One of the things I’ve been piloting in my day job is a program for graduating senior women to help them with the transition from college student to first job and the first six months. This week we met for our first Zoom session post graduation. Beyond it being wonderful to see these young women who I’ve invested so much time into — a true joy! — it was fun to listen to our guest speaker give advice about solicticing feedback. That’s the kind of topic that we can all benefit from. In addition to adding to my already towering to be read pile with a book on feedback, the speaker shared some great practical tips on for these young women and me. But one of the things we talked about was how hard it can be to give and receive feedback. There are many reasons but a couple that came up are that it’s hard to hear that we aren’t doing well nad then figure out how to improve. And there’s also the risk of getting stuck in comparison.
This month we asked this cohort to read a section of Beyond Grit by Cindra Kamphoff, and in it Cindra addresses the importance of being our authentic selves and not falling into the comparison trap.
How does this apply to writing and reading?
Writing is such a solitary life. It’s one reason I love this community at Inspired by Life & Fiction. But when I feel isolated and alone in writing, it’s easy to move from a posture of celebrating when my friends receive an aware or accolade to bemoaning the fact that I didn’t. Often this happens because I’m comparing two people that are at very different points in their careers. Or I’m comparing books that aren’t equal in any sense (genre, category, etc.).
When I move from celebrating others to comparing, my attitude takes a nose dive. I become whiny and all woe is me. I’m no fun to be around. At all.
That’s one reason I try to stay focused on the people. When writers are my good friends, even best firends, then it’s so easy to celebrate with them. It’s such fun to cheer on their success. And that’s one of the reasons I started Book Talk. Keeping the focus on promoting other authors helps keep the focus off me — and exactly on where it should be…serving others. I’d love to know how you combat the comparison trap!
I’m slightly stunned that we’ll cross 100 episodes in July. What?!?! But it’s been such fun to be able to introduce y’all to some of your favorite authors or new-to-you authors. If you’d like to share ideas and thoughts with me on what the podcast should look like moving forward — or even if it moves forward — then I’d love your feedback. You can give it in this short survey; I’ll be sending everyone who completes it a link to one of my books to download for free in ebook formats. Feel free to click the image below to go to the podcast page on my website with links to all the places you can watch and listen to all the episodes.
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I love the podcast, Cara (watch it on YouTube) and have so enjoyed learning more about authors I don’t know as well, but also authors I’m already friends with, yet hearing your interview with them, I learn something new and interesting about their writing and their life outside of writing. Thanks so much for doing these great interviews! I’ll happily watch 100 more episodes!
“Comparison is the thief of joy.” I’m too lazy to go look up who said that, but I believe it is true.
In my Bible, at the end of John, in relation to the story where Peter asks, “What about [John]?”, next to 21:22, I wrote on June 4, 2000, “Jesus was saying, ‘Don’t look at what I’m doing with someone else’s life. All that should concern you is what I’m doing with yours.’ (i.e. Keep your nose out of John’s business.)”
That lesson has helped me avoid comparison in the decades since. Not 100% of the time but most of the time. At the very least, it helps me get back on track faster.
And I love your podcast!