market and publish your bookDear Fellow Writer,

How’s it going? You know, with the book writing … and publishing … and marketing?

Hopefully you’ve found success and confidence this year.

Hopefully you’ve launched your author marketing platform without batting an eye, and you’re already interacting daily with avid readers clamoring for you to write more books.

But if that’s not the case …

If you’re still on the fence, or still trying to wrap up that last chapter, or still struggling over whether to use a pen name …

Or, if you’re like me and you got blindsided by life events that left you standing yet hurting, sad but wise, immobile yet antsy …

Then let’s all just take a moment.

Take a moment first, to look around you at all the blessings in your life. Even if they’re not what you pictured having by this point, you surely have some.

Take a moment to remember the early burn of your first writing goals. Remember that warm feeling it lit inside of you, much like spiced cider or kneeling by a blazing hearth.

Is that fire still burning? Or is it blanketed by ash?

If your spark has gone out, this is the month to rekindle it.

Why Now is the Best Time to Reawaken Your Writer’s Thirst

I just got done reading a lengthy Facebook post started by a well-known and much-respected copywriter.

The post was about his biggest regret in life. He finished by asking, “What’s yours?”

The number of responses was staggering. Dozens upon dozens of people — many of them writers — opened up about things they wish they’d done, or hadn’t done, in life so far. Some, I could relate to. Some just outright shocked me.

But every one of them was about living better and celebrating life more often in some form.

Many people said their biggest regret was not being there for family and friends in their final moments. Many said they regretted not pursuing an education, not working harder to make something of themselves, or not achieving success while certain loved ones were still around to see it.

Not one person said they wished they’d lost those extra pounds they carried around, or that their house had been cleaner, their cars nicer, their wrinkles gone.

On some level, you and I both know the things that dominate our minds daily are often not the things that matter most.

Earlier this week, I finished a book called The Secrets of Happy Families by Bruce Feiler. It’s a phenomenal book, with many valuable takeaways. But one of the most powerful things I gained from it was that families, and life, will always be wrapped in a thread of dissonance.

You can have the most organized, loving, mindful family habits … you can plan the most exciting, bond-producing reunions …

Yet at some point, someone’s going to argue about something. Someone’s going to step on someone else’s toes, or theories, or ideas of what should be but isn’t. And then arguments will surface, neck hairs will prickle, doors may slam …

But it will pass. When people put forward a single-minded determination to invest their mental, emotional, and physical energy in something — in this case, a happy family — it will come to fruition.

The same is true for your book.

Not a month will go by without some kind of hurdle for you to overcome. Or some excuse that gives you an easy out.

But if writing your book is something you’ll genuinely regret not completing, something you don’t want to finish your life without having done, then recommit. Do it. Act. Write.

Finish your book if it’s not there yet. Build your author platform if you haven’t already started. And get it out there. Make connections in the writer world. Build connections in the reader world. Let your voice be heard, so that many moons from now, this won’t be the single largest regret that clouds your past. Believe me, writer regrets aren’t easy to live with.

Fortunately, one thing that’s always helped me in times of writing limbo is having a community of writers to reach out to for support. I’ll certainly be leaning on them in the busy months of writing I foresee for the New Year. You can learn more about The Barefoot Writer community here.

To your imminent writing success,

mindy mchorse, author and copywriter