Help! I Want to Write Online, But My Friends Think I’m Cringe

Dear David, 

I’m Scared of Looking Dumb. I dream about sharing my work online. I have experiences I want (need) to write about. I have ideas I believe are genuinely valuable. I’m dying to express myself creatively. (And I even spent four hours this weekend choosing the color palette for my website.) But I have nightmares about becoming the inside joke of a group chat. 

I know I’m not crazy. I’ve seen before — someone I know starts sharing their work (a link to an essay they wrote or a video of them singing) and that’s when it starts. The snide giggles. The hushed whispers. The rolled eyes and the snarky comments.

What if my friends think I’m cringe? What if my coworkers laugh at my writing? What if I regret writing in public so much that I’m forced to delete social media and move to rural Idaho just to escape my own cringe? What should I do? 

Sincerely, 

Scared of Looking Dumb

Dear Scared of Looking Dumb, 

I hear you. I’ve been the laughingstock of a group chat once or twice. But trust me — your people are out there. The Internet is the best matchmaking tool on the planet. Here’s what I’ve learned. 

When you share your work online, you receive real-time feedback on your ideas from strangers all over the world. (Where else can you do that? Nowhere.) 

You connect with like-minded people you would have never met in person (a new best friend, a fan who loves your work, the CEO of your dream company — I’ve seen it all). 

Your ideas work for you, opening doors you didn’t know existed in the first place — book deals, podcast appearances, and seemingly random DMs that say, “Hey, would you be open to working with us?”.

And that's not even the best part.

When you share your work online, you start honoring your potential. You start respecting your ideas and fulfilling your desire to create. You start becoming the person you know you can be. 

Again, I get it. Your fear of looking dumb is valid. (Being “cringe” is a social guillotine nowadays.) But if we’re being honest, no good piece of writing was ever created without a little bit of cringe. 

My advice to you? Embrace your little bit of cringe. Respect your ideas; honor your potential; and if you’re burning to write online, just do it. Ten years from now, no one will remember your cringy first article. But if you don’t start, you’ll regret having never shared your ideas.

If you’re looking for a way to kickstart your writing streak, join us for Publish in a Day. The next one-day workshop will run on January 19.

Here’s to honoring your potential, 

David

Alumni Stories

Publishing online isn’t as scary as you think. Just ask Bennett. 

Bennett was bursting with different passions: travel, food, surfing, new languages, you name it. He had never published online before, but he wanted to honor his ideas. He joined Publish in a Day to explore his curiosities and share them with the world. 

His goal? Get over the hurdle of hitting “Publish.”

“The biggest thing is you get to see the results you’re capable of in one day. These results are tangible, which is the overarching theme of Write of Passage. There are tangible relationships, you get results on your writing, and you feel like you’re learning and improving,” he said.

Once Bennett published his work for the first time, he realized that writing online isn’t scary, after all. It’s fulfilling. And it can be for you, too. 

P.S. Here’s a selection of articles from our alumni. They published in a day, and you can too.