Thanks for posting this. That bit about momentum hit home for me. It’s hard to get started sometimes. That first step feels like a mountain. That you’re climbing. In the dark. Without a flash light. And it’s hard to tell whether you’re stepping off a cliff or walking on solid ground.

Right now, I’m faking it, and it feels uncomfortable, of course. But at least I’m moving forward. Just one step at a time.

I totally hear you! I feel the same way too at times. Like: Who do I think I am, calling myself a writer? I write “how-to” stuff and that’s not “real” writing. Or I tell myself I’ll only be a “real” writer when I publish a novel (never mind that I’m writing DIY MFA, the book right now…) Imposter Syndrome IS the worst.

What I do that often helps is using mindfulness techniques to reset my brain, as it were. Like when those pesky Imposter Syndrome thoughts jump into my head, I just say “Here I go again, with that imposter syndrome” and then I redirect my thoughts to the present moment and what I can do right now to push one of my projects forward.

This is super-tough, and I often find myself “resetting” multiple times in a day. It’s hard to do, but definitely helps.

Hi Swati! Funny you should mention this. We’ve actually got something in the works. Stay tuned. We’ll be sharing details with the email list soon.

Thanks a lot for sharing this.

Just a suggestion: It would be nice to see Writer Igniter app on Google Play. I plan to do writing prompts immediately after waking up in the morning. I like to refrain from switching on the laptop( and use the internet) at that time and it would be really helpful if I could have Writer Igniter as an app on my phone and use it without going to Google search and looking for the DIY MFA website.

I always feel like such an imposter. Java is too hard and no one will use my app once it’s completed, so why even bother? My husband, who doesn’t really know Java, could program circles around me and everything that I’m doing is WRONG, that there are more efficient and thus better ways to do what I’m doing. Never mind that in less than two weeks I’ve gone from having no knowledge of Java or Android development, to having a working app that can read from and write to a database.

When I sit to write prose, every word that comes out of my fingers is crap, my sentence no verb, my grammar is the worst in the world, etc. Even though my editor assures me that my writing is good, I remain convinced that I’m the worst writer ever. It doesn’t help any that my one review left by a stranger on my tiny flash fiction book says it’s crap.

Imposter Syndrome! It’s the worst. I’m actually thinking of going back into therapy to discuss this and see if I can learn to be less hard on myself.