Have you ever sat down to write and immediately started second-guessing every sentence? Chances are that the problem isn’t your ideas. It’s the audience in your head.
In this episode, I dive into the concept of imagined audience and how it can either support or sabotage your writing. Most academic writers don’t realize they’re writing for someone who’s not actually their reader. Instead, they write defensively for a critical advisor, an intimidating colleague, or a harsh reviewer from years past.
You'll learn how to identify when you're writing for the wrong audience, how to shift out of self-doubt and perfectionism by changing who you're writing for, and a three-stage strategy to guide your writing through different phases of the process.
This episode builds on Episode 3: Writing to Think vs. Writing to Communicate, where I introduced the idea that we need to write through our thinking, not wait until it’s all figured out.
If you’ve ever felt blocked, anxious, or overly defensive while writing, this episode will help you reconnect with the joy and freedom of putting ideas on the page—and remind you that writing gets easier when you write for the right audience at the right time.
The next time writing feels unusually difficult, ask yourself, who am I writing for right now? Then, give yourself permission to shift that audience to someone more helpful and kind.
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