Impostor Syndrome?

Right now I don’t feel like a real writer.   Maybe its because I haven’t been writing for a number of weeks and I have a big deadline bearing down on me.  It will be good to get back to my desk in January.  I’ll probably have a lot fewer pep talks with myself when I do.   I think it’s strange that not writing for a few weeks makes me feel like a pretend writer.   I didn’t feel like  a faker when I was a teacher.  I didn’t feel like a faker when I was in PR and sales and marketing.  So why do I feel like a faker when it comes to being a writer?

Yesterday after seeing the doctor I stopped by Barnes & Noble at the Kahala Mall and bought a stack of books.  A big stack.  Three Georgette Heyer’s, three Larissa Ione, an older Mary Balogh, an older Kresley Cole, and Nora Robert’s newest.  I am so delighted by my stack of books.  I like looking at them.  I like knowing they are there, waiting to be read.  I like the possibilities that exist within their covers.

Barnes & Noble must think I’m a real writer because at the Kahala store, they had one of each of my women’s fiction titles in the fiction & lit section.   I even took a picture of the shelves with my books (see below) to remind myself that this is real…and that in 2012 I will have three new books out, two new Harlequin Presents in North America and the September publication of The Good Woman from Berkley.

Do you ever feel like an impostor?  What do you think its from?  I wish I knew.  One of my friends said it was a fear of failing, or a fear of disappointing.  That makes sense, because I do worry now about letting my readers down.  I hate the idea of disappointing them, or you.  Maybe it’s inevitable that we worry about what others think when we care about those people.

Speaking of caring, my heart is very happy that my friend Megan Crane will soon be here for a week with her husband Jeff.  They arrive Christmas Eve, and then my two big boys arrive on the 27th for New Years.  I love it when the house is full of friends and family, especially over the holidays.

Hoping the holidays are treating you well.   Talk to me and fill me in if you have time.  I’ve got three prize boxes for three of you.  As always I will draw the winner’s names from the comments below.  Contest runs through Christmas Eve and sometime on Christmas Day I’ll pop in to announce the winners.

Until then, stay warm and dry and know that I am so very lucky to have friends in all of you!