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Hey Reader,

I’ve stopped and started a book I’m writing so many times I’m sick of myself. Do you ever get so sick of yourself you just want to scream and scream and scream until you’re hoarse? Yes, well. Just because I’m a writing coach, doesn’t mean I’m immune from the brain nonsense that flattens us all at some point.

I’m the proverbial cobbler with holes in her shoes.

The physician who needs to heal thyself.

I was, in short, stuck.

And the ridiculous thing is, I know exactly why I was stuck and what was keeping me there because this is what I do for my clients.

The words — or, more accurately, the voices in my head — were getting in the way of writing and I was letting them. Until I remembered that my reader doesn’t care if my sentences aren’t perfect. My reader doesn’t want The Best Words. My reader just wants to feel less alone.

I’d lost sight of the point of the whole thing: connecting with another human being.

The voices in my head had thrown a blanket over me, bundled me into the back of a van, and driven me around the countryside yelling lies and doubts into my ears.

Stuff like:

Is it correct?

Do I sound clever enough?

How is this making me look?

Does this idea even make sense?

Will it get lots of likes and shares and good reviews?

WILL EVERYONE GET ANGRY AND HATE ME WHEN THEY READ IT?

Where these voices come from

One of those voices is probably your English teacher (unless you were very lucky) or an elderly relative who keeps banging on about how you can’t start a sentence with “and” or “but” and if you’re boldly splitting infinitives you’ll go straight to Grammar Hell.

(It’s perfectly fine to do all of those things if you want to, by the way.)

The way we’re taught to write to pass exams is not the way we need to write if we want to a) make real connections with other humans and b) enjoy ourselves.

The algorithm does us a similar disservice. That, and all the shiny perfect people on social media telling us that we’re doing it wrong, and if we want to be anything other than a sad little dirty dishrag, we need to do it their way and nobody else’s.

The internet makes us perform. To please the algorithmic overlords, our audience, our peers, and our enemies. It demands perfection and we kill ourselves trying to deliver the impossible. The systems we’re working within — end-stage capitalism, patriarchy, white supremacy, mass-self-destruction — push us to not only be something we’re not, but to desire something we can never be. This isn’t just my gut feeling, either; studies on social media show that performance metrics (likes, shares, comments) trigger dopamine-driven feedback loops which make us prioritise validation over authenticity. We’re always chasing the next viral post that’ll boost our ego, rather than seeking genuine connection — because that’s not gonna make the headlines or put us on a pedestel.

All of this impacts our creativity. I’ve written before about how generative AI is destroying people’s creativity and ability to think but perfectionism is just as guilty. A 2018 meta-analysis found that maladaptive perfectionism (that’s fear of failure and socially prescribed perfectionism) negatively correlates with creative achievement. That’s correlation not causation, but I’m going to draw a causal line to it, too. If we’re continually seeking a fictional idea of “perfect” it hobbles us. We can’t allow ourselves to screw up, to make a mess, to fail because to do that will be to fall short of this ideal. Which means we don’t play. We don’t discover new connections and have silly ideas. We lose our curiosity.

Underlying all of this is a very real, very valid fear: rejection.

Your fear is valid

Back in the day, ejection from the tribe meant a death sentence, more often than not. We’re social animals and even the most solitary of us needs a community for safety and security and food and shelter and love. Today, our physical safety may be less threatened by rejection, but outcasts have worse life outcomes in general, shorter lifespans, more health problems. fMRI studies show that social rejection activates the same brain regions as physical pain (the anterior cingulate cortex) — so your fear of rejection is real and valid and reasonable.

However, our brains also lie to us. Especially if we’re neurodivergent. Those of us who are autistic or with ADHD have a heightened fear of judgement: rejection sensitivity dysphoria (RSD). It’s an extreme emotional response to perceived rejection. Research shows it’s tied to dopamine dysregulation and it can paralyse creativity.

