Dear Writer, You Need to Quit (QuitBooks for Writers, #1)

by Becca Syme

You write these stories of transformation all day long, every day, some of you, and yet you still expect your own journey of transformation to be easy. Don’t be stupid. I’m sorry to be harsh here, but stories are resonant because they feel true, in their core. Black moments are part of life. The bad news is, nothing will ever truly transform you that won’t be a crucible. It’s going to be hard. It’s probably gonna suck a lot. Stop expecting things to be easy. That’s an unrealistic expectation that will never serve you. It will only handicap you.

Of course, QTP isn’t just about Facebook (or Instagram or Twitter or any other social media). It’s about every premise we accept that makes us lose something. Lose productivity. Lose confidence. Lose capacity. Lose momentum.

Willpower is a resource, just like our energy. It’s not unlimited. And one of the reasons that “change all the things” doesn’t work is because we’re spending our willpower in tiny increments in too many places, and then it runs out.

Smartypants Book Marketing Podcast.

What would it hurt to just accept that you won’t be happy all the time? That everything shouldn’t be easy?

The next best thing to “easy” is a manageable problem.

Reviews are for readers. Not for authors.

When you need time and space to think about stories or characters or plots, then you need time and space. When you have a day job, then you have a day job. When you have a family, then you have a family. You can’t exist outside of these things.

You have to take into account who you are, and what you want, and what your contribution to the world will be.

If you are on the road to burnout, then stop with me for a second and do some reflection. Why are you doing this? What is at stake for you? Is it really necessary for you to keep this pace? If you were to look back at yourself in ten years, what would you say to yourself? What is the question you have been dreading answering? What’s the thing that you avoid thinking about?

Talent, work, timing, and luck.

never give in to rhetorical questions. Make them real questions. Either make someone ask you and you really have to answer, or you journal about them. Answer the questions.

You have to be willing to endure the essential pain (the boredom, the fear, the frustration, the discomfort), or you will never grow in your resilience, and the work will always be hard.

You expect fear to be there. You don’t wait for fear to go away before you act.

Inaction is where intention goes to die.