OLD POST ALERT! This is an older post and although you might find some useful tips, any technical or publishing information is likely to be out of date. Please click on Start Here on the menu bar above to find links to my most useful articles, videos and podcast. Thanks and happy writing! – Joanna Penn
I turned 40 yesterday and I am super thrilled that I have made this milestone birthday while doing something I love with my life!
It's been a journey and I have learned a lot along the way … I've been sharing everything here since 2008 but here are some of the most important things I've learned.
First of all, looking back … what a difference 10 years makes!
On my 30th birthday, I was living in Auckland, New Zealand and newly divorced. The scuba diving business I had with my ex-husband, as well as our property investment was all gone, and I was back at my day job.
I was an IT consultant, implementing Accounts Payable systems into large corporates and small boutique companies (yawn!) – something I did from 1997 – 2011 in the end.
My two best friends were single at the time as well, so we hired a body painter and got glammed up. Cameras were clearly not as handy back then – no smart phones! – but the pics are still quite fun!
On my 40th birthday, I am happily married and living in London, England. I am a New York Times and USA Today bestselling thriller author under J.F.Penn, with 6 novels and 3 novellas out in the ARKANE and London Psychic series, as well as a short story collection.
I also have 4 non-fiction books under Joanna Penn. I'm an award-winning creative entrepreneur, international professional speaker and this site, The Creative Penn, has been voted one of the top 10 sites for writers and self-publishers multiple times. My best friends are writers and I am part of a community of creative entrepreneurs worldwide.
I am incredibly grateful of the opportunities that have led me here, and thank you to all of you who have supported me on the journey.
So how did I make such a dramatic shift? Here's my lessons learned, in the hope they will help you too.
(1) Take 100% responsibility for your life
I first read Jack Canfield's The Success Principles a little after my 30th birthday, and the 10th anniversary edition has just been released. I still recommend it as a life changing book and am re-reading it at the moment.
The first chapter, Take 100% responsibility for your life, still resonates with me.
I had what many would have seen as a successful life back then. I was earning very good money as a consultant, doing a high status job in one of the best cities of the world.
But I was empty inside.
That emptiness around my career remained even when I met a lovely man and moved to Australia. Which is when I read Jack's book and decided I had to make some changes.
I had originally decided to change careers way back in 2000 when I went traveling, but I kept ending up back in the same job. My exam results led to a degree at Oxford, which led to a consultancy job, which led into the work I did – seemingly without any real conscious choice. I had ‘fallen into' a job, as many do, and I needed to make a change.
Since then, I have changed direction several times – learning about blogging, online marketing, writing books, professional speaking and a lot more besides. But it all starts with deciding to take 100% responsibility, stop making excuses, stop blaming other people or your background or whatever and just start on whatever you really want to do with your life.
(2) Balance consumption with creation
This was the first major mindset shift and one I still make sure I keep in balance as a creative entrepreneur. Here are a few examples:
- Make stuff instead of just buying stuff
- Write a book, don't just read books
- Or read a book and put it into action in concrete ways
- Record a podcast and not just listen to podcasts
- Record a video and not just watch videos
- Do an online course to learn something – and then immediately put it into practice and create something from those ideas
- Spend time creating instead of watching TV, or watch TV and then use those ideas in your own work. Steal like an artist as Austin Kleon says 🙂
We all NEED consumption as artists – we need to fill our creative well, and learn from other media – but if you record the hours you spend in consumption instead of production, you may see why you're not getting enough creative writing time in! Remembering this will help you turn your time into finished products.
(3) The magic of scalable income and intellectual property
I've had several life-changing moments in my life as an author-entrepreneur:
- Discovering print on demand and realizing that I didn't have to pay for printing books. I could just upload digital files and Amazon would sell direct to customers. I didn't need to hold stock or do any shipping or pay in advance. That was amazing! (especially as I had just paid for 2000 print books, which mostly went in the landfill). Here's my video on that realization – it's 5 years old and pretty hilarious!