Rejection and ostracism are genuine threats, but our brains blow them out of all proportion. We believe that people are far more invested in us and our work than they are (everyone is too busy obsessing over their own perceived shortcomings) and we believe people will judge us and our work far more harshly than they really do. This, too, hobbles us. It keeps us from exploring, from playing, from messing up and failing. It makes us put far more importance on the work we do than is warranted.

Our work IS important — but as an evolving body of work, not as individual chapters, paragraphs, sentences, and words.

All of this is to say: your ego is a shitty writer.

It really is.

Your ego is a shitty writer

Your ego wants people to think you’re cool. Of course it does! So does mine. So it tries to keep us safe by preventing us from being “cringe” or making a mistake. The trouble with that is, it stops us from doing much of anything at all.

Let me give you an example from my own world. Every few months, I hand-draw a zine. It’s silly. I fill it with my handwritten musings, drawings I’ve made, creative prompts, blackout poetry, bits and bobs. Then I have it copied and I send it out, physically in the post with a stamp and envelope, to people I like, people I’ve worked with, people I’ve met, friends, and family.

Every now and then, I freeze: “How cringe is this?” says my brain. “I’m making something stupid and amateurish with paper and ink and foisting it onto people who haven’t asked for it. They must be laughing at me.”

And so I put off doing the next one. Until I remember two things: I regularly get messages from one or two of those people telling me how much they love my zine and how it brings them joy, which is exactly why I started doing it. To bring some joy in this bin fire of a world. And I remember how much fun I have creating it. How joyful it is to carefully hand-letter the front cover, and draw a cartoon or a doodle, and make a poem, and then pack it up and send it out to land physically on someone’s doorstep — a bright spot in a sea of brown envelopes from HMRC or the Funding Circle (dear god can anyone tell me how to get the Funding Circle to STOP BOTHERING ME?).

My zine isn’t cool. But IS delightful. And it’s mine. And it brings people joy. Not least of whom is me. If I let my ego take control, it’d never get made.

Your ego wants to protect you but it’s also a shitty writer. Don’t let it paper over who you really are with a performance designed to please strangers who couldn’t care less.

If we let our ego dictate our work, we let the words get in the way of the connection we’re trying to build. The words we use matter, but they’re not the most important part of writing.

Connection first. Then idea. The words will come later and we can always polish them.

Connection first; words will follow

But if we don’t start with the connection and the idea, the words won’t come at all. Writing for connection is its own reward, too, according to Self-Determination Theory. Autonomy, competence, and relatedness (connection) are core psychological needs. When we act autonomously, our actions reflect our genuine interests, values, and integrated self-concept rather than external pressure or obligation — our behaviour comes from ourselves, in other words, and is a key factor in intrinsic motivation. Competence means feeling capable of producing desired outcomes and developing genuine mastery of a skill. And relatedness requires being seen, valued, and understood — making real connections, in other words.

If we can get out of our own way, and write for connection, the writing will be its own reward, because we’ll start to hear from readers in a way that likes, shares, and AI-generated comments cannot compare with.

And if that’s not enough, consider all the other reasons you’re probably writing: to build a readership, perhaps to make sales, find clients, grow your audience. If that’s the case (and it is for most of us), you’ll want to consider the Narrative Transportation Theory: that readers are more persuaded by stories when they feel emotionally transported — which is what happens when the writer prioritises connection over polish.

You know this is true: have you ever tried to persuade someone out of an emotional position with facts? Even if you’re absolutely right, and they’re 100% wrong, it’s an impossible task. If we want to change minds, we have to change hearts first. And we can only do that with emotionally transportative stories. And to do THAT, we have to connect.

When we perform, we forget about the connections we could make. We forget what the point of all this is: to say, “Hey. This is me. I’m here and I see you. Do you see me?”

Next time you’re stuck, instead of worrying about how you sound, ask yourself a simple question: Who am I trying to reach?

TTFN,

Vicky 🫡

p.s. I can help you get out of your own way. I have a spot for my 3 month coaching programme starting this month — it’s for people who want to get the first draft of their book done — joyfully. Details here.

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