Hope you’re having a great week my friend.
By the end of this letter, you will know:
- The best thing you can do to set a strong writing foundation
- The benefits and pitfalls of inspiration
- How to use outsized goals
Mastering your mindset as an author is the first step to an exciting career, and the information in this letter will help you get started.
Enjoy!
Going Pro
Athletes have it good.
It may not be easy to “go pro”, but at least the path is clear.
Pick a sport you like and continue to play it for years. Show you are committed. Get stronger and more adept at the game and you have a chance to be selected for the big leagues.
Writing doesn’t have such a clear path.
The theory is similar, but in reality it just doesn’t work the same.
First of all, there are no physical changes to show your progression, like gaining muscle. Visual improvement goes a long way to enhancing confidence, and it’s more difficult for an author to see their progress than an athlete.
Writing is also a largely solitary activity.
Few authors have the benefit of a coach or team to encourage and guide them. It’s just you and your thoughts. Worse, much of the path to “go pro” as an author is based on hope.
You hope you can find an agent…
You hope they get you a book deal…
You hope people will buy it…
This is partly due to the subjective nature of stories.
The athlete trains hard, then demonstrates their skill and is measured based on how fast they can run, how many goals they score.
It’s cut and dry.
An author is measured on the quality of their story, which means different things to different people on different days.
It can feel random.
But what if we’re thinking about this the wrong way?
After all, writers produce a tangible product when they train, while the touchdowns an athlete scores disappear into history.
A Strong Foundation
Instead of thinking of success in terms of book deals, think of writing as setting a foundation.
Say you spend 1 year writing a book.
By the end of that year you will have a tangible stack of paper you can rifle through. A physical manuscript you can hold in your hands.
If no one wants to publish it, your book doesn’t disappear. It’s a thing you made, and it will stick around.
And now that you’ve written a book, you are better at writing books.
You can spend the next year writing another book—maybe you’ll write it even faster.
Now you have 2 books.
At this rate, you can have 5 books (or more) written within 5 years.
If one of these gets published it’s likely they’ll want to see your other work. You can show them the other 4, maybe re-edit them with your new experience.
The point is, the work you do does not disappear. It’s a long-term investment in yourself.
If you want to make a career out of fiction, you need to think in a timescale beyond your debut novel.
Stay consistent, and when one project finds success it will bleed into your earlier work.
Even if it doesn’t, you can return to stories you’ve already told with greater skill if they’re important to you.
An athlete can lose the big game, but a writer can’t lose a book.
(friendly reminder to back up your files!)
Here’s another way to look at it. Think of your favorite musician. How many songs can you think of?
I can name three. I’ll recognize five more when I hear them.
Are they the only songs the musician has written? No. They wrote hundreds, maybe thousands, that never got released.
That effort wasn’t wasted, because it led them to the piece you love.
Plus, fans often intentionally seek out the artist’s early work.
This holds true for authors.
Our Greatest Obstacle
We’ve decided our true goal isn’t fame, but setting a solid foundation for a career of writing well.
Our greatest hurdle—the one thing most likely to bring us to our knees—is analysis paralysis.
It’s good to write from the soul and want your project to succeed, but when that stops us from finishing…
the amount we care actually gets in the way.
Worse, it can stop us from ever getting started.
I meet plenty of writers who have been working on the same book for the last ten years, because they really, really want to get it right.
Often they’ve tied their worth as an author to how well this one specific novel turns out.
But imagine they had spent those years finishing ten books…
The likelihood of doing their passion project justice goes way up.
Paradoxically, releasing your attachment to any one story and focusing on your ability to improve raises the quality of everything you write in the long run.
The best thing you can do for your career is learn not to put all your eggs in one basket.
Don’t get so attached to one project that it ruins your mindset if it fails.
Think about the big picture.
Work hard to make each story the best it can be, but focus on the goal of writing and improving so you’re not overly attached if two, ten, or even fifty of your stories fail.
Your worth is far greater than any one book.
The Role of Passion and Inspiration
We’ve all felt it.
That spark of an idea sending us scrambling for a notebook.
We work furiously for a few hours…
A few days…
and then something distracts us.
Time goes by, and when we return to our work it’s just not as exciting.
The fire has dwindled and the project gets shelved as we move on to something new.
Something really exciting.
Few writers manage to ride their initial motivation long enough to finish their draft.
Kudos if that’s you, but the rest of us just have to accept passion and inspiration are not the way books get written.
These emotions give us a kind of high, but it fades within a matter of days or weeks.
Media glorifies the mad genius of an author frantically scribbling their way through a brilliant idea, but in reality books are written by dedication to routine.
By consistently banging on the keyboard despite a thousand new ideas trying to distract you.
This is the trap new writers fall into.
The spike-lined pit of thinking that if you’ve lost your inspiration for the story it means the idea wasn’t good enough.
Ever heard runners talk about “The Wall”?
It’s the concept that there comes a point during a marathon when you feel like you’ve reached the end of your endurance.
Your strength is failing.
You can’t go on.
You’ve reached your limit, both physically and mentally.
Except…
Those who push through The Wall talk about experiencing “Runner’s High”.
A state of deep euphoria that relieves pain and boosts their mood.
And suddenly, they can keep running.
Writers won’t feel the physiological changes that come with hard exercise, but they will come up against a wall when the inspiration fades.
Giving up and starting something new is tempting.
Certainly it’s easier than pushing forward.
But those that break through this barrier find satisfaction and are far more likely to finish their draft.
Passion and inspiration for starting. Dedication and consistency for finishing.
The Role of Goal Setting
Athletes set goals.
If they weren’t striving for something they’d never improve.
The gym bro wants to bench 200 pounds.
The runner wants to finish a marathon.
Those are great long-term goals, but if you set out for your first jog and start wheezing after 100 meters…
Well, a marathon seems unrealistic.
Having overarching goals is important, but having manageable goals you can actually achieve in the short term is crucial.
Reaching a goal provides a hit of dopamine and reinforces your desire to keep at it.
As a writer looking for consistency, smaller, attainable goals are what you should focus on day to day.
That said, there’s a strong case for setting goals outside of your comfort zone.
Consider driving a car.
After driving for a while at a comfortable speed, going faster can make you nervous.
You become more alert and aware to possible danger.
And then you relax again, having adjusted to the new pace.
Ever notice when you drop down to your original speed it feels like you’re crawling along?
You can use this effect when setting goals for improvement.
Too many writers do themselves a disservice by setting their word targets too low.
If you don’t push yourself to write more you’ll never write more.
You’ll become complacent at your current level and never know what you’re truly capable of.
Writing 1000 words might seem like a lot until you’ve done it for a few weeks. But then your mind will adjust to the new pace, just like it does when speeding up in a car.
If I hadn’t set myself the goal of writing 10,000 words/day, I’d never know that I could consistently write 6000.
It was a big jump from my earlier routine of 2k.
Small goals are important, especially when starting out. Building a consistent routine is more important than writing sprints.
Thinking only of the marathon won’t get you out the door every morning. A 10-minute jog might.
But once you’ve done that for a few weeks…
Once you’ve built the habit…
It’s time to stretch your limits and throw fuel on the fire.
So push yourself. See what you’re capable of.
It just might surprise you.
P.S. If you enjoyed this letter, consider taking my Author Mindset Mastery course. In 3 hours, you’ll learn everything you need to prime yourself for a long and successful career – before ever picking up the pen!
