Bad habits are self-defeating. Bad writing habits affect your writing success. Although they may be detrimental to your writing career, you do them anyway, even when you’re aware of them. This goes with every aspect of our lives, but this article focuses on writing. While you may not be able to annihilate all bad habits, you can take steps to at least curb them. The article, Curb Self-Defeating Habits, at Mindful.org, offers some basic steps to take to get a handle on habits that are stopping you from reaching your goals. 1. What self-defeating thoughts are you repeating? According to an article at Forbes about training your subconscious, “your mind is constantly filtering and bringing to your attention information and stimuli that affirms your preexisting beliefs (this is known in psychology as confirmation bias) as well as presenting you with repeated thoughts and impulses that mimic and mirror that which you've done in the past.” So, if you’re faced with a stressful situation and your first thought is to eat junk food or pour a glass of wine, it’s because you’ve created that impulse by repeatedly taking that action. For whatever reason, the action makes you feel better, even if just for a moment. This perpetuates the pattern. The same goes for your writing. When faced with a deadline or you’re stuck, your impulse may lead you to distractions. So what can you do? The first step is to discover the negative thoughts that keep you in the negative loop. The Mindful.org article calls this negative self-narratives. These narratives become repetitive attitude and behavioral patterns. Probably one of the most common negative thought patterns for a writer is the imposter syndrome. Telling yourself that you’re not a good writer is self-defeating. Or telling yourself that you’ll never achieve the success some of your writing peers have reached can kill your drive. The sneaky thing about thoughts is you don’t usually pay attention to them. You act on them without realizing that those negative thoughts are motivating you to take that particular negative action. So, a key to creating positive self-narratives is to pay attention to your thoughts and change them when needed. If you’re not successful, keep trying. Self-talk is an excellent tool to train your brain to think differently. You might come up with a mantra that you repeat to yourself throughout the day. It might be “I’m a successful writer” or, “I write and submit my work on a regular basis.” It would be a good idea to make it detailed to suit your personal goals. For example, mine might be, “I’m a skilled and successful writer. Projects come to me easily.” A note here: If you use a word like successful, you do need to know what success means to you. What does it look like? How does it feel? Another tool is to keep positivity front and center. This may be in the form of notes, images, and a vision board. SEE IT. SAY IT. BELIEVE IT. 2. What about self-defeating actions you keep repeating? The Forbes article mentions that if you have a self-defeating habit, such as eating junk food or having a glass of wine when stressed, each time you take this action, you’re reinforcing it. In regard to writing: -It may be you’re on social media too much, or maybe it’s TV. -You may procrastinate by going through your emails rather than writing. Those social and promotional emails can bring you to lots of articles and promo content to read, keeping you away from your writing. -Maybe you call friends or relatives and talk for hours to avoid working on your writing project. -Maybe you start stories but never finish them. -Maybe your write an article or story, but don’t submit it. What you continually do to avoid writing becomes entrenched in your behavior pattern. This makes it difficult to stop the negative impulse. The Forbes article suggests that you be willing to see the change is possible. Maybe you’ve been procrastinating about submitting article queries or book proposals or queries. Go beyond your comfort zone and actually submit. You may not get any responses. You may even get rejections. But if you keep taking positive actions, eventually something will click. A Final Tip Going back to the Forbes article, it explains that “when our subconscious minds hold us back from pursuing something that we love, it is because we are holding a conflicting belief about it.” This is when you need to become a detective. Dig deep and try to find out what that conflicting belief is. Subconsciously do you think you don’t deserve to be successful? Are you afraid of success? What keeps you repeating a negative action when you know it’s self-defeating?
I’m a working children’s ghostwriter, rewriter, and coach. I can help turn your story into a book you’ll be proud to be author of, one that’s publishable and marketable. You can contact me at: kcioffiventrice@gmail.com. Or, you can give me a call at 834---347---6700 Or, if you’d rather do-it-yourself, check out my book, How to Write a Children’s Fiction Book.
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