In 2018, I wrote a book called Dear Writer, You Need to Quit, which was the result of my having coached a couple thousand writers and seeing some patterns coming.
The patterns I saw coming are the patterns we’re now in. Where we’re all doing too much, we’re all scared we’re not gonna sell (now or later), and we’re all confused about what’s going wrong.
While that book has helped a lot of people (it’s been nominated for awards, it’s often recommended in writer groups, etc.), it was missing some things…
When I first watched people read the book, the message was landing. “Ok, I don’t have to do all the things. Great.”
And we quit the easy stuff.
Don’t like social media? Great, I’ll quit that.
Don’t like ads? Great, I’ll quit that.
Don’t like book signings? Great, I’ll quit that.
But new FOMOs replaced those. And now, I’m afraid we’re caught in such a competitive market, and no one knows how to evaluate their “lack of current success” (or “lack of the success I want”) in a helpful way.
So here’s my attempt to help with that.
Anytime someone says, “this will for sure make your books sell,” take a whole huge step back from that and wait to do a little analysis. Even if all you do is ask questions, but you still decide to listen to them, you’ll at least keep yourself from following advice because of FOMO.
Here are some questions to ask.
Did they start publishing during the Gold Rush? (Anytime between 2014 and 2019, although the GR was technically over before 2019.) Probably question the premise of their advice… the market is so much more saturated now. Unless they are adapting to the current market, I would at least question.
Did they have advantages you don’t have? (Do they not have children? Are they fully abled? Do they have family support? A different personality?)
Is their “best-practice” based on having assets you don’t have? (Expendable income, a partner with a stable job, a large backlist you don’t currently have, free time you don’t have, a spouse who will work for their business and a business that can support that.)
Is their “best-practice” based on doing a level of work you don’t have time for or aren’t able to do?
Is their “best-practice” based on having started the action at a time when the market wasn’t saturated (for things like Kickstarters, TikTok, etc.)
Are their goals different from yours? Some people who are offering advice are only interested in being # 1, and their tactics and strategies reflect that. They will do a level of work and make a level of sacrifice most of us are not able/willing to make.
Do they have personality advantages it would take you years of work to overcome? (Not that you shouldn’t still look for tools, but are you expecting yourself to “just do” what they’re just doing? You know what happens when we use the word “just”… it’s always evidence of an intact skill chain we have that someone else doesn’t have. We say “just” because we don’t know how to explain how we do that thing we do.)
Are you singing “That Thing You Do” in your head now? Just me…?
I’m getting to the punchline here…
I don’t say this to discourage anyone. I’m trying to provide answers, and I can’t coach every single author anymore. But this industry is a bear, and like wild, unruly animals, you’ve got to know a lot about it before you decide what its actions mean.
So, what do we do with this information, Becca?
Here are your action points.
Before anything else… and this is important…
* if you do not know how to regulate your nervous system or stabilize your emotions (especially fear), you need to learn that immediately. That’s something all top-tier athletes and professionals have in common. The ability to handle their emotions. (And I don’t mean “bury”… that’s different. That will eventually come back to bite you. I mean regulate.) This is sustainability 101. I know this is hard for some of us, but it’s necessary work if you want to get where you want to get.
Ok, about our mindset now. First thing is:
* If you are not having success yet, do not give up. You’re in the R&D phase of your author business. It is not a bad sign to have many (and sometimes many, many) years of a lack of success. Just because other people are having quick success doesn’t mean you should quit because you haven’t. Success can still be in front of you.
Second:
* If you are expending resources at a level that’s unsustainable, please consider making that trajectory more sustainable. We’re seeing more and more and more “marathon, not sprint” careers happening than we saw in 2020/1 and absolutely tons more than we saw in 2016. That means your money may have to last many years… be conscious of how fast you’re burning through it. (And yeah, I mean to quit our stuff too if it’s burning your cash and you can’t afford it.)
Third:
* Expect this to be hard. I did a post last week about “why is this so hard”, and hopefully that will help. But we have to expect this to be difficult. It can still be fun and wonderful, but if we expect something to be easy and it isn’t, we’re more likely to give up. (Here’s looking at you, gifted kids…)
* Expect the work to be hard, too. Like, expect to work hard.
Fourth:
* Stay connected to encouraging people. Be really wary of people who make you feel afraid. (Fear of missing out, especially.) And if reading this post is making you feel afraid, stop reading. Focus on regulating and believing that, no matter what happens, you will be okay. Stop reading me if I make you feel afraid. Regulate.
* Stay connected to yourself. (If you haven’t done the work to stay emotionally and physically regulated, do that.)
* Stay connected to your physical body. Don’t expend your only non-renewable resource for this work. It will not be worth it. No matter how much. money you might make. Don’t disconnect from your body.
And fifth:
* If you have questions, please find someone who seems like they understand the industry from the inside and from a big picture. Not just from being a loud voice or having the assurance that they’re right.
* Correctness and certainty have an inverse relationship. You can be completely certain and 100% wrong. And you can be 100% uncertain, and be absolutely right.
Having coached 6,000+ individual authors at this point in my career, I can tell you things about the industry that very few people will ever know because they’ll never have the volume of information I have. And I can tell the difference between people who have this kind of perspective (where they’ve seen enough to know the actual patterns). Advice from objective people matters.
My goal here is to help authors feel like they know what they’re doing and can reach for success. That’s why I’m a success coach. What’s standing in the way of our success and how do we conquer it. Even when that thing is ourself.
Some of us don’t feel successful because no amount of success is enough to produce that feeling. And for those people, I will say, the emotional resilience work should help. But for those of us who are asking “why do I not feel successful” and the answer is, “because you’re expecting something that hasn’t happened yet,” that’s a much easier problem to fix.
I hope this will help. And if not, feel free to ask questions. I don’t know how many of them I’ll get to yet, because I’m putting this on Pat—n as well, and I’ll answer there first. But I’ll do what I can to help.
– Becca