How do I avoid getting depressed after receiving edits?

Question

I just wrote my first op-ed for my college newspaper, and I've always considered myself a pretty okay writer; but after receiving my first round of edits I just feel so low, like I've disappointed the entire editing staff, and I never want to write an article ever again. I'm not upset with the edits at all: they are helpful and relevant. It's just so many things that were wrong with what I wrote. I just feel like I am so much worse than all of my other peers that I have difficulty getting the motivation to writing my second draft. I don't really know if I have a specific question I'm trying to get answered, but does anyone feel the way I do? How do I avoid this extreme depressing feeling when I get edits back so I can just write this second draft without feeling like my entire existence was rejected?

Answer 1

1. Understand that becoming a good and successful writer requires learning the craft. As with any other skill, you cannot expect of yourself to be an acomplished writer when you are just beginning. There's a long journey of learning and practice ahead of you. Allow yourself to be a beginner, to make mistakes, to learn, and to grow.

2. Do not identify with your work. You are not your text and criticism aimed at your writing is not a criticism of you as a person. You are still a good and lovable human being, even if your writing isn't flawless.

3. Getting feedback and revising your writing is a normal part of professional writing. A text isn't finished when you reach the end of the first draft, it is finished when it has gone through the revision process. Look at this as a natural part of writing, just like brainstorming ideas, doing research, checking spelling, and so on are parts of writing.

4. If you feel that even adequate and friendly criticism hits you uncommonly hard, consider psychotherapy. You may suffer from low self-esteem and pathological perfectionism. Changing such dysfunctional mental habits might require more comprehensive treatment.

   a. One good technique to overcome fear and self-loathing is to act how you would have acted if you hadn't felt that way. What would you have done if you hadn't felt so bad about the criticism? You'd have been grateful for the feedback and the chance to improve yourself and your text and you'd have sitten down and written the second draft. So, just don't follow your emotions (that tell you to avoid writing, because it was so painful), but instead use your reason to understand that your emotions are unwarranted and employ it to control yourself and make yourself do what needs to be done. The effect, in the long term, will be that your emotional system "learns" that this level of fear and self-loathing is unnecessary and it will "tune those emotions down" to a more functional amount.

   b. Another helpful technique is to practice thinking of yourself and your work in a more benevolent manner. For example, instead of thinking that, as you wrote, there were "so many things that were wrong with what [you] wrote", that is, instead of thinking of the perfection that you have tried to achieve and how you have failed to achieve it (i.e. instead of thining "I only managed 50% of 100%"), you could think "that was good and now I'll try to make it even better" (i.e. you think "I managed 100% and now I'll try and make it 200%"). From the first viewpoint you focus on your failure (which feels bad), from the second you focus on your potential (which feels good). If you find it difficult to think of yourself in that way, you can write such positive thoughts about yourself on flashcards and read them several times a day (e.g. every time you drink) to practice that unfamiliar way to think. With time it will become more natural and happen automatically.

   c. Practice mindfulness. For how to practice it, I recomment The Miracle of Mindfulness by Thích Nhất Hạnh. (Briefly: Practice letting go of all thoughts and focus on your sensual perceptions during tasks such as doing the dishes or hanging your laundry.) Through mindfulness you learn to direct your thoughts where you want them. Instead of dwelling on past failures or future (possible) failures, you learn to live in the present moment, appreciate it, and make good use of the opportunities that every moment offers.

   There are other techniques that are too many for me to list here, but you can search the internet for anything related to positive thinking and increasing your sense of self-esteem.

Answer 2

First attempts are always not good. Deal with it.

How were your first words? I'd bet it was a mumble only your parents were able to decipher. How was your first bike ride? I'd bet you fell in few meters. Great speakers started mumbling, great bikers started falling.

All writers started like you did with your article.

The advisor of my first thesis used red ink to mark corrections on the paper draft. The first draft had the least ammount of ink used - it was crossed out from one corner to another with a note "rewrite!" Same was the second. Third had more ink - two big cross-outs with one paragraph accepted with sentences comented.

The more iterations, the more ink was used per page - from crossing pages out, it went to paragraphs, sentences, words...

Then suddenly the ink started disappearing with fewer and fewer sentences marked for rework.

Couple of years later I was in their shoes advising theses.

The first draft was worth crossing everything out. I wasn't dissapointed by that since I was expecting that. The only thing I was disappointed was the lack of improvement between n-th and n+1-th draft.

The point is not "Do not make errors"; it is "Do not make same errors again". The first kills creativity and powers anxiety, the later lets you grow.

Be humble. Be humble to yourself too. You have just started, there is no way to start from perfection. As you got a lot of relevant edits it means there is much more that does not need editting! You are having a head start, actually. Many would reach such notes in third edit round but you got it in the first run.

