Comparing yourself to other writers harms your creativity and thinking as it prevents you from doing your best and promotes self-doubt and self-criticism.
Impostor syndrome is characterized by doubts about your talents and feeling like an imposter. It mainly affects high achievers who find it difficult to accept their achievements. Many people wonder if they deserve praise.
Comparing ourselves to others is one thing we can’t deny; no matter how much we convince ourselves that we don’t, that is near impossible because there will always be those times that we doubt ourselves and our abilities; however, people should not turn a blind eye to such a crisis that they are facing.
Writers often compare themselves to other writers without realizing it, thus giving the wrong impression of a great writer. Such thoughts should be stopped and forgotten because they harm their way of thinking and bring terrible results.
Killing Your Creativity
Comparing yourself to others kills your creativity, which is not good because creativity is crucial to a writer’s way of thinking. You must understand that you have what it takes to become the person you want to be.
It is not a matter of how many other writers have succeeded, but how you have to overcome this barrier and become one. You should be proud of yourself and your writing rather than trying to find “answers” in others.
Writer’s Block
It is uncommon to hear that comparing yourself with other writers can generate writer’s block; however, it contributes because writer’s block results from fear, Self-Criticism, External Pressure, and stress.
The more you think that another writer is better than you and that your works are nothing compared to theirs, you create fear of making mistakes, you tend to be hard on yourself, and you will feel that your ideas are no longer great from how you initially thought of it. Hence, it leads to the stress of being unable to write and having no inspiration.
Factors like this affect your focus and way of thinking, which is not very good for a writer because writers constantly think about their daily lives as creative people. It creates writer’s block. After all, you don’t know what to write anymore because every idea you have you think is never enough.
Self-Destructive
The more you think you don’t have what it takes to be a great writer like everyone else, the more you doubt your skills and abilities when it comes to creativity and writing. You will slowly lose your way to success, and one day you will lose the chance to achieve your goal of becoming a great writer. All of this is possible the more you compare yourself to others and criticize yourself for not being as great writers as they are.
For all the time you waste comparing yourself to other writers and blaming yourself for not being enough but never taking the risk of trying, you are destroying your future little by little.
Regret never came first, and you will realize that if you don’t stop comparing yourself to other writers instead of working on your skills and improving to be the successful writer you wanted.