5 Years on WordPress?! Notes on What You’ve Seen and What to Expect for 2020

So, the little notification bell alerted me to the fact it is my 5th anniversary of blogging! The fact I had no idea it had been this long probably tells you a lot more, a lot quicker, about my current state of mental capability, than all the whining I could throw down at the moment.

But anyway, when I took a second to consider this, I realized the bell was right. It was a cold, blustery January day in 2015 when I decided I needed to do something different with my life, and took the plunge into unfamiliar territory — social media. I’d determined I really wanted to finish writing a novel and explore self-publishing, and building a base of knowledge and support seemed like a good idea.

Fast forward to now, and not only do I have several publications under my belt, I have met some of the most wonderful, encouraging, compassionate people, who have helped to see me through some intense ups and downs the last few years. Together, we’ve celebrated the highs and pushed beyond the lows; and as someone who constantly battled feeling like she didn’t belong anywhere, knowing (at last) that this is not the case is more valuable than words can explain.

I used to be very driven by establishing my platform quickly and covering as many bases as were possible. I toyed around with the notion of being on every single social media site (ha!), and attempting to cast my net wide to scour the internet for supporters from various near and far areas. Rather soon, I learned that spreading myself too thin achieved none of this. Hence, I’ve limited my online presence to WordPress and Twitter, which tend to do just fine in terms of keeping people who follow me informed of the latest. I may not be getting as much publicity as other indie authors, but since I’m doing it all on my own, maintaining the pressure is much more appealing than seeing my face absolutely everywhere.

Though there will be some expansion coming up. I’m working on (finally) publishing ebooks, and I’m going to make some updates and additions to my current bibliography this spring, too. After agonizing for quite a while (no lie) about how to proceed with this end of my marketing and production, the goal became not how to do this the way everybody else was doing it, but how to do it to my satisfaction. So that’s why this undertaking shall proceed, after all.

And because I’m going to be working more on actual fiction writing and what gets it to the page/device, it means I may not be around here as much as I have been. But there is also something to be said for recognizing when you just can’t handle it all, and determining what’s more important at certain stages of your life.

The one thing that I know won’t change is the ongoing support from my tribe, and this is what matters more than anything else. I probably would’ve thrown in the towel on this whole fancy of actually releasing into the wild the stories I kept to myself for so long without my cheering section. So, to each and every one of you, THANK YOU, and here’s to a great new year!