June’s Question is: Did you ever say “I quit”? If so, what happened to make you come back to writing?
I actually feel like I want to quit right now! It’s
not the writing that gets me down as an indie, it’s the marketing and
keeping up with everything that needs to be done in order to stay on top
of my game. It doesn’t help that I’ve recently
joined an indie FB group with over 10k members, a lot of whom are very
experienced and make over six figures a year (some even make six figures
a month!). It’s hard not to do the comparison thing when I see their
posts and it makes me feel like no matter how
much time and energy I put into this pursuit, I’m already so far behind
and I’ll never catch up. On top of that is the fact that I despise
technology. It’s a miracle that I even have a blog. So to think about
all the things I need to do just to make sure I
remain relevant makes me feel exhausted before I have even finished
writing. The only thing that keeps me going is stubbornness. I refuse to
be that person who gives up when there are so many out there making it
work!
Six figures a month? I can't even imagine it. You can't compare yourself with that. Just focus on you and learn from others.
ReplyDeleteGood ol' stubbornness is actually a good thing! Somehow, it's going to have to work out in the end, but it's all so overwhelming.
ReplyDeleteI don't even want to think about all that marketing stuff while I'm still trying to learn how to swim, so to speak. I'll just keep trying to actual finish a publishable piece of fiction because that's hard enough.
Good for you. Keep being stubborn. It takes a certain amount of that to get somewhere, eh? And I totally hear what you're saying, but the truth is, we all have an audience, and we're all working on growing it. It's hard to see the day to day progress though without looking back at square one.
ReplyDeleteHello, Lan. I hear ya'--I just attended a meeting of writers, some of whom are very successful indie authors. Their talk about the many facets of marketing made me dizzy, but I'll be plunging in soon.
ReplyDeleteI'd hate all that marketing stuff too. I'd just want to focus on the writing.
ReplyDeleteI feel the same. Marketing and technology both make me want to crawl into a hole and hide.
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