<\/p>\n
Among the many mental and emotional flaws of the fiction writer is the
\ndriving desire to get published.\u00a0 It’s a modern misinterpretation
\nof the true goal — to get noticed.\u00a0 To be read.\u00a0 The
\nmisguided youth culture of the last 40 years has made publication for
\nmoney the end-all, be-all goal of the writer.\u00a0 Oh, it’s a good
\nthing.\u00a0 Don’t get me wrong.\u00a0 The problem is not, necessarily,
\nthe goal.\u00a0 The problem is the motivation.\u00a0 Today, the desire
\nto be published stems from the flawed mentality of advanced
\ncapitalism.\u00a0 That’s all I hear — I want to get published so I can
\nmake money, so I can leave my nowhere job and sit in my bathrobe and
\nwrite all day.<\/p>\n
You know what?\u00a0 That will never happen.<\/p>\n
Oh, there are the lucky few.\u00a0 The proud and noble leaders of the
\ncause, the exceptions to the rules.\u00a0 That’s why you know their
\nnames so well.\u00a0 But those names really are few out of millions
\nand, upon closer inspection, you’ll find that those proud few work
\nharder than you ever have in your life.<\/p>\n
Do you have the names of the proud few in mind?\u00a0 Let’s talk
\ndedication to the job.\u00a0 Those names in your mind, do you notice
\nthat they put out at least one book a year?\u00a0 There’s no time
\noff.\u00a0 You finish the bestseller, you take a week to get your wits
\ntogether and then you start writing the next one.\u00a0 Oh, and get it
\nfinished in a few months, kid.\u00a0 You should be well on the way with
\nthe next book before the one you just wrote goes to paperback.
\nThen there are the tours, possibly the wrangling with a production
\ncompany over an option, the useless, static webpage that cost a pretty
\npenny.\u00a0 It’s astounding the sacrifices you make so that you have
\nthe time to cuddle up with the visions in your head and get them on
\npaper.\u00a0 More often than not, the money will run short or be
\nunreliable.\u00a0 You can teach then, lecture, judge contests, host
\nwriting seminars.<\/p>\n
Writing is work.\u00a0 If, 10 years from now, you’re the next Stephen
\nKing…writing will still be work.\u00a0 Oh, you love what you
\ndo.\u00a0 The only problem is that you have to keep doing it if you
\nreally want to not worry about the car payment at the end of the month.
\nIt amazes me how struggling writers think it’s so easy.\u00a0 Sell a
\nstory and make a mint and you’ll be famous.\u00a0 Of all the people,
\nthey should know the truth.<\/p>\n
Most struggling writers treat it as a hobby, or escapism or self
\nhealing.\u00a0 They work their nowhere jobs and then spend the evenings
\nlaboring over some long winded novel.\u00a0 That’s cool, everyone
\nwrites, but don’t wonder about getting published and making a living
\njust because you wrote one story about the time Uncle Harry whipped
\nyou.\u00a0 The first thing to identify is why you are writing.
\nThe writer writes because he or she must write.\u00a0 It’s what you
\ndo.\u00a0 The drive to be a living writer shouldn’t come from the idea
\nthat one wants to leave the workaday world and enjoy themselves but,
\ninstead, that one must figure out a way to devote the most time
\npossible for something that’s in their primal, basic nature.
\nAs with everything in life, if you’re not following your heart, you’re making mistakes.<\/p>\n
The golden rule which every struggling writer needs to realize is a simple one:\u00a0 “You will fail.”<\/p>\n
There.\u00a0 Say it.\u00a0 Relax and really get your frenetic,
\nmegalomaniac psyche around that idea.\u00a0 It’s not about what you
\nthink it’s about.<\/p>\n
Got it?\u00a0 Good, now you’re ready to write.<\/p>\n
It’s long been my opinion, and I’m not alone in these thoughts, that
\nwriting comes from the same mechanism as dreams.\u00a0 Even with the
\nstrictest, disciplined outline you’re still creating a freeform
\nenvironment where anything can happen.\u00a0 Even if you’re writing
\nthose pre-form romance novels, in the juice of act 2, where your hero
\ntakes a fall, call me if you don’t see an unexpected turn.<\/p>\n
It’s a real world that you’re building with these words.\u00a0 You can
\nlearn the language and the structure but you can’t learn how to create
\nthat world.\u00a0 It’s a dream given form, and some people are better
\nat that than others.\u00a0 Your creative writing degree exists only as
\na resume builder.\u00a0 I’m convinced that an illiterate boy raised by
\nwolves could be a bestselling author if he has the ability to give
\nthose dreams form.\u00a0 This is where escapism comes in, but for the
\nreader not the writer.<\/p>\n
The struggling writer often fails at this point.\u00a0 He or she
\nforgets the reader.\u00a0 Yet he or she constantly asks how can they
\nget published and make a fortune.<\/p>\n
I hate to be political, but, if anything should be ruled by true
\nsocialism, writing should.\u00a0 It’s the foundation of all
\nentertainment.\u00a0 It stands there with art and music.\u00a0 It’s
\nwhere modern glitz begins.\u00a0 It also belongs to the reader as soon
\nas you write “The End.”\u00a0 I don’t mean belonging in a financial
\nsense.\u00a0 It’s deeper than that.\u00a0 You get inside people with
\nwords and music and art.\u00a0 You make them love you, hate you.
\nYour words shape their speech, their thoughts.\u00a0 You inspire and
\ndestroy the masses with a page you wrote while slightly intoxicated,
\nwearing a bathrobe, at 2am on a Tuesday morning.<\/p>\n
Your connection with the reader is intimate.\u00a0 Forget about the
\nmoney in their pocket, focus on the touch. Mesmerize the beast, and
\nyou’ll get your money.\u00a0 Getting paid is not the first step.
\nIt should never be the first step.\u00a0 The key to understanding money
\nis to ignore it.\u00a0 You’ll be surprised how much you make and save
\nwhen you don’t give a damn.<\/p>\n
Your priority, as a writer, is your audience.\u00a0 You’re writing for
\nthe guy in the hospital bed, the woman in the bathtub, the pensioner on
\nthe evening train, the flight attendant in the hotel room, the
\nprofessor in his study on a Saturday morning, the kid taking a break
\nafter his history final.\u00a0 That’s your audience.\u00a0 Little cells
\nof Humanity who want to take you into their sphere and let you talk to
\nthem.\u00a0 Private, personal..and, hopefully, repeated a few hundred
\nthousand times!<\/p>\n
I’ll talk about my experiences in the publishing world next time.
\nFor now, let go of your fear, your advanced capitalism, and your
\nexpectations.\u00a0 Just write.\u00a0 Don’t worry about your stupid
\njob.\u00a0 Write at lunch, write in the bathroom, use your vacation
\ntime, set aside a day during the weekend where all you do is write.<\/p>\n
Follow your heart and, for God’s sake, stop your foul whining.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[352],"tags":[353,127],"class_list":["post-2588","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-gsarchive","tag-gs-archive-2004-2008","tag-writing"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/greatsociety.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2588","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/greatsociety.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/greatsociety.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/greatsociety.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/greatsociety.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=2588"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/greatsociety.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2588\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":2796,"href":"https:\/\/greatsociety.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2588\/revisions\/2796"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/greatsociety.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=2588"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/greatsociety.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=2588"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/greatsociety.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=2588"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}