#anyway anon i love you and i hope you find your 6 psychos soon

[nocaptainonthisship]

I understand the point of your post but it hurts alot when your fics don't get the kind of kudos or comments other writers fics do.

I completely hear you on this, nonny.

Not comparing myself to other writers is something I am trying to get better at every single day. Its hard! You start to wonder if people aren't reading because there is something wrong with you, or with the way you write. I have to say, I don't think that's true at all.

I think a lot about that old biblical phrase, "there is nothing new under the sun." I think, too, about "there are no new stories, only new writers." Partly, its because I write fanfiction. Partly its because I'm repeatedly drawn to adaptations of older works. Partly its because my number one response to watching marvel movies was usually saying "Cool story, bro, but what if it was about a woman??" and then, a couple years later saying, "Ok, but maybe not like That."

But I get to think about the other implications of that, too. No story I ever tell will be completely 100% from my own imagination. I am the sum total of all my parts. Every book I read and every movie or tv show or play I've seen lives inside me, the parts that most interested me broken down and distilled and recombined to be something that feels entirely my own.

What makes my writing special is ME.

I wrote my first piece of fanfic when I was 12. It was a songfic(Evanescence's Bring Me Back to Life, just in case you were worried I wasn't a baby emo) and it was angsty as all hell(some things never change I guess.) A few people read it. A few even dropped nice little notes about it. I can't tell you if it was actually any good, because that forum has been dead for a long time, and the desktop at my parents house has been replaced in the almost 20 years since. I suspect it was fairly terrible, though. I mean, I was 12.

I wrote a little more as I got into high school, before I started telling myself to grow out of fanfic(don't worry, I also grew out of that.) But I kept writing, mostly just for me. I kept getting better. I kept becoming more and more confident in my own voice and what it is I can bring to the table.

Which, I guess, brings me at long last to my point. I'm not some superwriter who doesn't get a burst of joy when someone leaves a comment on one of my fics. I LOVE connecting with people and knowing that my words touched someone's life in a positive way. But I don't need it. I'm going to write for myself(and the 6 psychos in my dms.) I'm going to write things I can be proud of, things I can stand back and say, "I did that!" I don't need to be the most popular, I simply need to be the best version of myself.

There is always going to be someone out there who is more popular than me.

But there is never going to be another me.

There is never going to be another YOU.

Be the best you that you can be. Tell the stories that you want to tell, not the ones you think will get the most engagement.

What you bring to the table is important, no matter how many people comment.

Keep writing, keep being you. You will find your people, I promise. I didn't find the 6 psychos until my 30s. There was a time I thought no one at all would ever like my words. As much as I enjoy being right, I'm so glad to have been proved wrong on this one.