Oh Lord it\u2019s hard to be humble<\/strong>
\nWhen <\/strong>you\u2019re perfect in every way<\/strong>
\n\u2014 from the song, \u201cI<\/em>t\u2019s Hard to be Humble\u201d<\/em><\/p>\n

You would think writers are the humblest people around.<\/p>\n

They\u2019ve become practiced at it from writing mountains and mountains of words, only for many if not all of those words never to see the light of day in the form of being published. Writers get used to rejections and criticism\u2014from publishers, editors, reviewers, awards or contest judges, readers and even other writers.<\/p>\n

With all that adversity, the writer\u2019s ego should be in tatters, paralyzing him or her from writing another single word. And yet that\u2019s hardly the case. Writers are some of the most resilient, tenacious people I know (they have to be if they want to continue doing what they love). Writers are also some of the most stubbornly egotistical people too.<\/p>\n

Balancing humility with self-confidence and continued faith in your abilities is difficult. Even impossible for some, yet truly essential.<\/p>\n

I know a couple of published authors (and many, many unpublished writers) who, at some point in their writing careers, decided they didn\u2019t need to read any more books on the craft, take classes or go to writing conferences. It was a waste of their time (and money) because they already knew what they needed to know, were naturally good at writing, were having some success, and if anything, should be teaching<\/em> the classes, not taking them.<\/p>\n

I\u2019m honestly puzzled by this attitude. Nobody is that good at anything that they no longer need to continue to learn. Do doctors, pharmacists, engineers, pilots, or athletes stop learning? Absolutely not.<\/p>\n

To learn, it\u2019s critical that you put aside your ego and to admit that you don\u2019t know it all, that you need help, that you have much to learn no matter how much success you\u2019ve enjoyed. As the Greek philosopher Epictetus said, \u201cIt is impossible to learn that which one thinks one already knows.\u201d<\/p>\n

Continuing to learn your craft, your trade, your profession, is crucial no matter where you\u2019re at in your writing career. Because if you\u2019re human, you can never \u201cknow\u201d it all. You can never, ever reach your very best because you can always be better. And you can\u2019t grow and learn if you\u2019re too self-assured, too arrogant or too fearful to admit your weaknesses and to ask questions.<\/p>\n

As writers, we must learn to accept feedback, even when it\u2019s not glowing feedback. Especially when it\u2019s not glowing feedback, because that\u2019s how we learn. Ego and fear will be defensive and not accept feedback and will not want to learn. Ego and fear will say, \u201cYou\u2019re already great, so it must be everyone else\u2019s fault if you\u2019re not successful.\u201d<\/p>\n

We all want to be good at the things we love to do. And let\u2019s face it, who doesn\u2019t want the accolades and affirmation and adulation of being a successful writer? But first, we must learn the fine art of humility. Which means we must forever be willing to be students.<\/p>\n

Writers, remind yourself that you\u2019ve not reached the pinnacle and never truly will (because there\u2019s no such thing), but you\u2019re better today than you were yesterday and yesterday you were better than you were the day before that and tomorrow you will be better than you are now. Each day, you\u2019re growing and learning and improving. And at the end of the day, that\u2019s really all we can do.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Oh Lord it\u2019s hard to be humble When you\u2019re perfect in every way \u2014 from the song, \u201cIt\u2019s Hard to be Humble\u201d You would think writers are the humblest people around. They\u2019ve become practiced at it from writing mountains and mountains of words, only for many if not all of those words never to see […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":4,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[15,16,14],"tags":[449,450,106,129,84],"class_list":["post-1295","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-on-inspiration","category-on-the-writers-life","category-on-writing","tag-fiction-writing-fiction","tag-humility","tag-inspiration","tag-novel-writing","tag-writing"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/ascribewriters.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1295","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/ascribewriters.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/ascribewriters.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ascribewriters.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/4"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ascribewriters.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1295"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/ascribewriters.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1295\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":1299,"href":"https:\/\/ascribewriters.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1295\/revisions\/1299"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/ascribewriters.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1295"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ascribewriters.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1295"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ascribewriters.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1295"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}