Desiring And Waiting For External Validation Is Choking Your Creativity, Writer.
Care about what other people think and you will always be their prisoner.
Upcoming episode on Becoming A Writer podcast this Saturday — we are going to talk about how baking cakes made me a better writer.
Care about what other people think
and you will always be their prisoner.
- Lao Tzu
Since late 2023, my writing morale has been low. And for a reason that’s out of my control — engagement from readers.
At first, I assumed my readers were busy with Christmas and New Year festivities and, therefore, felt they had little time to read my essays. But as March came to an end, I realised that something was definitely off.
While I increased the length of my essays from 800–1200 words to 1500–1800 words and I improved in providing detailed and valuable essays without compromising the quality, my monthly views on Medium went down from 3.7k in 2022 to 2.4k in 2023 to 933 in 2024.
I am not one of those content creators who obsesses over and gets bothered by the analytics, but such an in-your-face change could hardly be ignored. So the first inevitable and cliched question I asked myself was — “Am I doing something wrong?” It was making me doubt my ability, making me wonder that maybe I was (*wait for it*) “not doing enough.”
My inner knowing was so angry with me for asking such an unloving question, and it spoke sternly,
“Dude, we are on the verge of a physical and emotional breakdown. We are alone working at least 3–5 people jobs, without even including the personal responsibilities we have, and yet you are saying, “Am I doing something wrong? Maybe I am not doing enough.” Bullshit!
We are overworked, overstressed, and disheartened to the point that all we want to do is run away to some cabin in the forest with only our books, notebooks, food, and coffee. And what’s worse, we are falling out of love with our writing.
Listen, we know our writing isn’t that bad and that there are many other factors involved when it comes to reader engagement.”
Unable to find any answers by myself and to ensure I was not blindsided by my own ego, I consulted my writer friend, who always gives me his honest thoughts. After reading my essays, he told me not to worry — there was nothing wrong with my writing. And yes, he, too, felt that engagement on various social apps was drastically low without any reason.
With this assessment in hand, I decided to give myself and Medium derailing some space and time; all will be revealed in time.
I am glad I took some time off because it made me see that I was letting others’ reactions (or lack thereof) decide and dictate how I felt about my writing. I was letting external validation choke my creativity.
Why Writers Shouldn’t Rely On External Validation To Believe In Themselves As A Writer?
Because anything outside of you and your determination towards your writing will keep changing.
The market trends will change — from witches and wizards to teenage vampires, billionaires with freaky bedroom habits, and now enemies-to-lovers. The readers’ tastes will change, too, according to their needs in the moment — for instance, I went from cosy mysteries to thrillers to psychological thrillers to police procedurals to make my way back to cosy mysteries, while also, I have shifted from fiction to non-fiction reading.
Also, life happens. For example, readers get busy surviving the day and hardly have any time left for reading. Or social apps and websites, like Medium, change something in their backend (a.k.a., the dreaded algorithm) that drops the interaction on your posts.
Therefore, pursuing external validation to determine whether you are a good writer and whether your writing is working is like chasing a moving target — making it torturous for a writer to find stability and contentment.
How External Validation Can Hinder Your Writing Journey?
Stifling your creative expression. If you are constantly seeking approval from strangers on the internet, you may end up censoring yourself in order to please them. And that helps neither you nor your readers.
Losing your authenticity. In trying to write to please others, you will give in to what’s trending and start writing what they want to hear. This does a huge disservice to your writing, what needs to be written and read from your own unique experience and voice.
Falling into a comparison trap. Of course, now that you are writing to please, you will compare yourself to other writers to get the satisfaction of knowing that you are the greatest pleaser of all. But there always will be someone who is or is doing better than you, and that will erode your confidence in yourself as a writer.
Adopting conditional confidence and happiness. Since you are relying on external validation to approve you, you will start to experience fluctuations in confidence based on external feedback rather than maintaining a stable self-assurance in your abilities. A viral essay will make you feel like a king, while an essay that hears crickets will make you feel worthless.
Growing imposter syndrome. All the above will, therefore, lead you to doubt yourself and your ability to write.
Overlooking personal milestones. Now that you doubt yourself, you’ll ignore the accomplishments that you are making on your journey of becoming a writer. You are so focused on what others think of your writing that you lose touch with what your dreams and hopes were for your writing.
Neglecting your craft and personal growth. Since there is less-to-no external validation to give you the permission to embrace yourself as a writer, you’ll start to wonder, “What’s the point of putting in so much effort?” You’ll forget to notice and take care of your craft and how far you have grown as a writer and as a human.
Losing your intrinsic motivation. At this point, you will feel your inner fire for writing flickering and diminishing. Since the outside world is not validating you, you will start to lose your love and joy for your writing.
Falling into the firepit of creative burnout. At this moment, you are still not going to give up — because if you don’t write, then who are you? But now, you will be writing from a space of desperation and lack. You will write in order to prove that you are worth the external validation. This pressure to meet external expectations will lead to burnout, draining whatever leftover joy you had for your writing.
Losing of your passion. And finally, you’ll reach a point where you have lost all hope, joy, fun, and excitement for your writing. You may give up on writing entirely at this point, or you may continue to stick around, like someone in a loveless and respect-less marriage, hoping that one day they will come to their sense and notice how great of a writer you are.
The Wrong And Right Types And Sources Of External Validation.
Does this mean that external validation is bad? Yes and no.
External validation is for your ego. It wants to feel and be seen as important. And what better way to do that than to have your readers praise you for your work? Validation means you only want to hear good things about yourself and your writing. This kind of external validation is bad for your writer health.
What you want to be looking for is effective feedback. You want to learn from reliable sources what is working and not working in your writing. You may not like what they might have to say but you know that it’ll make you a better writer. This kind of conversation will help your writing grow and flourish.
The wrong sources for external validation will be strangers on the internet, people you don’t align with mentally, emotionally, or spiritually, anyone with a condescending attitude, and anyone who will benefit from or enjoy your failing.
If you are looking for effective feedback, the right sources will be loved ones who are your true friends and will be honest in their opinions and people who genuinely want the best for you and your writing.
The Best And Only Kind Of Validation You Actually Need.
Your personal satisfaction.
It is as simple as that.
If you are not content with what you are writing right now, you won’t find contentment even if you get a Nobel prize.
You have to trust yourself and your writing and give it your all at the moment. Yes, there will definitely be scope for improvement, but that doesn’t mean what you have written so far is absolute nonsense and a waste of time. With every word you write, with every essay, short story, or book you finish, you are fine-tuning your writer self. Focus on that accomplishment.
Reflect on the progress you have made so far in your writing journey because you definitely have made some progress. Remember the fickleness of the world and how unstable it is to place your self-worth on. Find that stability and self-worth inside you. Remember to consider Timing — some things need more time to grow and flourish. Just because you have hit a rough patch at the moment doesn’t mean you are stuck here forever; times will change, and you will find your time in the sun.
