Writing Success
Many writers yearn for success. Most writers want their carefully crafted words to be published. More than that, they also desire a large readership, people who enjoy their stories or are inspired by their words. Many writers look at the publishing world through rose-coloured glasses. They do not realise how difficult it is to get published, let alone be successful as an author. There are very few writers who make it to the big time, to number one on the best seller list. Most writers will never see their words in print. As for making money, even a modest amount, this is way beyond them.
It was against this background that I was encouraged when reading an emailed newsletter recently. The newsletter was the Writers’ Market, a production of the print magazine Writers Digest. The following quote struck a chord with me, just one amongst many thousands seeking publication.
…beginning and not-so-famous writers do get published. Bowker recently reported nearly 200,000 new titles were published in 2005. At best, only 20-30 titles were by “big name” personalities; hard-working writers wrote the rest. So keep your nose to the grindstone and keep at it, because writing success does happen—nearly 200,000 times a year!
Nearly a quarter of a million titles are published somewhere in the world each year. Only a very few are written by high profile names. The rest are written by writers like me, struggling to make a mark, small though it be, on the publishing world.
Just keep writing.
Using the Internet
No Comments »21st June, 2006; Category: The Writer's Life
The rapid growth of the internet of the last decade has been a two-edged sword for writers. Consider the following points:
Positive:
- Research information is often just a few key strokes away on Google.
- Publishers and writers can communicate instantly via email.
- The tyranny of distance is no longer a major issue.
- Writers who blog can instantly publish their work and potentially have a world-wide audience for their writing.
Negative:
- Almost everyone, it seems, thinks they have the ability to be a writer without doing the many years of hard work to hone one’s skills.
- The millions of blogs on the internet that display a chronic ignorance of basic spelling, punctuation and sentence construction skills means that the internet is in grave danger of becoming clogged up with fifth rate rubbish.
- The internet has produced a proliferation of on-line writing courses with tens of thousands of would-be authors. The present day trend is for fewer books to be published. With thousands more writers submitting work to publishers, the slush piles in publishers’ offices are rapidly becoming mountains, making the discovery of worthwhile manuscripts even harder.
“I have to say I am a bit jaded by the Internet.” writes Sean
McLachlan. “I rarely surf for new sites anymore, unless it’s part
of my research, and while I’m a member of several writing-related
news groups, I tend to skim them as the majority of people on
them are rather amateurish. That said, the Internet is vital to
my writing career. I live in Spain, and all my publishers are
either in the U.S. or U.K. I simply couldn’t make a living if I
couldn’t cyber commute. I use the Internet about as much as I
did a few years ago, but my use is more work-related and
efficient. I don’t spend much time reading stuff that won’t help
my career.”
Sean is right. He also highlights an important skill one needs to develop, that of focus. It is easy to become distracted for hours surfing the net. Focus on the task in hand and ignore all the distracting, non-useful, sometimes poorly written garbage displayed on the internet. Sifting the wheat from all that chaff is a skill all writers need to develop.
Sometimes, however, I feel overwhelmed.
Trying to find relevant information is like finding lots of wheat in the haystack – but it’s the tiny needle you are looking for.
Walking and writing
Ever been to a writers’ workshop and the instructor asks you to do something you really don’t want to do? I have – and so has Carol Hathaway Scott. In a recent article she writes:
The writing instructor’s announcement messes up my plan to sit and soak up information. “Walk outside for twenty minutes,” she says, “Then write a personal essay based on the experience.”
Walking can often be very useful in a writer’s life. I like to take a break from my writing and go for a walk for the following reasons:
- I need the exercise – and because my doctor says so.
- I need the fresh air.
- Sitting in front of a computer screen for too many hours each day can boring, and it dulls the brain and tires the eyes.
- Walking gives me thinking time and the creative juices start flowing.
- Going out for a walk also involves looking at the birds and plants and flowers, and that gives me material to write about in my birding blog.
Related posts:
Coming up with writing ideas
I generally do not have trouble coming up with writing ideas. Over recent years I have usually been in the happy situation of having far too many ideas for writing. Far too many for me to use. In fact I don’t think I will run our of ideas for several decades. Even blogging every day on three blogs hasn’t emptied the tank. On my blog on birding I’ve been going strong since early September 2005, while this writing blog and my travel blog have been in existence since the beginning of March this year.
