The Trials Of An Indie Author: Pivoting Works

THE TRIALS OF AN INDIE AUTHOR: PIVOTING WORKS

I've been an indie author for a very long time at this point, and I've learned and experienced a lot over my years. I've made mistakes, but I think all authors, somewhere along the way, will make those, and it's just a case of learning from them, moving on, and sometimes pivoting to make sure that you don't make them again. I was first published in 2005, and while I've grown since then, sometimes you forget that you can still fall into those same traps and bad habits.

One thing that it is easy to get caught up in, is the fact that as an indie author, you're pretty much the one who has to make all those decisions. You have to hire the editors, the cover designers, do all the promotion and release stuff. While yes you can hire PR companies and the like, not everyone starting out, or even later down the line, has that kind of money to do so. It's great if you do, but for a lot of indie authors, it's just not possible.

While I've talked before about all the hats an indie author wears (found here), I thought that today I would talk about how sometimes you can make a good thing out of a bad thing, even if it doesn't feel like that at the time. I made the mistake of not looking into doing audiobooks when I first started. It felt like something that was always going to be out of my reach, but when I finally, last year, decided to give it a go, it opened up a whole new world of readers, and it's something that I plan to continue doing going forward, as much as I'm able to at least.

A lot of the time as an indie author, you can feel like you have all this pressure on you, and you don't know how to get it all done. It's something I've felt a lot, especially when it comes to releases, and that's when I've found it better to focus on the things I can do rather than the things I can't. Like I'm never going to be able to write, edit, and publish in a matter of months, but I can make sure that I have a steady release schedule. Yes I have a lot of books drafted that need to be revised, and the thought of writing more made me feel way too anxious because how was I going to find the time to really revise the ones that needed a lot of work, and maybe even sensitivity reader input? That's when I kinda pivoted and decided to take a break from drafting and focus on getting some of my projects in better shape.

I'm someone who has always been exceptionally organised. It's something I've done from a very young age and it's something that helps me stay on track and allows me to stay productive even when my body is saying it needs time to rest, because I prep so many things in advance, it allows me to take those times off and still manage to stay on top of work. It's not something that works for everyone, and my way may not work for you, but it's a good idea to give it a go, especially if the indie life is already overwhelming you, because man, I feel that on a deep level.

But when it comes to pivoting, to changing direction, to taking the bad issues and making them good, it really is a good idea to have some kind of plan in place. Like I knew that I wanted to take at least a year off drafting. I knew that if I didn't set a deadline for when the current revision/rewriting projects were done, then I would spend forever going back and forth with them. I know that I work well with those kinds of deadlines because I have them when it comes to getting my books to the dev editor and the like. So I made sure I had a good chunk of time to work on things, and then set a finish date. I will be doing the same with two more projects after this, but again, there's another deadline there, after which I hope to maybe be in a place where I can draft again.

I tell you all this because I feel like a lot of the time, the focus is on churning out book after book after book, and if you are someone who can write, edit, publish in a short space of time, hats off to you. I am not. I know it would just stress me out, and I would lose my focus, so I do it my way, and that's fine. But if you're finding that the way you're doing this right now isn't working for you, then pivot. You might surprise yourself!

Any questions? Lemme know in the comments!

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