One of the hardest things about being a writer is having confidence in your skills and abilities!

There are times when I read the passages or chapters that I just wrote and I think, "Damn, that's awesome!" I feel good about my writing, and I look forward to sharing what I have written with others.

And then there are times when I read what I just wrote and my heart sinks into my shorts. I compare myself negatively with all of my favorite authors and think, "Gods have mercy, no one is going to want to read that!"

But over my years of writing--both blogging/copywriting and being a fiction author--I've learned that confidence is the key to being a good writer.

Ray Bradbury said it best:

When you are writing, you HAVE to trust that it is good enough. You have to have the confidence that the words you are putting on the page are interesting enough that people will want to read it.

Of course, that doesn't mean that those words aren't going to go through a whole lot of editing, polishing, re-writing, and improving. On the contrary; everything you write should be checked and re-checked to be certain that it is the best version of what you want to say.

But ultimately you have to have confidence in your abilities as a writer, as a story-teller, and as an artist.

Thanks to the time I've spent writing, I've realized that I really do have a lot to offer to people. The stories that I dream up and the concepts that I create really do interest and intrigue readers. And if something I've created in the PAST has held their interest, what's to stop the things I create in the FUTURE from doing the same? How could the creative or talent "faucet" be suddenly "shut off" from one day to the next?

As a writer, you need to have confidence in your abilities, but thankfully, you also develop a lot of confidence through your writing.