Now, you may say, "Jen, I don't have to worry about that because nobody, including my mother, has ever praised my writing," but if you keep writing and keep improving your writing, at some point, magically, someone will say something good about it. What then? For me, I find this a difficult thing to handle. My husband says that I am suffering from "imposter syndrome," and I have no evidence to refute him. When someone says something positive about my writing, my first thought is, "Oh, they're just saying that to be nice, they don't really think it's good." But that is not a very helpful way of handling praise because then I am not able to distinguish in my head when my writing is good and when it isn't.
One thing to consider is the source of the praise. Obviously we should take things with just a few grains of salt if that source is closely related to us and maybe has a history of sparing our feelings. But the "best" praise shouldn't come from a stranger either. It should come from someone you know who is able to be impartial and honest in their assessment. I suppose the best way to know if something truly is a good piece of writing is to send it to multiple people to read. Now, it is true that different people have differing opinions, and occasionally one person will think something is great when another person thinks it is garbage, but that is pretty rare.
Anyways, I hope that this is a "problem" that I have more and more often. Cheers. ;)
I Write, I Edit, I Write Again. Witness!
We're Making Better Words, All of Them, Better Words.
I Write to Burn Off the Crazy.
A Good Day Writing is a Day Writing.
It Puts the Words on the Page or it Gets the Hose Again.
Just Keep Writing, Just Keep Writing; Writing, Writing, Writing...