How do y’all write without throwing everything away bc your internal voice says “This isn’t award eligible so it isn’t worthwhile” I am asking a couple of friends privately but honestly like i need to know lol

Because awards aren't worth anything half the time, nothing more than popularity contests between arguing tribes. The awards I've won give a quick PR buzz and then mean nothing. A letter from a reader that likes my work is better than that. And I've had those from non-award winning works.

Well, I'm a raging mediocrity, so take this with a grain of salt. But late in 2021, I wrote what I figured would be my last piece of prose just to get it off my chest, and then leave the field a failure. That lousy thing became my first sale to the Comics Journal, which is why I'm still writing.

I gave up the idea I was ever going to win an award of any kind a long time ago. Of course, it's been replaced with "Will somebody pay me for this?"

This is always a creeping feeling, but when it gets bad I try to remember how good it feels when I'm writing and the words just feel somehow tangibly right, like brain candy. And then I chase the brain candy 🍬

My internal voice tells me the same thing but then I remember the people who told me that something I wrote made them think differently, made them laugh, or healed them. Sometimes terrible shit wins awards while brilliant works go unnoticed but good stories are always worth pursuing.

A lot of non-award eligible writing is read by many thousands of readers. I keep writing because I want readers to get pleasure out of my stuff. That's SO worthwhile!

This is a super unpopular opinion but eh, I'm nobody - awards are for the most part just popularity contests won by marketing. If you can improve even one single person's day (including your own!) by writing, then it's worth it.

I know that if it were easy, it would have already happened, but: loving your work is the only thing I've ever found that works. For me, a story isn't done until I love it.

Why wouldn't it be award-eligible?

I write crap for fun.