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raven-at-the-writing-desk · 1 year

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Hi Raven! Lemme start out saying that I love your posts, they are really thought out and informative, especially with matters going on in the community. You don’t have to answer this if you're busy,but I have a question. I wanna start a Twist blog, well kinda. I wanna start posting some of my works, and kinda make a blog on my Twist OC, but I don't know where to start. If you have any tips or tricks, that would be helpful l, but if you don't have a direct answer to this, that's fine too anything will help. And another question is, how do you get over to fear of people not liking your works or even OC? I've seen quite a bit of hate in this Fandom, and idk if my sensitive heart can take it. 😅 It's kinda the reason why I've never posted at all. Thanks again.

Hello there ^^ I’m happy that you enjoy my blog and that you find my posts informative!

For general advice on starting and maintaining a writing blog, please see this post. I’m going to use the rest of this response to speak at length about the second question posed by the asker: “how do you get over the fear of people not liking your works or even OC?”

First, let’s get something out of the way: humans are inherently social creatures; therefore, it is in our nature to desire positive attention/approval and to be afraid of rejection and ostracism. There is no shame in wanting validation. It’s a built-in survival mechanism leftover from the past—because when humans band together, they are more likely to thrive. However, I also think that in the modern world, it’s easy to get carried away and care too much about what others will think of you. This is so true in the age of social media, where likes, shares, and even follows and views are quantifiable and thus can be used as a point of comparison to others on the same platform. It’s also easier than ever to connect with others, which can be both a boon (meeting people you otherwise could have never met) and a detriment (internet hate).

Now, as simple as it would be for me to say, “create for yourself rather than seek the approval of others”, that advice doesn’t actually do much for anyone. It's easy to talk the talk, but it's much harder to walk the walk. It’s all about mindset, because in actuality, a very small number of people out of the overall fandom will care about your works enough to actively hate on an individual. The mind seemingly magnifies the number because humans are hardwired to pay more attention to the negative experiences over the positive ones (which, again, is another survival instinct; you pay attention to the bad things to avoid them or to resolve the issues). There goes the saying, “we’re our own worst critics”, and it’s very true here. It’s not just negativity from others you must deal with, but self/doubt snd your own mind perpetuating the belief that the negativity is much worse than it actually is. Of course, there are actual serious cases of hate (harassment, stalking, threats, doxxing, racism, etc), but here I am only referring to general cases of other people “not liking what you make” or saying mean things (such as “you’re a bad writer”).

So how does one improve their mindset? Truth be told, it doesn’t happen overnight. In fact, learning to not care what others think of you is a difficult and lengthy process. It will take time and effort to reach a comfortable state of acceptance (and yes, I’m talking years long here)—but it is possible to grow out of that fixation.

Here are some truths you have to accept if you want to overcome your worries:

In putting your work “out there” in a public space, you will naturally invite feedback, both good and bad. An integral part of creating is, of course, wanting to share one’s creations with others. However, it’s unrealistic to think that you won’t ever get negative feedback or critique. It isn’t always constructive or helpful to you, but you must brace for them to come your way all the same. If you think about it, getting nothing but praise isn’t good either because then it traps you in a cycle of thinking you’re perfect and there’s nothing you need to improve on. It becomes an echo chamber and it can lead to stagnation because you’re already satisfied with your current state instead of thinking about how you can grow. Mixed feedback is important for personal growth.

There may not necessarily be a problem with your content, it could be a matter of differences in circumstances or tastes. You must remember that lack of engagement is not always equivalent to hate. Indifference or not even coming into contact with a post is NOT the same as actively going to post a negative comment or ask. That being said, lack of engagement could be the result of a website’s algorithm working against your favor. Alternatively, it could be that you aren’t hitting a target audience. Like, if you write angst, it may not appeal to a certain subsection of fans. These are factors largely outside of your control, and trying to gain that control would be a fruitless effort.

There’s nothing wrong with blocking, especially if things escalate. I know that on sites like Twitter and Tiktok, blocking people is seen as “taboo” or some kind of hateful social statement when… it’s not. Blocking is a means of curating your space so you can have fun online without worrying about others raining on your parade. If people are giving you a hard time, nothing is stopping you from blocking them (which can be done even with anonymous asks). Don’t give people that send “hate” attention by responding and showing just how upset their comments made you, it only encourages them to continue once they’ve seen how much it affects you.

One instance of “hate” is not representative of the entire fandom’s feelings. This circles back to what I said before; the negative and toxic people in this fandom is actually minuscule when compared to the total number of fans in this space. Instead of letting the few rotten apples define the entire bushel, think about all the positive experiences you’ve had!

You can’t please everyone. As much as you try to, it won’t happen. But you know what is much more feasible of a goal? Pleasing yourself. You know what you like best, and if you’re able to make what makes you happy then you have a 100% chance of satisfying at least one person.

If you feel frustrated, it’s fine!! It’s normal to feel this way when you think a work you shared isn’t getting the kind of exposure you want it to (whether it’s little exposure or negative exposure). We want to feel like our energy and time was put into something worthwhile. Just don’t take it too hard because these things are bound to happen. Not everything you make will be a hit, and your audience may not always be receptive to what you put out.

