Sometimes…

The road to achieving a dream can be less than clear.

After I wrote yesterday’s post, I started thinking about ‘why’ the writing dream has remained so elusive for me.

I think, I may have stumbled over what’s been holding me back. It has to do with the way I approach problems and the resultant solution(s). I use a method I call ‘divide and conquer’. In short it involves taking all the known components, breaking them into discrete little tasks, organizing them, and starting in on the entire project.

I’ve used it in nearly every single activity of my life; as far back as I can remember. It’s served me incredibly well in the software development arena, and in most of my other ‘careers’ as well.

This writing dream however is a bit more, let’s say “fuzzy”, though. The writing part seems simple enough, once I get an idea in my head; the words seem to come along fairly well. It’s the ‘what to do with the words’ part that I find so perplexing.

You see, in everything else I’ve done, I had an assigned task first, the resolution second, and the delivery (and the money) last. In writing, it appears you deliver first, and then have to locate a ‘market’ for the deliverable, and last (hopefully) receive payment for your efforts.

Getting these first two articles published was fairly easy. I simply contacted the editor directly (someone I met gave me her email address), she sent me the editorial calendar and suggested I write something that would tie in with the various themes. I wrote two articles, she accepted both of them. (Task, resolution, delivery)

That process fit in with everything I already knew.

This new process, well how to begin it, is far less than clear to me. Many publishers only accept certain genres of work, others will accept many types of writing, but how they decide what’s ‘marketable’ is very unclear. No one ‘needs’ a book, it’s a luxury, an entertainment product, something I have zero experience in understanding.

What separates the selected work, from all the rest? What sorts of writing is more likely to ‘catch the eye’ of a potential publisher? What kind of living can I realistically hope to earn as a writer (assuming of course someone actually buys something I’ve written)?

That’s a lot of unanswered questions for me. I’ve always answered all the questions first, acted second. I wonder now, should I just write what’s in my head and then, look for a publisher? Or, research the market, find a topic someone is paying for, that peaks my interest and write something to submit? Or, some other avenue I’ve not considered yet?

My personality (an ENTP for those of you familiar with such things) is one of wanting ‘data’, information (and too much is not enough) with which to make these sorts of decisions. I’m beginning to believe that my inability to act on this is rooted in the fact I can’t seem to gather enough of the right information.

It’s frustrating as well, I search, google, yahoo… whatever... and I find an overwhelming amount of information, none of it specific enough for me to act on.

So, I’m reaching out to you folks, my readers, for some answers.

You’ve read my stories, thoughts and ideas, and so on… where do you think I should go to find a market? Magazines you read, publishers you may know of that publish these sort of “life’s moment’s” compilations… Honestly, anything, anywhere, you think I could turn to find a place suited to my style.

I promise, I’ll run down every lead y’all give me, and let you know the results.

Thanks again for stopping by, feel free to leave me a comment, I really do enjoy knowing what you think!