The problem may be that only the success is presented, not the way to it. We cannot see all the drafts before the article or book is printed. We don't see the ammount of lines deleted stright out, we don't see how many times one sentence was reworded to sound right. Even this answer wasn't written in one go.

So relax. You didn't disappoint the editors (yet). You might disappoint them by not addressing their comments or adding more material to be editted. You might disappoint them by not polishing your work any further.

Also remind yourself the editors are different people than you are. They think differently. They use language differently. There will always be edits because of this.

Answer 3

Your reaction is not uncommon

It sounds like a combination of Imposter Syndrome and Rejection Sensitive Dysphoria (RSD). It's not related to your abilities as a writer or as a person: both of these can be found in people in other fields, and even nonprofessional settings like romantic relationships.

Preamble: While neither is in the DSM, they are often comorbid with conditions that are. (RSD is especially associated with ADHD, for example.) Treating these conditions directly can alleviate problems like the ones you're having, in addition to any other problems that justify such a diagnosis. Nonetheless, not everyone with Imposter Syndrome or RSD has a comorbid condition.

Strategies

The internet has a wealth of information and testimonies to help if you know what to search for (thus the importance of having a name for what's happening). The following is what I gleaned from a number of sources.

On a personal level

Work towards viewing your achievements as what they are, which is important to prevent burnout. You may not cure yourself from all the negative feelings going forward (nor is it likely necessary), but that just makes it all the more important that you bring in positive ones to counterbalance it. In this question, you've taken an achievement (writing something for your college newspaper) and twisted it completely (feeling like your "entire existence was rejected").

Achieving more doesn't fix these feelings. Since they're not rational, there's a good chance that you'll move the goalposts on yourself and find some other reason to doubt yourself.

You will have to do work between the initial draft and publication, as would everyone else. A huge difference between your work and theirs is how much you know about the grunt work behind the scenes. Instead, it's easy to see just their final product. There still are iterations of feedback and polishing happening that you're just not privy to.

Talking with your peers about their struggles during the process may be helpful to put things in perspective.

On an interpersonal level

Make sure you don't sabotage yourself. There are many dysfunctional behaviors that people fall into (like holding themselves back from attempting bigger projects, or isolating themselves), in lieu of real coping strategies. In this case, you need to work through your negative feelings and finish making changes, even if it's just one at a time.

Answer 4

I am an analytical sort of fiction writer. I believe in craft, and learning the craft.

I have been red-faced embarrassed many times by reviews of my fiction writing; but I have always told my readers (volunteers or paid) "don't hold back."

Soon enough, the embarrassment fades, and my analytical side takes over: What exactly is wrong with it?

Can I find a pattern I need to correct? Can I understand why this is cringe?

Understand the point of the review is to get beat up. Do not even expect praise for writing. Thank your reviewer in advance, and read their review in private, and brace yourself to feel insulted. They are probably just trying to help you.

Sometimes, some reviewers are just uncomfortable with sex scenes, or gratuitous violence by the villain. But for the most part, their criticism is helpful.

And you don't need to just correct the one problem they pointed out -- You need to understand your error in broader terms than that, so you don't make similar errors in the future.

Learning to write prose that other people want to read is a long and difficult process, just as much as working out in the gym every day to build muscles.

You have to build your writing muscles. And, to borrow a phrase: No pain, no gain.

Ours is just psychological pain, but it is worth it to build your writing muscles.

Answer 5

Let me first state that I understand that your piece was not wholesale rejected but only rejected in its current form; that is actually a measure of success.

The emotional response you have is in principle not untypical. It also is not specifically related to writing but in my experience occurs in all instances where we produce something or undertake something that contains "a part of us" which is then rejected: A college or job application, an artwork, a piece of non-trivial computer code, a love declaration. We all know the feeling that this was not just a formal rejection but a rejection of us as a person. Any of these rejections can leave us shaken and emotionally down.

You are asking here because you find this emotional toll hard to manage. Because I don't think this is specific to writing any advice here would be generic, including getting professional help if you feel you cannot cope with it on your own.

Answer 6

My mother was a visual artist (stained glass) who also taught color theory. When we were children, she introduced us to the concept of attending a "crit" (short for critique) of one's work, which was a normal practice in her department. The very idea terrified me at first. Eventually I came to realize that the best way to advance in the quality of your work is to invite critique, to seek it out, to soak it up. These people are, for the most part, helping you grow! They are the sun and rain for your creative flowering. Your feelings are normal, but we can evolve to feel differently, to even welcome critique and seek it out. The trick is knowing that over a lifetime, every word you write brings you closer to your goal of mastering your art.