- The launch of Amazon Kindle and going digital as a reader. Realizing the potential of reaching readers globally through self-publishing to this new platform radically changed my business plans because the publisher was no longer necessary as middleman. I didn't have to ask permission anymore. I could just choose myself and give it a go. Here's another funny vid of me extolling the virtues of the first iteration of the international Kindle. You can see the packing boxes in the background as we were just about to move house in Australia. Again, it's pretty embarrassing but good to see how far I've come since then.
- Realizing that a book was not just one book. One manuscript can be turned into multiple streams of income through the exploitation of rights. Multiple formats, multiple country sales, multiple languages – and all possible as an indie author. When the penny drops, your head may explode! Read more on this idea here.
- Understanding that fiction doesn't age. Every story I write can sell for my lifetime and 70 years after I die according to copyright law. Stories touch people many years later, even generations later. Whereas I have to update my non-fiction every couple of years and I have withdrawn several since starting writing. Ditto for online courses, which date even faster. The best use of my time is therefore creating fiction. Here's a video of me talking about this realization.
(4) Beware the shadow career
Another book I re-read over and over again is Turning Pro by Steven Pressfield.
He warns of the shadow career, which echoes our calling but entails no real risk. His example is,
“Are you getting your PhD in Elizabethan studies because you're afraid to write the tragedies and comedies that you know you have inside you?”
Everyone has their different version of a shadow career – and it is hard to face up to.
For me, the constant challenge is: Are you blogging and speaking about self-publishing and book marketing instead of writing the stories that will make an impact on the world?
The former is easier than the latter and it is easily justified.
I love to help other people, and I still make an income from this site, my non-fiction and professional speaking – and I love all of it to a point – but I need to constantly re-evaluate my time in order to create the things that really challenge me.
Does this challenge you? Do you have a shadow career?
(5) The Compound Effect works
It's interesting that in reviewing the biggest changes in my life, the ideas often stem from books that I have read. I've never had an ‘in-person' mentor, but I have had hundreds, if not thousands of mentors online and in books. You'll find much of their wisdom interspersed in my own non-fiction books. Yes, I am a self-help junkie!
The Compound Effect by Darren Hardy is a great book, even if the basic idea is quite obvious.
Essentially, little steps every day in the same direction will get you a very long way over time.
If you keep chopping and changing, and if you give up too soon, you may have nothing. But if you hold to your course, keep making consistent steps towards your goals every day, then you will achieve far more than you think is possible.
This might be 500 words every day on your book, which is 182,000 in a year, which is three thrillers or a couple of fantasy novel, or six romance novellas 🙂
It might be one blog post a week, making 52 by the end of the year. Or taking one photo a day and sharing it on Pinterest or Instagram or Facebook or Twitter, resulting in the beginnings of a platform by the end of the year. It might be 10 mins meditation a day, leading to a calmer, happier life.
It might be reading 10 pages a day of life-changing books – which has made a huge difference in my life, that's for sure! You can find more of my recommended books for writers here.
I am evidence of this principle working in practice.
On my 30th birthday, I had no books, and no inkling of even writing one.
I had no website, no blog, no social media, no email list. I knew nothing about publishing or marketing. I didn't know that I would end up here by 40. I DID have a desire to change my life, and I was willing to take massive action.
It was 3.5 years from the photo at the top of the page to when I started this site in Dec 2008. It was 6 years until I gave up IT consulting forever to become a full-time author entrepreneur. That may seem like a lot of time, or no time at all. But the point is, it can be done.
If you feel unhappy with where you are now, you CAN change things.
In this new world of creative opportunity online, you are empowered to write, to publish, to create, to reach readers directly, to make money online through a myriad of opportunities.
The only thing stopping you is you.
As for me, well, I have plenty of plans for the next 10 years. I hope you will join me for the ride!
Please do let me know what you think in the comments below. I'd love to hear about your journey and lessons learned along the way.
