard work I've put into owning my slow and steady approach to the craft has helped me build confidence in my creative journey. If, for any reason, you've also wondered whether you're failing to live up to your creative potential, I'd like to share some of the hard truths I've learned with you today. So, I've been writing fiction for nearly eight years now. In that time, I've written four novels, including three manuscripts and one complete rewrite, and I've done plenty of revision work as well. I'm currently almost three years into working on the story I intend to be my debut, a medieval fantasy novel called Lady Legacy that you can read a little bit about by clicking the link in today's episode transcript at well-storied.com slash falling behind. I'm dead smack in the middle of draft four revisions on this project, and I'm happy with how the draft is coming along, but I'm still months, if not more than a year, away from preparing to publish this book. In truth, my fiction doesn't always get the attention it deserves. I do try to work on my novel each and every day, but most of my mental energy at this time goes toward my work at well-storied. I don't always have a lot of gas left in the tank at the end of the day to work on my fiction, though this is an issue I'm working to address this year. Knowing that I'm not where I'd like to be in my fiction writing life is admittedly a bit frustrating. This only lends to the fear that I'm somehow falling behind, that I'll never get around to publishing my fiction, and that one day, one day, everyone will realize this and lose faith in my ability as any sort of writer, novelist or otherwise. But fear is just fear. It isn't fact, it's simply a common response to uncertainty. And as I explained in our article and episode on writing doubt, uncertainty is just another word for doubt. It's how we respond to doubt that matters. Let fear win, and doubts will warp into limiting beliefs that hold you back from living your best writing life. Take action, and you'll resolve the uncertainty at hand. For me, taking action means continuing to revise my manuscript, but it also means taking a good, hard look at the limiting beliefs that already cloud my creative mindset. What internal struggles are holding me back? How can I rewire my beliefs to better set myself up for writing success? In asking these questions, I've uncovered a few powerful truths. Truth number one, you are your own worst enemy. If you feel like you're falling behind, that means you're already playing the comparison game. You're looking at other writer's work, their process, their progress, their successes and so on, and choosing to believe that you don't measure up. But what exactly are you trying to achieve? Each writer's process is unique, as is their definition of writing success. And most often, what we see of other writers online and even in person is taken out of context. It's consumed without intimate knowledge of their own doubts and fears, their own bad writing days, their own missteps and side steps and failures. To combat the fear of falling behind, you have to get out of your own way, and that often means diving deeper. It means getting real about what you want from your writing life. It means addressing your creative mindset and limiting beliefs. It means cutting the head off the comparison game and learning to love your writing life. Truth number two, publishing won't make you a real writer. Because traditional publishing comes with gatekeepers in the forms of agents and acquisitions editors, there's this pervasive belief that landing a book deal will somehow validate your worth as a writer. But what about all of those objectively awful books that still somehow manage to get published? What do they prove? In truth, the only thing that traditional publishing can validate is that an industry professional believes your work may be marketable. I don't say this to knock on traditional publishing, not in the slightest. What I'm knocking is the belief that one hasn't truly made it as a writer until they land a book deal or make it big. Publishing is a career path, not an entry exam. A person with a phenomenal singing voice isn't any less of a talent if they don't pursue a career in music, and you aren't any less a real writer if you aren't yet published or choose not to publish at all. So don't let anyone pressure you into publishing before you're ready. Truth number three, you have to work with the creative energy you have. I am not the most prolific writer on the planet. I'm currently revising at a rate of one chapter every three to six days, and I have 30 chapters to go before this draft of my novel will be complete. I'm looking to increase that pace, but as I mentioned earlier, I don't always have a ton of creative energy to put toward my fiction. I'm currently striving to cultivate more of this energy, but at the end of the day, the more I push, the more likely I am to run into writing burnout, and that is certainly not productive. So while I'm looking to expand my writing endurance, I'm also working to honor the energy in my creative well. If you want to find fulfillment in your own writing life, you have to stop