We are so excited to have Chelsea Beaker with us today.

Chelsea is the California Book Award-winning author of three books.

Most recently, the national best-selling novel Madwoman.

A book of the Month club pick The New York Times calls brilliant in its depiction of the long shadows cast by domestic violence.

She is also the co-founder of The Fountain, which is an online membership-based platform

of courses, audio visualizations,

and community with a monthly live class

that helps writers connect to their intuition

and cultivate a sustainable writing practice.

And I am so excited to hear all your thoughts

on comparison in writing, Chelsea.

I feel like you're the perfect person to talk about this. Oh, thank you so much. I'm so excited to hear all your thoughts on comparison in writing, Chelsea. I feel like you're the perfect person to talk about this. Oh, thank you so much. I'm so excited to be here with both of you,

and I just love everything you're doing in the writing world and so inspired by you both,

so I can't wait. Well, we're so excited to have you, but maybe to start, can you tell us about a specific time or times that you've been affected by feeling comparison during your writing career?

I don't think we have enough time for that. I'm like, where to begin? I mean, I think at every phase of my whole career or pursuing writing,

there is comparison baked in, right? It's sort of by nature of the design of a workshop where

you are sitting next to your peers and you are talking about your work right after them. And there's this natural

comparison and competition that I think can be born into those structures where, you know,

in my program, it's like only two of us got tuition remission. And so right off the top,

there was like two writers that had been sort of granted this like crown that you didn't

really know who's making these decisions. Why is one person better than the other? It just

immediately sets off the group into feeling a certain type of way. And I don't think it's

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