Hello Joanna,
I HUGELY enjoy your blog! I have been reading it for somewhere around six months (I think). The tips that you provide in this article are the very same tips that I have used to build my author-entrepreneur career. I am on the verge of taking my “big jump” from the US Air Force Active Duty to full-time author-entrepreneur and home-school mom, which is a big faith/purposeful jump for my family and I. The tip you gave to offset the consumption with creation has been PARAMOUNT to my productivity! I watch my son and other young children who want to color on the walls and everywhere else (which parents and teachers typically are not happy about), and it seems that in the process of “domestication” for adulthood and to fit into the corporate agenda, many people may loose the connectedness with creativity.
The only thing that I see you mastering that you did not include in the post is networking. As a Creative Penn consumer, I have watched some videos, listened to some podcasts, and read some blog posts where you have done some awesome marketing techniques. I would have to guess that the marketing techniques developed alot since 2008. Would you agree? Thanks so much for pursuing your passion because your joy is encouraging to myself and others!
Thanks Tiffany – I consider constant learning to be part of the journey, absolutely. As I learn things every day, I could have included that – but I count marketing as just one of the things I learn about – I still learn craft stuff, entrepreneur stuff, and I’m currently getting into virtual reality and high tech right now … I am a learning junkie! Marketing is one aspect, as is networking – although the latter is also about being truly passionate about what I do and connecting with other people in the niche.
Happy birthday Joanna, and thank you for making me start living my dream!
Happy birthday, Joanna! I think this is a great time of life to make changes and be an entrepreneur – I turned 40 21 days into my full-time self-employed life and I couldn’t have done it at another time in my life. In the last 10 years I’ve moved cities, gone back to the career I thought I loved, set up a part-time business, moved it to a full-time business, created a successful and popular blog and written 6 non-fiction books – I would never have DREAMED of that ten years previously!
Best wishes for more books, more entrepreneurial activities, more inspiration from and to your community!
Congrats on all your success too, Liz!
Thanks so much for this, Joanna. I truly admire your apparently unfaltering level of motivation and diligence. Your writings and musings, for my part, have triggered much list-writing and goal-setting over the past few years; I’m grateful to report that a certain amount of ticking and attaining has gone on too as a result!
As an indie author, the most valuable lessons I’ve learnt from you are your assertions in blog posts and in your excellent ‘How to Market a Book’, that you won’t sell any books if you don’t promote them (end of) and that it pays to be patient.
I was going to say that your ten-year journey shows that ‘anyone can do it’ but, of course, you’re not just ‘anyone’. We need and appreciate folk like you as talented, inspirational and practical guides, but have to be mindful of our limitations too. It’s so easy to blame other people and even potential readers for a book’s poor sales when it is often down to our own lack of talent or negligence. The negligence part, at least, I have learned, we can do something about. It’s astounding, but perhaps perversely satisfying (when you feel you’re one of the ‘enlightened’!) that many authors are still puzzled that their books aren’t flying off the shelves, even though there’s the small matter of no one knowing they’re even on the shelves.
Like you, though, despite my perverse satisfaction remark, I strongly hold that we must support each other in our endeavours to succeed as writers. I was promoting a Kindle KDP Select 99c/99p Countdown deal for ‘If Everyone Knew Every Plant And Tree’ on Facebook recently and a fellow author belittled me for ‘prostituting’ my work and implied that if it was of a decent standard, it would sell itself! She thought it was shocking and disgusting that I was disrespecting my writing and other people’s by charging so little. It was surprising to me that she hadn’t heard of these types of promotions. She believed that her work was of such quality, being the result of vast swathes of time and talent, that she could never contemplate selling it for a single dollar/pound. I let the ‘Haha, you haven’t got a clue and I see from Amazon that your unsold $11.99 ebook is skimming the sludge in the depths of the Amazon Sea’ thought pass and thought to recommend your book to her, adding, graciously, (okay then, with a smidgeon of smugness), that my last Countdown promotion and concomitant advertising on Ereader News Today and Kindle Nation Daily had resulted in the #1 bestseller spot in several categories! I wanted her to see that using this sale strategy had huge potential to broaden one’s readership and isn’t that why we all write books – to reach readers so that they may be entertained and touched and affected positively? But, then again, everyone is different: some authors may not mind if only a handful of eyes (nice visual!) land on their book… I’m not one of them. And, evidently, you’re not one of them either.
