I've said before that everyone tries to be a writer at some point. Authors are just the people that stick with it because they have an intrinsic need or desire or reason to say something through prose or poetry. I started out like everyone else, creating imaginary stories when I was a little kid with a little-kid-sized imagination (which is ironically larger than that of adults.) I composed a 13-page story about my TY Beanie Babies in fourth grade, foreshadowing my current passion for writing. The following years had a smattering of attempts at stories that never saw the light of day, as well as some poems that also remained buried. All teenagers write poems. Teenage angst is terrific writing inspiration.
When I started writing the very first draft of Freeflight my junior year of high school, no one knew about it. I wrote the first ten chapters or so without any mention of them to anyone. I was writing it for my personal enjoyment, and didn't need - or want - anyone to read it. That was how all my writing was. It wasn't that I had no confidence in my ability, just that writing was a very personal thing for me and always had been. Why would I share it?
One of my close friends somehow found out about it and convinced me to show them the first chapter. Their feedback was so positive that I shared the chapter with a couple other close friends. They were so encouraging that I gave them the rest of the chapters, and then shared each new chapter as I wrote it. It was because of them that I finished the first draft of Freeflight.
I started putting the chapters on a website so that I didn't have to give each of my friends the chapter file individually. Things progressed from there and...well, here we are.
Where am I going with this?
When I talk about writing with friends, they often tell me that they do a little writing of their own, but no one has read it. Their temperaments range from being terrified at the idea of anyone ever seeing it, to telling me that they'll share it with me if I remind them about it later.
Some have asked me how I have enough confidence to toss my writing out there. Don't I worry about its quality? Don't I worry about what people might think of it? Do I think I'm the greatest writer to ever grace the Internet with her flawless prose?
Yes, yes, and no.
Hopefully everyone who reads Freeflight realizes that it's a very rough draft. I'm definitely not going to ship it off to a publisher the moment I finish it. It still has a long way to go, even the written parts. Especially the written parts. I cringe when I read over it because I see inconsistencies and bad writing all over the place. Those are the times when I'm very tempted to take it off the website and profusely apologize to everyone who slogged through the swamp of my imagination.
I'm not sure I would even call myself confident about my writing. I suppose I'm confident enough to believe I have something good in the making, but I question my ability with every sentence I write. In a way, that's good because it pushes me to constantly improve. But I have to make sure it doesn't drag me down and convince me to give up.
If you consider yourself a writer, whether that means you write every day or only when you feel like it, you need to remember a few things.
Your writing will never be perfect. There will always be something you want to change about it. I struggle with that a lot because I'm a perfectionist.
Having room for improvement is a good thing, not a bad thing. See mediocre writing as an opportunity to improve both it and your overall writing ability. That's why writing often is important - most of the stuff you write will be crap. Such is life.
If you never let people read it, your writing will become stagnant. Criticism is good. Feedback is good. Other perspectives are necessary to create an effective piece of work, in my opinion, even though it might be hard to take the criticism.
That said, only let the readers of your writing be people who care, at least while you're writing it. Nothing kills inspiration like someone shrugging at the story you slaved away at for four years of your life. When looking for feedback, make sure you get people who care about you, what you have to say, and quality writing.
Lastly, don't be afraid to let your writing be read. My writing started out as something very personal, and it still is. But the reason I write in the first place is because I have something to say. Stories are meant to be told and shared. Don't be selfish!