Thank you so much for this post. I missed it the first time around.

I’m in the final editing stage of a book right now. As I near completion of it, I am feeling ‘called’ to self publish and do something different than the usual Amazon blast approach. It’s not as important to me to add the words best-selling author to my CV as it is to be part of the shift in consciousness we are all experiencing right now. I want to help people to move through the frustration or fear that it sometimes causes and become the brilliant creative being they really are.

I think we are all being asked to learn trust in our own inner guidance more than what we hear from others (one theme in my book), and that’s what I read in your words. As I read the post, I was saying yes, yes, YES!

Thank you!

Katherine

So well done for carrying on writing. Self-pub for me was a way to start, without the rejection, but I still want to be get a publishing deal. There are many ways to get your work out there now. I like to share those options!
All the best, Joanna

Your post sang to me in two ways. I’m 43 and have a love/hate relationship with my writing (which I’m looking to change). When I’m at the page and my writing self has been unleashed I can’t imagine anything better. When the temperature cools and my thinking self takes back control, self-doubt reins supreme.

Your post reassured my inner writer that there is hope for me. That fear can be conquered, dreams can be reached and I can learn to play with my writing instead of dreading it.

I’ve recently finished writing a children’s novel that I had always planned to self publish. When it was returned from an assessement with a children’s editor, along with corrections and some fabulous suggestions, the editor questioned my decision to self-publish. It was enough for me to loose my footing.

Reading your post has reiterated what I’ve always believed about self-publishing, it is an act of empowerment. Thank you.

Joanna

Anyway, I think once I set aside the “I have to traditionally publish” mantra that was among all of my writing peers in my writing circles, I really started to get passionate about writing. It was no longer me writing for what a publisher wanted. I was writing what I wanted, and that’s when I became more passionate about writing than I’d ever been. Traditional publishing has its place, but it would not allow me to be who I really am. (This, of course, is just me and my experience.) I think self-publishing opens people up, and it definitely eliminates the fear of rejection.

I’d never really seen myself as a writer even though I’ve written most of my adult life. But my writing was always done in a business context: proposals, reports, manuals, methods and the best damned letters around. I was often approached by people who knew someone who knew that I had a gift for the exact turn of phrase needed to communicate a difficult idea. But I never really considered that to be writing. I mean, in my book, any idiot could that! (As an aside, I now pay attention for that dismissive attitude towards ANYTHING in one of my life transition coaching clients. It usually points to one of their great strengths that they totally dismiss. My response to them typically is ‘no, not any idiot can do that. It takes a special idiot to be good at that!’)

But I digress. My beginnings as a ‘writer’ really happened several years ago when a business partner and I were offering a series of specialized personal growth coaching certification programs. At the final level folks had to write a closed-book exam. I can still remember two startling insights: one morning I sat on the side of my bed and thought ‘shit, they have to have a study guide to get them ready for the exam. I guess I’m going to have to write one.’ And then several weeks later as I was plugging away at writing that ‘study guide’ I really realized that I was writing a book.

My business partner had already self-published two of her own books so I had a mentor for the process of getting my first book out there. It wasn’t hard from a technical perspective, but it was often terrifying from an identity perspective. What if everyone thought I was an idiot? What if people were underwhelmed by my understanding of my topic? etc., etc. But the big thing was that I got it out there.

Not long after I produced a chapter in a collaborative book telling the stories of 17 women who had life altering experiences.

Last year I wrote and illustrated a small book of my life stories, poems, photos and paintings as a 60th birthday present for my husband. I published it through Lulu and then customized two separate additional versions for each of my step-daughters. By the time I’d completed those, I realized that I had an inspirational book on my hands. Interesting that your Twitter post showed up today because I just put the finishing touches on that ‘Choosing Life’ book this afternoon and will be uploading it to Lulu next week!

I have 2 other books about 70% written (one for beginning artists; the other about business start-up) and recently downloaded a whole pile of blog postings about retirement. I realized that I have about 35K words about retirement already written so I guess there’s another book almost done. Whew! No wonder I feel overwhelmed sometimes.

All that to say, I find that my ‘best’ approach to writing a book is to back into it! I usually don’t start out to write a book. I start out to write about something I’m passionate about and that I think I have a contribution to make around. And the book just evolves from that.

I think that we live in a truly magical time for anyone who wants to express themselves creatively, whether it is through art, music, writing, speaking, film …we have tools at our disposal that almost take my breath away. I’m old enough to have lived most of my life in a pre-technology world. I learned to type on a manual typewriter and remember being terrified when someone sat me down at an electric typewriter the first time! I’m not the teary type but I remember crying the first time I tried to learn computers. You had to code in Fortran and I just couldn’t get the hang of it. Way too much attention to detail for my big picture brain. I now embrace new technology because I am clear that it is the pathway to the creative expression I crave and am no longer willing to live without.

If I can offer you one piece of advice about writing some creative fiction it would be this. Don’t set out to write a novel. Sit down and write the story you are passionate about. If you simply invite the story to flow through you, I know that you’ll end up with something great and it will create its own shape and form. It’ll be rather like a chanelling process, where you are both the channeler and the channelee! …personally, I can hardly wait to see what you produce.

In addition to books, I write articles about personal growth, creativity and small business which I publish on my website. And I’ve got a gig writing a monthly column for a local lifestyle magazine. It requires that I seek out interesting and unusual folks in the area. One of my best stories was about a 93-yr old woman who still teaches Tai Chi. And this month it is a photo-essay about quirky rural mailboxes in the area. Been at that for 19 months now and it hasn’t lost its lustre. In fact, I love the adventure of it.

Whew, that was a big dump! Thanks for the opportunity to talk about something I am so passionate about.

Gwen McCauley

Thanks Jane, radical self-pub sounds very cool! Glad you have your ‘tribe’ all ready for your work – that’s exactly the way it should be done! Thanks for sharing!

Joanna