In a recent issue of Photo Journal the editor’s letter to the reader is about being organized amidst chaos. It sounds smart, right? A great topic that goes beyond photography to writers, hell, to life. But it wasn’t about simply keeping your head in the middle of a chaotic shoot or how to deal with the elements when shooting outdoors, or crazy, temperamental models or equipment-it was about using the chaos of the crappy economy to get yourself organized. And that struck a chord deep within for me.
Right now, the news is full of unemployment rates, layoffs, and bankruptcy. The economy isn’t flush, and the publishing industry is feeling the crunch, just like everything else. We all want to survive these lean times, we want to sell our stories to publishers, and then to readers, but what do you do when sales are few and far between?
My advice is to take this time to think outside your normal zone. Dig deeper and take some risks with your writing. Try a genre you’ve always wanted to try, give that nagging secondary character a story. Write the one you’ve always wanted to write but thought will never sell. Not only will this keep you working, but it will keep you wanting to write. It’ll boost your creative juice up a notch and, in the end, you’ll have a product. And when the upswing comes, you’ll be more than ready. You’ll be ahead of the game. When editors start looking for more, you’ll have completed projects to pitch.
When everyone else is either too busy trying to keep their day job to write, or perhaps too stressed about keeping their editor/publisher/readers happy to venture too far from their status quo, you can make the best use of this time. Work harder. Write more. Don’t despair over what’s selling or not selling right now. Instead, I urge you to look to the future. Things will hit an upswing again. It’s bound to happen, and you want to be ready when it does.
I decided over a year ago that I needed time off from writing full-time. I had my reasons, but those reasons don’t really matter right now. What matters is that when I knew the economy was starting to get rough, and I knew publishers might not be buying for a while I had to think seriously about what my next step would be. Part of me wanted to get my ass in gear, pound out a few ideas/proposals, and get them into my editors ASAP with the hope that I’d once again be contracted and not have to wonder if I’d ever sell again. The other part of me wanted to use the turn of events as an excuse to go back to the regular job and never write again. It was a battle between, I tell you. One that I never really resolved. I feel like I’ve floated through the past year, and to be honest, I have. But it’s become clear to me that I needed to. You see, a few months ago I bid on one of the getaways Cherry Adair had donated to the Brenda Novak online auction for juvenile diabetes, and I got it. I quickly rounded up 5 author friends and we planned a writers’ retreat. I was ready and eager to have it in July, but working out a time when 6 people who all have other things going on in their life besides writing took a bit of effort. But we did it. And this week it’s happening. Last week was when I picked up the copy of Photo Journal.
Even though I didn’t have anything firm in mind to work on this week, I was still eager to come and brainstorm and spend time chatting with others that are at various points in their careers. And okay, I was also eager to sit on the deck by the lake, drink, eat and laugh with my friends. Some really creative story ideas come about that way!
Anyway, back to my point. I’m sitting in the Seattle airport right now, waiting for my ride, writing a blog post that I tried to find the time to do all weekend. Why didn’t I get it done earlier like I’d planned? Why am I doing it now, last minute as usual? Because when I started to think about what to bring here, I collected the many notebooks strewn about my condo that I’d jotted down every crazy and out of the box idea I’d had in the last year. Then I started reading those notes, and the editorial from Photo Journal came back to me and I was hooked. I’m sooo ready for this retreat it’s scary. I’m going to plan my whole year, or two, or five with all these crazy ideas I have. I’m not even going to start looking for a home for any of them until I feel the market has improved enough that I can sell more than just one book. The goal is to build a lasting career, and for me, right now, that means looking to more than the next book. So my plan has become to get my ideas written and proposals polished and when the publishers start buying like crazy, I’ll have some stuff already done and ready to roll.
The message; Don’t stress about things that are beyond your control. Focus on what you can control. Your work, your writing, and what you do with your time.
“When life hands you lemons, make lemonade.”
From Sasha White
*For Mark Henry who said that the RSS feed never tells you who wrote the post.*
