So why do you write?

Not a rhetorical question. The answer to this question is really damn important and will determine your method.

Do you write to impress your friends?

If so, your friends are impressed. Congratulations. Your efforts have served their intended purpose and it doesn't matter if you destroy it. Your fans are even more your fans than they were before you did something to stoke their fandom. You get over your "crushing disdain" by aligning your expectations with your objectives.

Do you write to satisfy your own creative urges?

If so, revisit the shit that drives you crazy and revise it until it's awesome. Yeah, right now you start and then you cast it away 'cuz it sux but you need to let go of that, chief. Writing is rewriting and by casting it away you're taking the coward's way out. You want to write something you're proud of and you'll never get there if you keep discarding shit that you don't know how to fix. Learn to take something you hate and turn it into something you like. Do this enough and eventually you'll get consistent about it. You'll develop a style that you like. You'll learn an approach to editing that you can consistently apply with good results. It will cease to be an act of divine inspiration and become a slog, but it will be a slog you can get through and be proud of the results.

Do you write to gain a broader audience and acclaim for your works?

THEN FOR FUCK'S SAKE QUIT GIVING SHIT TO YOUR FRIENDS.

Seriously. I have no idea why amateur writers think this is a good idea. No one you know has the first fucking clue how to evaluate your writing. All they know is they don't want to piss you off and they'd love to see you succeed. So anything that they like they'll trumpet and anything that they think is valuable they'll encourage.

Write this in calligraphy and tape it to your monitor:

Art is the knack of making something out of nothing and selling it.

- Frank Zappa

You don't need to convince your friends that you're good. You need to convince utter and total strangers that would rather spit in your face than give you four bucks for your tortured, self-involved prose. That regional 'zine that is calling for entries in the back of Poets "&" Writers magazine? DOES NOT FUCKING MATTER. That indie press in Upstate New York that only prints limited edition monographs on woodblock printing? DOES NOT FUCKING MATTER. Go look up "Kindle Daily Deals." Pick a book at random. Read the reviews.

These guys. These guys matter.

The people that will write a 1000-word review for a book they downloaded for a buck matter. And honestly? It doesn't even matter if they like your book. It matters that they care enough to bitch about it. That means you touched them somehow.

You've never even approached them, have you?

'k. So check it out. Critters Critique. Used to be it was only sci fi. Now it's everything. Here's how it works. Every week, you read three examples of someone else's drivel. You provide them a critique. You do this for weeks and weeks and weeks until you've earned enough points to inflict your drivel on someone else. BAM. Suddenly you have an objective measure of your work. AND - just as importantly - you have a good sense of how your drivel stacks up against the drivel of others at your level.

I did Crit Critique for a few months. I reviewed a half dozen pieces. Several that I panned were published. Doesn't mean they didn't suck. Does mean that they didn't suck enough to not get published. Which - really - is an objective measure of non-suckitude no matter how much I denigrate it.

Do this until you have an objective sense of your writing.

That's it.

That's the schtick.

Okay, fine. You want some more?

1) Read this goddamn book. I don't care how you regard Stephen King. Dude knows how to write. More importantly, dude knows how to write shit that will sell. This book is in two parts. Part 1 is basically "Hi, I'm Steve King. Here's the journey of how a vaguely troubled student from Maine became New York Times Bestselling Author Stephen King and how I nearly fucked it all up." Part 2 is basically "Hi, I'm Steve King. Here's how I approach my job - not my craft - of continuing to be Stephen King. Others do things differently, and not everything works for everyone, but here's the basic approach that works for me."

2) Put it aside until you've gotten through the uncanny valley of suckitude. Me? I'm 100% aware that my regard for my writing cycles from "It's brilliant" to "it's iffy" to "it's shit" to "it's redeemable" to "it's not bad but it could be better." With screenplays, I can tell you how long the first four stages last down to the day.* With novels? I'm still working on that but it's definitely related to page count.

TL;DR: PRACTICE