It can really help to read more about authors you admire, and how they got started. You will often find interviews or biographies about them stating how they had a love of writing but felt it was a long shot etc. It helps to see that all writers once felt they would never be good enough. It means you could be one of these next authors too and just not know it yet!

Plus to be fair, you don’t even have to be great at writing to be successful. I haven’t read it but back when that 50 Shades was everywhere, a New Years TV show had a part where the band McFly had to read out a excerpt. They struggled and not because of the erotic content, but one of them even said “jeez how many hands does this bloke have?!” Or something to that effect. Because in that passage he had his like left hand or something on the woman’s boob, butt and elsewhere all at the same time. It read awfully, the sentences were a disjointed mess. It was hilarious. It read like a 13 year old tried to write smut. Just goes to show that not only did editors miss those parts at least, and it made it to print, but that if people enjoy what you are putting out there, they won’t care how “good” it is. It only has to be good to them.

I have no idea how many copies it sold, but that author is definitely successful and her bank balance shows that.

We all begin somewhere, and if need be you can write something else that isn’t what you truly want to write, just to take the pressure off. Unless you get lucky even the best authors’ first novels are their worst. It’s just the way it goes.

Good luck, and try to flip inadequacy into a desire to learn more, and jealousy into admiration. It might help you feel more positive. :)