Take charge of your self-esteem and become the person you know you can be.

Start by managing your doubt. Many of my writing students who are excellent writers doubt themselves. This faulty perception will affect everything they do. They may even give up writing, because they've lost perspective.

For example, a writer with low self-esteem writes five pages and reads them. "It's crap," she says, and deletes the file, or tosses the pages into the trash. A writer with high self-esteem writes five pages and reads them. "Great start," she says, and grins. She knows the pages are crap. So what? She knows that writing is rewriting, and five pages of anything is way better than no pages at all.

How do you know you have low self-esteem? You know because you indulge in negative self talk. Negative self talk is insidious, because it's automatic. The tapes in your head are on fast-forward, and you no longer consciously hear them. However, your body reacts immediately: you get a sinking in your stomach, you feel tired, and your work just seems like too much trouble.

Unfortunately, you can't zoom from low self-esteem to high self-esteem in an instant. You need to work at it. The good news is that any small action you take to boost your self-esteem helps. Take enough small actions, and sooner or later your self-esteem will be sky-high.

Try these techniques. They help. They're not in any particular order, try one, or try them all.

=> Boost your self-esteem

1. Love what you do: take the time to enjoy your work, and reassure yourself that you love it daily

This is vital. If I find that I'm focusing on negatives like a looming deadline for a project that I won