In the months since my last post, I’ve gathered a few things. A long list of important topics to cover; a bristling quiver of metaphors about the writing process; quotes from bestselling authors; and big ambitions for this newsletter. Last week I sat down to write a post that I’ve been dreaming of for months, outlining for almost as long, and thinking, thinking, thinking about. But I found in myself another thing—a strange one: I was nervous about writing it.
Over the last twenty years I’ve talked with innumerable authors who felt stuck on some important point, not because they didn’t know the information, but because they felt its importance weighing on them. The more important they thought it was, the more frozen they felt. That might be contributing to what I felt, but I suspect it was something else, too. By giving myself the summer off writing here, I got the chance to stockpile ideas, read a ton, and come back with some energy. But it turns out there’s a downside that I didn’t anticipate, in the form of a new nervousness about publishing my own ideas. Of course, it’s not new—I felt exactly the same way before I hit ‘go’ on my first post a couple of years ago.
The upshot here is that I’m starting to think that in addition to the value to be found in writing (it might be the most potent part of the learning process), there’s a different value in publishing. And I don’t mean it in terms of tangible benefits like new connections (what’s ROI?). What I see is that the act of publishing gives me a worthwhile boost that carries through my other work. With surprising frequency, I hear that it’s helpful to other people when I publish, too.
If you’ve been thinking about publishing, whether that means pitching a book project to agents and publishers or it means starting your own substack, go for it. I’m giving you permission. I’m asking you to. If you do, drop a link in the comments here so more of my readers can find you.
And for now, this post will be my ice-breaker, so that next week I can get back to the good stuff.
You’re back!!!!
Go for it!