If you put your words on the page and the book into the world, someone is going to judge you. And that can be a scary thought!
Fear of judgment is something that I've come up against a number of times in my writing career, particularly when I was writing Desecration. Watch the video below or here on YouTube.
What is fear of judgment?
It's that feeling of like, “I can't write this. I can't even think this. Why am I thinking this?I'm a nice girl. What will people think of me when I put this book into the world? What will my loved ones think of me? What will my partner think of me? My boyfriend, girlfriend, my mother, my mother-in-law? What will my friends think of me? And then what will people I've never met think of me?”
All of these things are fear of judgment, the fear of what others will think, and even what we will ourselves think.
Now it's still there in the background and of course, we all feel self-doubt. I don't think I'll ever stop worrying about what other people think about me, but the important thing is that I'm not going to let it stop me writing or publishing.
There are things inside us that we need to let out on the page.
Our most powerful writing can sometimes come from the subconscious, the things we press down in normal life. The things that we wouldn't necessarily say in polite conversation. Maybe things that our friends and our family don't even know about us.
How can you deal with the fear of judgment?
First of all, understand that the book is not you.
If someone doesn't like your book, it doesn't mean that they are judging you. Now, this can be very hard, but it does get better with the more books that you write. If you only have one book, then you will be very emotionally connected to it.
But if you write more books, then over time, that body of work becomes much more robust. When people attack it, then you're much stronger in yourself. So the first tip is to write more books.
And of course, if there's a topic that you know you want to write about but you're not quite brave enough yet, then maybe save that for another book, but make sure you get there eventually.
Find people who appreciate who you really are.
Now, I'm super-lucky. My husband's very understanding. For Crypt of Bone, I took him on a romantic (book research) trip to Paris and then we went to the Catacombs, where there are millions of bones and skulls.
But what you can do is find a community online.
As J.F. Penn, my fiction self, I am into morbid curiosity, death culture, skeletons, graveyards, that type of thing. Online, that's not weird as there are lots of people who are into the same things.
Whereas I know my friends in real life, and certainly my family, don't really understand that slightly more macabre side of me. In fact, most of my friends and family have not read my books and I probably wouldn't want them to.
We get caught up in wanting the people that we love to love what we do in our art, but so often, they don't.
So, find friends online, join writers groups, join Facebook groups, find other people who love what you do and they will understand you. That will really help you because many of those people will also be afraid of judgment and will have other people in their lives judging them, too.
Learn about the shadow side and embrace it.
I studied psychology and Carl Jung's idea of the shadow is something that fascinates me. At some point, I will write a nonfiction book on the shadow side and how we can use it in our writing because it's so important.
The most psychologically healthy people I know are horror writers because they take the fear and the dark side of them and they put it on the page.
When we write down the things that scare us, they lose their power.
So this is why I think writing can be incredibly powerful and healthy for you. Get out some of the things that you might be judged for if you talked about it. But if you write about it, even if you fictionalize it, it can become the best way, a cathartic experience.
Use a pseudonym
Of course, your fear of judgment may be totally justified. Most erotica authors will write under a pseudonym for this reason. Many romance authors write under a pseudonym. They don't want the added hassle of being judged for what they're writing or they don't want people they know to find out what they're writing.
Using a pseudonym can be a really powerful way to still write what you want to write, but put it behind a veneer so that you can take a step back and it will protect you in that way.
You can't control other people's reactions to your work
“The reaction to your art does not belong to you and that is the only sane way to create.”
You don't want to die with your art still inside you.
So often, people get obsessed with grammatical mistakes and typos and things like that in writing whereas the bigger issues are inside of us and those are the things that can help us create more.
If you need any other help with the psychology of writing and the roller coaster of what being a creative is all about, then check out The Successful Author Mindset, available in e-book, print, audiobook, and workbook formats.
Do you suffer from fear of judgement? How do you deal with it? Please do join the conversation and leave a comment below.
View Comments (11)
Thanks, Joanna. Definitely needed to hear this again. This is an issue I've been grappling with for quite awhile. I have an awesome support circle--family and friends--and still the Judgment Gremlin keeps wreaking havoc :)
Glad it helped :) It's something that still gets me too!
Hi Joanne, thanks for a great post. I recently took my permafree book of horror short stories off of Amazon, after a 1 star review. This lady said her 6 year old could have done better! It didn't matter that all the other reviews were 4 and 5 stars, that one review got to me. Perhaps I wasn't feeling very strong that day. I thought about how I could have done things better, as I did publish the book in a hurry and in hindsight I didn't put 100% into it as I was more focused on getting it onto Amazon. So, lessons learned, albeit in a roundabout way. I won't be making the same mistake on my next book.
Best wishes
PS - I am ordering The Successful Author Mindset today :)
I'm glad it helped, Sandra, and it sounds like you took that review as critical feedback, which can be very powerful for making our work better. I hope you find Mindset useful :)
Immeasurable thanks for this powerful message. It took ten years before I had the courage to put myself out into the world with my writing. But three books down and getting there gradually has indeed been carthartic. Facebook live is a bridge I have yet to cross... I have drawn most of my courage from your inspirational messages. Thank you for articulating what most feel and struggle with as writers.
I really enjoyed this post. After publishing my 2nd title last year, a book I'm extremely proud of, response from friends and family has been almost non-existent. It definitely felt personal, but I'm learning to let it go, that, as you mentioned, I can't control people's reaction to my work. Thank you for sharing Elizabeth Gilbert's quote, "The reaction to your art does not belong to you and that is the only sane way to create.” I love it.
I totally get how you feel. Most of my family don't understand how I make a living and most of them, even my closest family, have not read any of my books. After a while, you get used to it :)
Thank you SO much for this video! It was exactly what I needed to hear today!
I'm an avid reader in the Reverse Harem genre and often find myself planning stories in it, just to turn around and change them to fit the SFR genre I usually write. Each time, I blame it on my fear of not being a good enough author to pull off such a complex relationship.
My husband called my bluff today, though.
I'm just afraid of what my conservative extended family and friends will say when I tell them what I write! That was a wake-up call and made me look deeper into myself and go online to research overcoming it. Your video popped up and was EXACTLY what I needed. I'll admit that I shed a few tears at the local Starbucks as I watched the video and came to terms with it all.
Anyways, thank you SO much for putting it out there :) It made a difference in this newbie author's life.
Hi Beth, I'm so glad the video touched you - and I know that feeling of being scared of what others will think. I know how much I had to face that with Desecration. But it's worth it to write what you need to :) Go for it!
Thank you for writing what so many of us feel. I came to fiction writing later in life so I'd already reached the 'grumpy old woman who will not be silenced!' stage, yet even so, I really worried about how I-the-person would be viewed by readers.
The reason? My first novel was all about psychopathic aliens with nasty sexual habits. There is no gratuitous violence in the story, but it doesn't pull its punches either, and I did worry that readers would think I was some kind of nasty alien too.
The thing is, writers are almost always highly empathic. We have to be in order to channel the various characters we write. But even empaths have a dark side and it's that darkside we have to tap into to make the story real. We can't allow fear of judgement to self-censor us.
Wow! You sound like my mentor while I was writing my novel "Governey." He told me the exact same thing about not caring what my mother, aunts, uncles, friends, etc. thought about my writing. And it really paid off! Not only did I write a fantastic story, but I was able to resolve some deep-seated issues from my past and am living a much more fulfilling life because of it. Of course, there are those who probably consider me to be weird at best, but aside from the fact that they are missing out on a great read, I really don't care. Again, thanks for the affirmation and encouraging words!