When It's Time to Step Away From A Project

Not every writer is going to be able to do every project. This is an unfortunately sad reality. Sometimes, no matter how interested you are in your project, no matter how much work you've got done for it, no matter how much research you've done for that particular project, the bottom line is that not every project is something you're going to be able to complete. In some cases, you're not even able to even start on it. 

There's an infinite number of reasons for this. You can't connect to the setting. You can't get into the characters. There are even projects that may be just too personal for you. 

That's fine. 

It may be something that's going to drive you crazy. And in some cases it can almost be like you're having to put your pet down.There's absolutely no way to get around that because we're human: We don't like putting an emotional investment into something and then having to walk away from it. 

Unfortunately, part of being a writer is occasionally realizing that sometimes we need to step away from something. Sometimes it's just not working. There's no way we can make everything work. Sometimes it's a limitation or skills. Sometimes it's a limitation or personality. That's fine. Everybody needs to know what their limits are. I don't care how skilled or how talented a writer you are, some projects just aren't going to work. 

So whenever that happens, just step away. Don't feel guilty. I know that last bit is going to be impossible you because you're always going to feel guilty but just just step away.If you don't you're going to go crazy trying to do something that you know is impossible. If you step away then you can deal with all of the frustration then and it won't be as bad as it could be later on. 

So the bottom line is that if you know you can't complete something just step away from it. It may be hard, but it's better to deal with it sooner than later, and frees up all of the energy that you were putting into the project so you can use it elsewhere. So let it go; you'll feel a lot better.

Unleash Your Inner Demons

Writers have arguably one of the coolest jobs in the universe, especially since it does have a little bit of a therapeutic aspect to it. We have a way to get rid of our inner demons in ways that nobody else does. 

Everybody else in the universe has to keep their demons hidden, locked away, chained up, and they have to do this for the good of society. They then have to go to a psychotherapist, who's modern-day equivalent of an exorcist, talk it out, figure out what the problem is. 

For writers, however, it's different. We have the advantage of releasing our inner demons have scenes that are so incredibly evil, nasty and absolutely disgusting, and we actually get paid to do this. We can actually throw them into the world and have a little bit of fun with them. We can explore why they're evil and why they're not so nice. 

Basically, we explore why they don't play well with others. And that's what people love about us. 

I don't care if you're doing horror or if you doing science fiction, you can just let everything go. If you have some sort of evil demon, figure out how to make it even nastier. Throw it into your story and have a lot of fun with it. The more fun you have with it, the more you let it run riot, the more people will love it.

Better yet, by dealing with the demon, by taking time to understand it and to basically figure out where it's coming from you're actually exorcising your own demon, which is sort of cool when you think about it. What this means from a practical perspective is that if you're having a problem, figure out how to set up this really cool villain your story based on that problem. Go deep. have a little fun, explore around and find the darkest, nastiest thing in there. And bring it screaming into the light.

Everyone else has to hide their demons. Writers get to let theirs loose on the world, and get loved for it. Talk about a major perk....

Build A Community

One of the things you need when you're starting to promote things is that you have to have people to whom you can promote things. I don't care if it's something as simple as your friends on Facebook, you need to have people that you can tell that you're doing something. I don't care how complicated or how simple it is; you need to spread the word and you can't spread the word if it's just you. If the only people person you can be sure to get in contact with is basically just you and you alone, then there's no real sense in promoting anything because obviously nobody else is really going to pay attention to you. 

However, by building a community, you create a support crew, you create people that will occasionally have your back and if you're having problems you can actually access advice. But more importantly, when you start doing promotion you've got people to whom you can promote whatever it is. You can go on to their Facebook pages and say, "What's up, here's what I'm doing." You can go into your LinkedIn and go, H"ey, this is going to help you check me out."

The key is that you've got to have some sort of community in order to spread the news to. And you've got to take the steps in order to build that community up. You've got to put a little bit of effort into it; this isn't something that you're going to start and go on to something else, and you have to constantly maintain it. You've got to figure out ways to say, "Hey, I'm alive!" You've got to check in with other people and you have to occasionally say "happy birthday" or "congratulations on a new job". 

The bottom line is that if you really are serious about promoting whatever you're trying to promote, then your first step should be to build a community that you can promote to, or you won't have one when you need them later on. 

Twitter is Your Friend

Sure, it's 280 characters, it may not seem like you can accomplish much, but that doesn't mean that it should be disregarded. Twitter allows you do a whole lot of things very quickly, making it a very efficient marketing tool.  

The most obvious thing that you can do is create a platform that basically says, "Hey, I'm here, I've done something really cool. Check it out!" and give a really quick reason why people need to check it out. If nothing else, this is a really great way to get you doing really quick elevator pitches; you've only got 280 characters you need to make it as quick as possible. This means that you need to get in, get out and do it as much damage as you possibly can. 

Just remember the five basics: 1) tell people who you are, 2) what you are, 3) why they should be checking you out, 4) what they're checking out, and 5) how to get there. If you can do all that, and you do this in 280 characters or less, you're golden. This means you're basically gonna be able to get into that really great Twitter feed, and have somebody actually check you out. 

Keep in mind that you're gonna have to follow other people and track what those people are doing. It sounds a little onerous and it can get annoying. But even if you spend, say 10-15 minutes a day on just checking things out really quick, you should be good to go. This is just basic courtesy: If you want people to look at what you're doing it helps to look at what others are doing.

Twitter allows you to post stuff up, let people know what you're doing, and keep up on what industry professionals are doing as well. Thanks to this, Twitter should be a major assist with any kind of social media campaign you're doing. And keep in mind that you should be doing this as a supplement; you should obviously try to figure out what your favorite social media choice is, and use that. But definitely make sure you do Twitter as well. It's easy to use, it's easy to maintain, and it can have an impact. 

Use it right, and Twitter can definitely be your friend.