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When People You Love Don’t Love Your Writing
“I read some of your writing and it sucks!”
That was my relative giving me feedback on an article I shared with him.
Maybe it did suck as it was one of my first articles — but ouch! The words slashed like a sword swiftly into the flesh of my small but growing heart for writing.
I dressed the wound by telling myself that he likely hadn’t read anything since he was forced to read a book in high school so all writing probably sucked for him.
I realized he’d likely never let written words journey far enough inside him to kiss his soul or light his mind on fire — so he’d never placed much value on them.
Because of this I now felt more sorry for him than indignant. This realization helped me let go of his words along with any resentment I had for his rude critique.
Then I shared some other articles with friends. They said they’d read them after they finished reading the book they were reading currently. Come on, man! My article is five minutes long and that’s if you read it slowly.
So I just stopped sharing. As a new writer, my creative confidence was very susceptible to damage from criticism or ignoration.