tearing yourself down for not being more than what you are. You have to take the circumstances you've been given and make them work to your advantage. You have to put in your best effort and let go of the things you can't control. It's the only way you're going to move forward. Truth number four, some stories take longer than others. An indie author that I admire publishes at least two novels every year. In comparison, I am completely and utterly inadequate, but by playing the comparison game, I become my own worst enemy, right? The truth is that I'm unlikely to ever publish two novels a year because I don't write strict commercial fiction as this author does. I write what's sometimes referred to as upmarket fiction, books that straddle the line between literary and commercial appeal. This doesn't make my writing inherently better than that of any other author, but it does mean that my novels take more time to craft because they don't feature traditional plotlines. And just as literary and upmarket fiction generally takes more time to write than commercial, you may have some projects that require more time and effort than others. Perhaps they're more personal and emotional. Perhaps they require more research. Or maybe you're just at a different and more difficult stage of life. Own that. Truth number five, you don't have anything to prove. Or rather, you don't have anything to prove to anyone but yourself because the second you start measuring your work and creative self-worth by the reactions and expectations of others, is the second you begin breeding dissatisfaction in your writing life. It's the second you start feeling like you're falling behind or failing to measure up. It's the second you pursue a negative response to doubt. The opinions of others are outside of your control. They're uncertain. And the more you try to influence them, the more free reign you'll give to doubts and fears in your writing life. It's not wrong to want to receive great feedback and reader reviews, nor is it wrong to write stories you believe your readers will love. But at the end of the day, the only person who needs to be happy with the work you're creating is yourself because you are the only person you have the full power to please. If you're happy with what you're creating, you are enough. You're not falling behind. You're not failing. You're not a disappointment or a sorry excuse for a writer. You are enough. But if you're unhappy with what you're creating, it's time to ask yourself a few honest questions. Am I truly putting forth my best effort given the time and energy I have to write? Am I writing stories I truly love? Or am I trying to please others at the expense of my own creative fulfillment? Am I putting in the time and effort but allowing limiting beliefs to convince me that I'm not enough? Do I truly know what I want for my writing life? Or am I chasing someone else's dream? So many of these questions are topics I address in Build Your Best Writing Life, the non-fiction book that I'm currently preparing to revise this May. In truth, this would be the perfect time and place to pitch this book to you if it were already published, but these words have been weighing too heavy on my mind to save them for a few months down the road. If you're interested in being the first to know when this book goes live, however, and to receive monthly updates along the way, make sure to check out the subscription link I've included in today's episode description. As someone who blogs about writing, it may seem like I'm already living my best writing life. Like, I've made it. But in truth, there's not a day that goes by that I don't question my work, my worth, or my progress as a writer. I always want to be more, more, more. There's certainly merit in seeking always to improve, but when that seeking becomes self-doubt or even self-loathing, that's when you need to put the hard work into overhauling what you believe about where you stand as a creative. This is also something that I do on a daily basis, and though my creative mindset isn't yet where I'd like it to be, I know I'm making progress. In reminding myself of the truths I've shared today, I remind myself that I'm becoming the writer I long to be in my own time and in my own way. I'm not falling behind, I'm not failing, and neither are you writer. So let's get back to work. Thank you for listening to today's episode of The Podcast Writer. I hope you found it helpful to your writing journey. If so, make sure to subscribe to the podcast so you never miss a new episode. And to give the podcast a quick rating and review. Doing so goes a long way toward helping the podcast reach new writers and lets me know that you're enjoying what I'm creating. You can also give me a shout-out directly on Twitter at christen underscore keeper. For additional guidance as you work to craft sensational novels and build your best writing life, be sure to head on over to www.well-storied.com where I share blog posts, workbooks, e-courses, and other helpful resources for writers. Again, that's W-E-L-L-S-T-O-R-I-E-D.com. Thank you again for tuning into today's episode, my friend. Until next time, happy writing!