Only once

November 4, 2014

I understand why some authors don’t want to deal with anything but the writing. Vetting editors, finding illustrators, getting a cover made, formatting the text, picking a distribution model, building a website, doing promotions, organizing sales … these all take away from doing the central work they set out to do, which is writing.

I’m a little different. I like to be in control of my destiny, and I don’t like to compromise creatively. That’s why I’m independently publishing. I’m also a marketer by trade, so all the business stuff is actually fun to me. I know, I’m weird.

But that doesn’t mean the new stuff isn’t scary. I’m trying to design my book’s cover right now, and it’s made me realize how out of my element I am. I don’t know what works in covers as well as I know what works in words. I have ideas, but this is all new, and scary, and I don’t know if I’m going to waste money or get ripped or and I just want to ignore it all and go write.

Here’s what I realized: it’s only scary the first time. Then it will lessen. Next time, I’ll know how to get a book formatted. I’ll have an illustrator to go to. I’ll know what promotions work and don’t work.

Oh, it won’t go away completely, but that’s fine. Fear is good. If you’re not doing work that frightens you, you’re probably not doing the work that’s worth doing. But it lessens. It’s not longer paralyzing, and it not longer slows you down. You’ve done this before. You can do it again.

It’s only scary once, and after that, you’ll know how to do it for the rest of your life. And that knowledge is more valuable than the extra time you could have spent writing, when you would have paid with the lion’s share of your profits for that time.

There’s outsourcing, and then there’s running away. Be sure you know which one you’re doing.