Behind-the-scenes footage of you after someone gives you positive feedback:
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Footage of you after not-so-positive feedback:
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I could tell you that putting your writing out there for the world to see is easy, but I'd be lying. It's going to hurt, but you have to understand that even mean people might have a point. People are all people, and you shouldn't feel hateful or resentful of them. Studies have shown that indulging in hatred, in shouting and "venting," doesn't really help you.
By venting, you're watering the seeds of anger. Why not instead water the seeds of happiness?
So instead of getting mad at people, you should learn something from them. Ask yourself, "How can these comments make me a better person and a better writer?" You often hear that growth comes through adversity. Well it's true. But when you get through it, you will be happier and stronger.
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Redouble your efforts. Fix mistakes. Consider everything ANYONE says about your writing.
Feel the pain, and make use of it. Don't blot it out; address it. Feel bad someone didn't understand what you were trying to say, and consider making an improvement.
Let me tell you a story about a little book called "The Temperature of Frost."
This was my first book to be featured: a dark, twisted saga about a girl slowly losing her mind. The problem with it? Very few people actually made it to the end, and I understand why. It was a confusing, overly adult story that relied heavily on innuendo and foreshadowing, failing to imbue its wonderful language with emotional substance. In other words, people just didn't care.
What did I do? I edited the book, a lot, to make it easier to understand. I restructured it, added more exposition, and cleared up the plot to make it as simple as possible. I worked on it for a year a half.
But it wasn't enough, and I could not deny the truth: that TOF just wasn't any good. It was not an easy decision to move on from a series I had worked on for seven years, but it was necessary. Seeing how people on Wattpad reacted to "The Temperature of Frost" taught me that I had lost perspective... that writing is as much about the audience as it is about you. Yes, I had thousands of positive comments on the story. It was featured. It won a Watty.
I learned it didn't matter.
And I went into a hole and hibernated for almost three months. My world was falling in around me! I barely used Wattpad... I barely even wrote. However, in February 2017, I emerged again and began to write a new book called "Elise Runs and Dorothy Falls." It took me just a month and a half to complete, but it turned out to be far better than "The Temperature Of Frost."
I resent none of those who I argued with along the way. I don't even regret the arguments themselves, because I learned from them not to have them again. And most importantly I learned that those people who frustrated me, those who I disliked, those who were blunt about my story... helped me, more than most people.
Our enemies can be our greatest teachers.
That said, don't let people run all over you. As we've learned, there's always a balance to strike. Don't indulge trolls if it encourages their behavior, but that doesn't mean you can't quietly learn something from them. It doesn't mean you can't quietly learn, at the very least, a little patience.
So keep it going, redouble your efforts, smile when you think of your adversaries and their inadvertent contributions, and GET TO WORK ON WHAT YOU LOVE!
P.S. Thanks, Meowth, for the wonderful .gifs.
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