Author Anxiety Syndrome

One of the reasons I like being a media person is that I regularly publish my work, and there is a sense of satisfaction in accomplishing one goal after another, but at the same time, I always worry about the (probably few) readers. Views, there are big and small burdens in my heart, and I often compare my own products with others.

As soon as there is a comparison, it is easy to feel that you are useless. This situation became more serious when I got older and older, and the Internet and self-media became popular, because I found that many people who are younger than me, have less seniority than me, and do not focus on writing/creation, are Talented and better than me. For more than ten years, this kind of pressure and anxiety has been there, and it has never improved. I can only try my best to get used to it, adapt to it, and calmly accept the fact that I am useless.

Reincarnate in fight or flight

Seeing other people's masterpieces, on the one hand, I admire and admire them, on the other hand, I feel inferior and self-pity, self-pity, self-pity and self-questioning. On positive days, I would push myself to work harder and try to find out what makes me unique; on negative days, I would escape reality, not input or output any form of creation, like fasting.

Until one day, until I was hungry, until I suddenly wanted to read or write something, I didn't leave the customs. And it's usually very hungry to the point of shame: I just have to see how well someone can write, I just can't write enough, but I just want to read and write, so what?

As @JinlyWong said in "For Self-Doubtful Author Friends" :

The vast majority of authors will never write a work that can be regarded as excellent in their lifetime, which will be widely recognized. We are all so ordinary that we can only be grains of sand on the beach, not pearls in the crown, all our lives.

What to do if you feel ashamed? Nothing to do, write it down with shame.

But after a while, I will fall into that dead end where my writing is rubbish and my articles no one wants to read my existence is a waste of air, and then restart the protection mechanism that closes me off. Application @slash 三宝pa said in the article " There is no useless experience in life, no wasted effort ", this is probably the response of fight or flight.

I think it's okay to fight when you can fight, it's okay to fly, escape is shameful but useful. It may be meaningless to go back and forth every time, and there may be progress in each introspection and precipitation. Cai Kangyong wrote a passage that I like very much in "A Message of Kindness to a Cruel Society":

We meet all kinds of walls. We push the wall ten times, and the wall will not fall; we push the wall a hundred times, and the wall will not fall; we push the wall thousands of times, and the wall will not fall. Walls just don't fall, but we become muscular and powerful people. The wall doesn't fall, and it shouldn't be an excuse for us to voluntarily be weak.

In English, there is the term writer's block, which refers to the psychological barrier that the writer cannot create. We push this block thousands of times, and it will not fall, but we will become stronger in the process. (Yes, today is my active day.)

Compare yourself to yesterday

I just happened to see a very interesting short film. Psychology professor Dr. Jordan B. Peterson pointed out in a speech that there will always be people around us who are better in certain aspects, which makes us jealous, resentful, and desperate. He mentioned that one of his friends was distressed by his lack of success in life. "He compared himself to his roommate. He said that his college roommate was a lot more accomplished than him, and that roommate... was Elon Musk." The professor joked that A friend is too subjective, there are 7 billion people who are less successful than Elon Musk.

He believes that it is natural for people to compare themselves with successful people, because we all need role models, but it is also easy to criticize ourselves and see only our own shortcomings. His suggestion for this is:

1. Who should we compare ourselves to? The answer is yesterday's self. The goal you want to achieve is to make yourself a little bit better today than you were yesterday (a little bit better every day is enough). The definition of "being better" is up to you, not someone else's standards, because only you truly know yourself.
2. Set a lofty goal that is difficult, then break it down to make sure you're making progress and that the goal is within a reasonable range of your ability.
3. Life is hard, what makes all pain meaningful? He quoted Nietzsche's words: "He who has a why to live can bear almost any how", only those who understand why they live can bear the test of almost any predicament.

In the same way, I believe that only people who understand why they write and don't forget their original intentions can withstand the suffering of almost any predicament. mutual encouragement.