A Common Problem
Coming up with new ideas for writing is a common problem amongst writers, especially bloggers, where the pressure is on to keep posting regularly, whether you choose to do it daily, weekly or less frequently. For non-bloggers there is often the pressure of publishers’ deadlines; to remain credible one has to write, one has to produce. Keeping fresh is the challenge. A dull mind results in dull writing. Coming up with fresh ideas is not easy when one is tired, under pressure or feeling that the tank is running on empty.
What can one do about keeping the ideas factory churning out material that is fresh, interesting, new or different?
Steve on his blog “Why My Blog Stinks” has come up with an amazing list of ideas that work – most of the time – in helping him keep fresh. He uses these ideas to keep the creative juices flowing.
In the past I have sat on tops of mountains and overlooked valleys. Some of my best poetry have come from doing this. Sitting on top of a mountain usually comes after vigorous activity, which is scientifically proven to stimulate the creative juices in your brain.
Other ideas he has listed are as simple as taking a brisk walk, having a long bath or reading an inspiring book. One of my favourites also gets a mention:
…traveling to new places can really help generate some ideas. I think change of scenery is sometimes a great idea to help look at what you are doing from a different angle.
Travel gives a different perspective to the daily grind.
Another one that I use effectively from time to time is not mentioned by Steve. In our cold winter months I love to go to my favourite comfortable chair, curl up with a good book and a cup of tea or hot chocolate in front of a warming fire. Nothing better when the winds outside are howling and the rain is pelting down on the roof.
Aiming for the Stars: to Boldly Go Where no Blogger has Gone Before.
Aiming for the stars.
Now there’s a lofty goal. Aim high. If your aim is too low, you might just surprise yourself and hit the target, so aim high. I set high goals with my writing and my blogging, as well as many other aspects of my life.
Are Your Goals Measurable?
An important reminder about setting goals: they must be measurable. If I say “My goal is to be a better writer” that is not really a goal. How can it be measured? It is a worthy ambition indeed but not really a goal. If instead I said, “My goal is to write a post on my blog every day for a year,” I’m setting a measurable goal. At the end of the year I can test that goal and say, “Whoops. Only 23 posts – bit short on that goal!”
Take a Long Term View
Setting goals for today, this week and this month are important in many aspects of life. For the serious writer and blogger they are crucial. Without clearly defined short term goals I tend to mess around with this and that and don’t really achieve much. Staying focussed is all important. It gets things done.
Too often though, I get too focussed on the immediate, and don’t keep a big picture view in mind. I read somewhere many years ago that most people, when setting goals, vastly overestimate what they can achieve in a month, or a year, but vastly underestimate what they can achieve over five years. Writing and blogging are long term projects. You can’t write a best selling novel in a week (well most of us can’t). You can’t have successful blog in just a month. Take a long term view. Be in it for the long haul.
Group Writing Project
Darren Rowse at ProBlogger has us at it again. This week’s project is on developing goals for a blog. Two weeks ago many contributed to his challenge to write about The Habits of Highly Effective Blogging. I’ve had some interesting and worthwhile feedback from my contribution here on my birding site and also on some follow-up articles on this blog. I’ve been thinking seriously about my long term goals with my blogs (I currently have three – see the others here and here).
Where am I heading with these blogs?
What do I hope to achieve?
What stars am I aiming for?
My Stars – or the blogging goals I’d like to achieve by the end of 2008.
- Posts: To have written 1000 posts in each of my three blogs by the end of 2008.
- Income: To have a certain level of income (not for publication) per month by the end of 2008.
- Plan: To draw up a plan of what I want to blog about over the next three years.
- Comments: To respond to all genuine comments from my readers.
- Links: To make at least one link every week, more if possible.
- Read: To read at least three blogs of other bloggers every day.
- Community: To develop a community of loyal readers of my blogs by engaging them in conversations through comments, links and emails.
- Accountability: To be accountable to myself (through regular posts, links comments etc) and to my readers (through traffic and comments).
- Content: To write posts that will be of interest to my readers leading to increased traffic to and comments on my sites.
- Enjoyment: To maintain a sense of enjoyment through all of my writing.
Wait a minute, I hear you saying. You’ve broken your own rule about goals being measurable. Some of these goals will be hard to measure, so they will need to be refined, reworked and modified as I go along. I need some thinking time to work through the issues.