Like all professions, there’s a whole spectrum of authors out there; I would just like to reiterate that, whether you accept it or not, you’re all the way over to the right of the swingometer and I thank you for all you have done thus far through your talent, motivation and diligence. Bon anniversaire and may you enjoy many more ‘big days’!
Thanks Julia – and on the other author, my husband would say, “keep your eyes in the boat.” It’s a rowing saying that’s based on focusing on your journey, your pace, your speed – and not someone else’s. There will always be people who do things differently. That’s fine – let them do their thing, and you do yours. We all measure success differently as well.
I like that saying, “Keep your eyes in the boat”! Thanks. Rowers do, though, have a good sense of where everyone else is, I imagine, to gauge the efficacy of their pace and speed. No man is an island, entire of itself, but, yes, the main focus must be one’s own path. It’s so easy to get distracted by other people – for me it’s an ongoing challenge to block out some of the ‘noise’. I’ve started watching less TV, influenced by your comments, and it now seems staggering how much time I ‘wasted’ watching mindless programmes. Still a lot of good stuff on though!
There’s some awesome TV out there – like House of Cards – we just binge watched the whole season. I learn so much about character and plot, and suspense from that show. I like to test myself by guessing what’s coming – I am so proud when I can guess it 🙂 I feel like my story radar is getting better!
I think the aim is targeted, rather than mindless, consumption.
Happy birthday Joanna! I hope you had a wonderful day.
Thank you so much for this lovely post. I’m sure it’s so fulfilling to look back and see how far you’ve come since you started this journey. Thanks for the timely reminders again that EVERYTHING we want to achieve is possible, if only we take charge of our lives and consistently put in the effort to achieve it.
The concept of a shadow career – *penny drop*
Now I’m thinking about it, maybe I have been hiding behind some of my other pursuits and making excuses…..
PS: I hope to have many inspiring achievements like you by the time I’m 40!
You will do at this rate Tolulope 🙂
Wow Jo, you’re a real inspiration : ) I’m thirty now, so, I’m hoping to follow your footsteps!
Happy birthday! It’s a milestone and it’s great you’re so happy at this point in your life. 🙂 The possibilities are endless for your 50th birthday!
And thanks for all the wisdom, I love ‘lessons learned’ type of posts.
Congratulations, Johanna! How wonderful! You achieved so much and are a big inspiration! All best to you and your family. Julia
P.S. – sorry, I just wrote Johanna (like my German friend) instead of Joanna!
Happy Birthday, Joanna! I really enjoy your blog and the information you provide.
Happy Birthday Joanna!
It’s quite the journey you’ve been on these past few years and I admire your steel and your courage! I’m dipping my toes into the waters this year, definitely not as sure as you were when you switched careers (yet!).
Definitely one of the lessons I learned since starting my writing blog this year is to “just start”. There’s never a ‘perfect time’, never a ‘perfectly prepared’. You learn as you go and you always keep learning!
Here’s to a fantastic next decade filled with all the joy and books you can manage!
– Care
Thanks Care – and yes, just start is so important. So read a book on writing and then write 🙂 that balance between learning and production is so important – too many people spend so long learning about stuff without actually DOING it! All the best with your creation.
Ah yes, the “shadow career.” I’ve been struggling with that one for awhile now.
I’m sort of like you Joanna, in that my heart is in fiction, and yet I still find myself doing the easy thing – writing and publishing non-fiction. For me, at the present, non-fiction comes super easy to me and it pays the bills rather well.
Writing fiction on the other hand, though I love “having written” takes a TON of mental fortitude and self-discipline. Maybe it’s because I have yet to prove myself in the fiction marketplace (still working on my first epic fantasy novel – 136,000 words in…yikes!)
Congrats on reaching 40 by the way. Your journey has truly been an inspiration.
