You Don't Need To Be An Expert
A very common excuse for not starting a blog is “I’m not an expert”. Impostor syndrome cripples people even before they start.
And I don’t blame them. I also used to hide behind that excuse all the time. Putting your work (and yourself) out in the wild is fucking scary. Especially without any credentials.
But the reason why it feels so scary is that you think you need to be an expert. Once you understand you can share and create things not as an expert but as a student, things change forever.
You no longer need to pretend you know everything. You no longer need to be afraid of making mistakes. Everything becomes a learning opportunity. And every learning opportunity is, in turn, an opportunity to teach.
People who really want to learn don’t care about your “credentials”. They care about the quality of your content, your fresh perspectives and your thoughtful insights.
So the fact that you’re not an expert might even be an advantage — they tend to get so used and attached to their knowledge that they often lack those fresh perspectives people are craving for.
Ironically, if you do start sharing all the things you learn, you’ll become sort of an expert after a while. You’ll be the go-to resource. You’ll be a reference.
And that’s fine. As long as you stay curious and don’t take yourself too seriously, there’s nothing wrong with being an expert.
This piece is part of a series of 30 atomic essays where I explore what it means to be a rational creative and the different aspects of being a creator online. You can read all the others essays here.
"So the fact that you’re not an expert might even be an advantage — they tend to get so used and attached to their knowledge that they often lack those fresh perspectives people are craving for." That's crucial.
Sometimes it's even better if you're not an expert. If you're a beginner that learnt something you have a fresh memory of the obstacles you've faced. So you're in a great position to help others who are struggling with this same problem. Experts often lack beginners context.
This a common question when starting anything, "Am I an expert?".
No matter what you start you don't have to be an expert to shine in your domain. If you're an expert you'll only fail less, try less, and take less time because you already know what to do.
Don't be an expert. Start doing. Fail now, fail more, try more, take more time, rest more, you'll figure things out eventually.
Wow. This is something I really needed to hear. Not 5 minutes before I read this, I was saying exactly that. Thank you for this -- I'm going to really reflect on this and then put it into action. Today is my first day on Indie Hackers and I was nervous about posting and commenting on other posts. Maybe this was the exact push I needed!