This is gonna be the thread where we talk about stuff

Right, that's why one of the big tricks is making sure quality isn't your yardstick.

A while back I was in something of a rut where I felt like nothing I was writing was any good.

I still kept it up. Of course, I was well into the habit by then; but the only way I was going to get past that point was to write more and hopefully I'd improve in the process. There are tons of little ways you can get better without even noticing, and the more you write, the more of those you'll come across.

I wouldn't say I was necessarily thinking in those terms at the time; the main realization I had was that it was a side effect of my standards for myself getting higher.

I'm not even entirely past it; I'm still disappointed in a lot of what I write. I think the difference is that right now, I'm challenging myself in a new way with Swamped, so I'm more willing to accept the times when it falls short. And having something that I'm generally pretty satisfied with makes it easier to handle writing something else and thinking it's not very good.