Cheers,
Thanks Ron – and I have another post brewing about Plato’s chariot and balancing the two sides of our personality. I have two quite different sides – and actually, I need to feed both of them – the darker, quiet story-teller (J.F.Penn) and the entrepreneur fascinated by tech and all kinds of other things 🙂 (Joanna Penn) I’ve been thinking on the shadow career this week – and actually, for me, it’s more about balancing my personality than trying to let one or the other dominate. Perhaps it’s similar for you.
Happy Birthday! And congratulations on all of your accomplishments during the past 10 years! 🙂
HBD Joanna!
Thank Goodness I never have to miss this post.
Joanna, your life and The Creative Penn blog and podcast are all great inspiration for me. I remembered that fateful day after quitting my real estate job and I’ve got nothing to do and fate made me stumbled on an episode of The Creative Penn podcast and that taught me that I can write a book and ship it out to the world without the need for any gatekeeper and now, gave me a reason to be happy that I screwed my boring 9-5 life.
In 10 years time when I will be 40, I know I will be able to look back and thank you more for a great motivational factor you’ve been when you don’t even know it.
Keep blasting the trail and I believe the sky ain’t gonna be able to stop you.
Cheers!
Thanks Mayowa, and it’s great to have the internet to make us findable all over the world – inspiring each other no matter where we are! All the best for your next 10 years!
Happy birthday!
Baby steps will always get you there, even if they are little. And goodness knows where you will be in another ten years, but one thing I do know, we will all be following your journey with interest!
I will be running workshops in my virtual reality space – which will be very cool indeed 🙂 see you in 2025!
First off, happy birthday and thank you for writing such a fabulous post. I’ve been a regular reader of yours for years now and you really inspire me. I’m going through a tough time recently—basically, I kind of “fell into” my current job and don’t like it one bit, which I know you can relate to!—and reading your blog gives me hope that I can change my life and have a career I love. I know it won’t happen overnight, so I’ve just got to keep working at it.
Again, happy birthday and I wish you luck with your future writing projects. 🙂
I know how you feel Natalie! It’s amazing how that happens – but realizing it is the first step and then you just have to take lots of steps in a new direction. My book, Career Change, goes through how I made that switch over time: http://www.thecreativepenn.com/careerchange/
Happy birthday, Joanna, and congratulations on your ongoing success.
One thing I have noticed about successful authorpreneurs such as yourself is how accessible you remain–not just in your inspirational blog posts and videos that are distributed for all readers, but in the time you willingly spend connecting one-on-one with your readers when they leave a comment on your blog or social networks.
That is a real testament to your character. I think it is also a testament to the fact that online success allows people to basically “package themselves” from a marketing point of view in a way that allows them to remain human, nice and connected, rather than kowtowing to the whims of some machine that wants to make sure everyone “stays on message”.
I believe very much in what you said, as well, about taking 100% responsibility for your life. It is so true. I have never read the Jack Canfield book but I may need to check it out.
Happy days,
Joe
Thanks Joe – I appreciate your kind words – and one of the reasons I do this is to be part of a community. Some say that being an author is a lonely life, but I certainly don’t find it so!
There is definitely ‘packaging’ to some extent, for example, when I am sick or feeling down, I try not to share that – my aim is to be positive and upbeat in what I share 99% of the time. But I do try to be authentic in all I do here. Thanks!
Happy 40th Joanna! I hope you had an amazing day. My 40th marked a huge turnaround in my life and I published my first non-fiction novel shortly after. In February this year I released my debut Young Adult fantasy book – all of this was possible due to the unwavering support and advice you give to us self-published writers’. I used the information from your post on hosting a book release party and ended up having the best four hour party of my life – all in the comfort of my home and pj’s! My Facebook reach hit over 13k! Thank you for a wonderful blog and many happy returns 🙂
My head is exploding! I just discovered you through a friend, a fellow writer. I am so glad you’re sharing your insights, thank you so much. I’m going to buy one of your books and learn more about you. I look forward to learning more. What you say resonates with me so much. Very grateful.