If you create mainly or solely for the approval of others, you won’t be happy with yourself. Ask yourself why you want to create in the first place. Most likely it’s because you’re passionate about TWST and/or you just wanted to have fun. But when this shifts to a focus on pleasing others, is it really fun anymore? If you’re always chasing trends (which are very transient) or thinking about how you should change your work to have greater mass appeal, is it really “you”, or are you just being what you think people want you to be? It just results in never being satisfied, because you’re aiming for the impossibility of making everyone happy. When you weigh your worth based on others’ perception of you or on engagement, you run the risk of burnout and losing joy in creating.

You’ll have to embrace cringe. When I say “cringe”, I mean it in the sense that you should be comfortable being your authentic self even if you fear people won’t like it. Again, you cannot please everyone—but surely there will be people who will accept you and like you for who you are. Some will vibe with you, some won’t, and that’s a fact.

You won’t be perfect at keeping out negativity from others, and that’s okay. What matters is how you address those instances when they arise. It’s not productive to let negative thoughts stew or hold you back from creating what you want. Instead of letting the thoughts fester, try to redirect your energy to something else.

Additionally, here are some suggestions on what you can do to alleviate your doubts. These methods work for me, but I’m not going to claim they work for everyone; I figured I’d just throw the ideas out there in case they’d be helpful to others.

Isolate yourself from social media for a period of time until you're in a better headspace.

An alternative to social media isolation is looking at other people's creations (but ignoring the numbers, as that can be a basis for comparison)! It may inspire you to make something of your own. For example, sometimes I've been scrolling and I'd see someone's OC in their own outfit for an event like Fairy Gala, and that made me excited to do the same for my own characters.

Another alternative to social media isolation is looking at the positives! Think about the number of people who have supported you or left nice comments and how they outweigh the Negative Nancies. (This is an example of using the numbers to your advantage!) I know of some friends who use a special tag on their blogs to denote "feel good" asks so they can reference these to cheer up when they're feeling discouraged or down.

Rather than comparing yourself to others, compare yourself to... yourself! Treat it like a New Year's resolution: you're looking back at where you started and think considering how you've changed since then.

Do something else you love to get your attention away from your creative endeavors. This could be another hobby or spending time with friends or family.

Speaking of friends and family, talk to them! Let them know how you're feeling and why you're feeling this way. They can offer you support and advice. I find that this is especially helpful when you are able to speak with other content creators, who may be able to empathize with your experiences.

Practice mindfulness and gratitude. Instead of thinking about what you don't have, think about what you do have and be appreciative of it. This helps shift the center away from things out of your control (ie other people) and to something that is within your control (ie yourself).

Minimize taking things personally. This can be especially hard in cases of OCs because creators tend to put a lot of themselves into their OCs (particularly if they are self inserts or Yuusonas)—so when others say they don't like an OC, it can feel like an indirect way of saying "I don't like you, the creator". But rarely is this the intended meaning of a comment. When people say they don't like something, it doesn't always mean they also dislike the creator. Remember that at the end of the day, we're all internet strangers that don't know each other on a deeply personal level (so why should you hinge your self-worth on such a thing?). You can be close with your works and OCs, but don't necessarily think of the works/OCs as a 1:1 extension of yourself. When you think of it like that, it helps to detach yourself from negativity that a work may receive.

Think about what you’re good at and focus on that niche. In this way, you will be able to make what you want while also attracting an audience that also appreciates this niche over time.

Make something for yourself, no posting necessary! Sometimes it can help you air out your feelings if you make a piece (art, writing, etc.) for no one but yourself to see. It’s surprisingly very therapeutic.

With all of that being said, I’d like to close off this post by saying that conquering the fear of others negatively judging your works is something that all creators have to go through. We're at various stages in this process, and we will continue to have our moments of weakness. This is a completely normal thing (though it is perhaps not commonly discussed out in the open) and it should be normalized. Even I go through periods of self-doubt and find myself holding off on posting certain pieces (especially anything that is OC-related) because I overthink how they may be perceived. I know that most of my audience is here for the canon TWST characters, so I worry that posting OC content is self-indulgent, maybe even selfish if I'm feeling particularly mean toward myself on a given day. It's negative self-talk like this that can be detrimental to creators and their enjoyment of their craft; that's why it's important to identify these moments and try to figure out ways to overcome them, even if it's just taking little baby steps. Some progress is better than no progress!

Anyway, I hope that you found this post useful ^^ If you think it may be also be of use to a creator you know, please consider sharing it with them.

#twst #twst oc #twisted wonderland #twst en #twisted wonderland oc #twisted wonderland en #notes from the writing raven #question #advice #disney twisted wonderland #putting this in the main tags in case this advice is found to be useful to other TWST content creators #honestly though this advice applies to creators in ANY fandom #tw // harassment #tw // stalking #tw // doxxing #tw // threats #tw // racism

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