Why You Need to Keep Sharing Your Writing

Welcome, writers!

I have to confess something to you. When I first started out, I was afraid to share my writing. I convinced myself that I didn’t need to blog or submit my stories. I could just quietly work on my writing and show no one until I had a perfect novel written. But I finally decided to submit one short story to a literary journal, and everything changed.

That acceptance led to other submissions, speaking openly about my writing, and starting a blog with my sister. Even now, I still have moments of doubt where I need a reminder of the reasons to keep putting my writing out there, even though I’m not at the point of making a living from it. And we’re here to remind you of why you should keep going too!

Confidence

We know it can be difficult to share your writing, especially on large platforms, but every person who leaves a comment means they took the time to read your story, and it impacted them enough to tell you! Every single comment, kind word, and encouragement goes such a long way. It’s a confidence booster, it makes you feel like your writing is worth something; and that’s just it. It is! Whether it’s monetary or not, your stories, your words mean something to people.

I can’t tell you how many times I’ve felt like my writing wasn’t the best, or lacked in some areas. Then I see a notification pop up, I click on it and there is a comment on how much someone enjoyed my story, and what they liked about it. Reading these genuinely brings tears to my eyes more often than not, because someone out there enjoyed what I wrote! It’s an incredible feeling that you can only get if you continue to write, and continue to put your work out there.

That confident boost is enough to keep me writing, and honestly gives me validity that my writing is worth the time I put into it. Confidence in your writing can inspire you to write more, and writing more means learning and growing as a writer, as well as exposure for your writing the more you post! In turn, take the time to read other author’s work, and show them the same kindness that has helped you. Being a part of a writing community is one of the greatest decisions we have made for our writing!

Accountability

Publishing your writing online is a great way to get accountability, if you are struggling to stick to a writing schedule. Knowing there are readers out there waiting for our next story is a big motivator for me. There are definitely hard weeks where I wouldn’t have written, if not for this accountability. Since we started posting our writing online, I’ve written much more often.

Sticking to a schedule is key when you want to build up a writing habit, and publishing your writing on a regular basis engrains that schedule into your mind. We post weekly, and every week no matter how busy my life gets, I always find time to sit and write, check on the blog, and at the very least (if it’s Clever’s turn for a story) plan out what either our next post or the next story will be about. I have never written more in my life than when we started publishing our work!

Experience

You will grow as a writer if you write regularly. A common piece of writing advice is to practice at it. Looking at our stories when we first started posting versus now, I can see how much both of our writing has improved. Putting our writing out there has allowed us to get feedback, and see what is working well.

You can also use your blog or writing platform as a way to experiment with different styles and genres. Trying different things might work out better than you expect, and sharing these experiments will tell you what your readers like. My first time writing a horror story, I was nervous that people wouldn’t like it. It turned out that story got the best reaction out of any I had written at the time! It encouraged me to be more vulnerable in my writing, and I have written more horror and dark fantasy since then. I wouldn’t have gotten this knowledge and experience, if I hadn’t put my writing out there.

Connection

One of the most surprising and rewarding parts of starting our blog and joining platforms like Vocal has been meeting new writers. I enjoy reading their stories, commenting on each other’s writing, and just getting to know one another. We have built some great connections with amazing writers like:

E. Ardincaple

— We enjoyed her folktale, The Princess and the Blue Rose, and are excited about the Fiction Friends publication she started. She also frequently reads and comments on our stories, which we really appreciate!

Denise Larkin

— We write for her popular fiction publication, The Lark, and she posts very encouraging and helpful comments on our stories.

Taylor D. Levesque

— She writes some great fantasy and horror stories. We especially like her Dragon’s Bane series.

Raine Lore

— Raine regularly leaves kind words on our stories. We particularly enjoyed her recent short story, A House in the Mist.

We’ve also built connections with readers by being vulnerable in our writing. I was nervous about sharing my first personal essay on Medium, about my husband’s cancer diagnoses and how we coped. This story ended up getting a lot of positive responses from people who’ve been through it too. It made me feel good that others were able to connect with my story and that maybe I helped them. You have something important to say and those words will touch someone if you put them out there.

What Do You Think?

Take a moment to think about your reasons for writing and sharing it with the world. Because the truth is, we all write because we have something worth saying, worth sharing, not to hide it in a notebook. Which reasons that we listed were encouraging to you? Do you have a reason to share your work that we didn’t include? If this post helped you, let us know in the comments!

Also, feel free to share some writers that you’ve made a connection with on Vocal. We’d love to check them out!

Thanks so much for reading!

-Clever & WTF