Letting other people see your work: Gaining confidence as a writer

This is going to be a short one reader (s).

So, something I wasn't able to do in India was feel confident about submitting my writing to my school magazine. Looking back, I think it wasn't me. It was the people who had my work in their hands that would make it possible for my work to be published, and their lack of positivity towards me. The teachers were never encouraging enough for my younger self, although not all of them were discouraging.

I guess the fact that teachers didn't always find me likeable was my major problem. I was just being myself, and with all the trials I went through in high school, I retreated into my shell when I had terrible experiences, especially with teachers.

The school magazine wasn't like the college magazine I submit to now. It was a typical Indian school magazine-no one was getting paid to do anything, and at the end of my senior year my entire class was basically forced to publish a piece, whether that was art or poetry or whatever else was allowed.

You wouldn't get any feedback or notice of whether your piece was being published, and so that year I never found out whether they actually published my poem in the magazine.

Here at UMass Boston, the level of the magazine, the quality, the people in charge... they're all of a higher level. These are people who really want to be editors and designers and all that stuff.

But anyway, I decided that I wanted to publish my poetry in The Watermark Journal after I took a course in Literature and Visual Arts in my first semester. The professor I had was incredibly encouraging when we had to do an assignment that involved poetry writing. He gave me an A for that assignment, and from then on I started using poetry as a method of journaling.

I write sad and angry poetry, but I also like happy poetry about simple things like daydreaming and being proud of myself and who I am.

I think that even though my poems aren't big contributions, they matter to me because of how high they've pushed me to step out of my comfort zone and writing something other than novels all the time.

My point is, to all the writers out there: You need to share your work! Share it on an FB group, a blog of your own, a school or college magazine. As long as you share your work, you're likely to get feedback, and then your confidence and the security you feel towards your writing will grow.

And that kind of growth is undeniably unique.

So go get it!

Seek it out high and low, and then continue to pursue your dreams.

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-Menaka