Mindset

Every writer I know, including myself, has anxiety and self-doubt about their creative efforts. When I went into it further, I found that it’s the curse of the creative classes.

A year after publishing The Chic Crone, I’ve learned that writing isn’t just about finishing a book—it’s about continuing through mistakes, discouragement, and uncertainty, and building something meaningful one imperfect step at a time.

For a long time, I treated my sales dashboard as a measure of how well I was doing—not just as an author, but as a person. A good day meant progress. A slow day meant doubt. It took stepping back to realise I was watching results instead of building the work that creates them.

For a very long time, I treated writing as a referendum on my worth. Not consciously, perhaps — but emotionally? That was often the system running underneath everything. Lately, though, something has been changing. I’m still ambitious. I still want readers. But I no longer want to build a creative life fuelled entirely by pressure.