Brook Warner offers writers some compelling advice.  She talks about the writer’s inner critic and all the things the critic says.  She says that we should take it all in, breathe deeply, and ask if any of the critic’s messages are based in fear.  Brook’s words spill beyond the work and life of the writer…

Your inner critic is a loud mouth who sits on a pile of fear in hopes that you won’t risk yourself. If you don’t try, you can’t fail. If you never risk, you maintain the status quo. If you don’t stretch yourself, you stay safe.

Our writing pushes us outside of our comfort zone because it challenges us to be more visible, bigger, more truthful, to take a stand for ourselves and what we want.

I challenge you to write down your list of fears and hang it in your writing space this week. It’s amazing how giving voice to something lessens its charge. When you sit down to a message that says, “Your writing sucks,” rather than getting worked up about it, answer with, “Yes, it mostly does, but this is a content dump.” The point of SheWriMo is to write. It’s okay if it’s shit. The whole challenge is about getting yourself into the habit of writing and setting a pace.

So let it be shit. And do invite your critic into your writing space this week. By the end of the week you might just have a new friend.

Read Brook’s entire post over at She Writes.