Author: Dan Blank

In my most recent guest post for Writer Unboxed, I talk about viewing your work as a set of skills to hone. It is easy to think of a basketball player’s work as PERFORMANCE. Something to hone in a myriad of ways. Yet, difficult to think of our own work that way.

So many writers and creative professionals I speak to feel scattered — they are wildly distracted by other responsibilities. They struggle to set up work processes, and the ones they do are thrown off kilter at the slightest gust of figurative wind.

I OBSESS about this. About you moving past writers block. About raising the game in your craft. About you reaching your audience. About you living up to the vision you have. About how your identity is affected by your creative work. How the lives of others are affected by that which you create.

In the post, I encourage you to review your own creative health in eight different ways:

1. Ideation and idea capture
2. Prioritizing time for creative work
3. Physical health
4. Nutrition as fuel for performance
5. Rest as fuel for performance
6. Mental heath as foundation for performance
7. Prioritizing creative work, and giving yourself permission
8. Collaboration and social health

Read the full post here.

Thanks!
-Dan

Whenever I work with a client, invariably I am trying to get them to come out of their shell. For instance:

• To be more honest in their messaging, instead of viewing it only as marketing.
• To forge individual relationships with the right people, not just “grow my audience.”
• To move past their comfort zone in thinking of the experience that their work creates for others, instead of just viewing it as how well their SKU number performs in Amazon.

Something I am always reminded of in this process is how relationships are such an important part of success. Consider these scenarios…

• An artist gets a gallery show because they met the right person three years earlier, and stayed in touch.
• An author gets great media attention because they knew someone who knew someone who knew someone who could make it happen.
• An entrepreneur whose idea is remarkably similar to yours gets way more traction because of who they partnered with.
• A designer gets a great freelance job for a large media organization because they met the editor at a party 2 years earlier.

So today I want to talk about the value of relationships, collaboration and social skills as they relate to success with your creative work.

Social Anxiety

Remember walking into the lunch room on the first day of school? You stood there with your plastic tray of tater tots, scanning the room for a lifeline, a familiar face who would save you from horrible stigma of eating alone.

I find that these fears rarely leave us, even as we grow older and wiser. That fear of being rejected, friendless, and adrift. These emotions have a way of creeping up when we launch books, schedule a performance, or otherwise share our work with the world.

We think: “Wouldn’t it be good to have a friend out there who can validate me and this work, and help ensure it doesn’t languish in obscurity?”

Some of you may already be resisting this topic. Why? Because it goes against things we feel we can control:

• Craft. That you can spend 20 years crafting a novel, and have no greater chance of success as a person who wrote a novel in a month, but has some popular friends who can push it out.
• Mastering the tactical steps in growing your career. That, if you just buy the right how-to book, take the right course, or mimic someone else’s strategy, you will find success.

In other words, 1,000 people can start a blog, but only 1 will have it turn into a five-figure business. 1,000 thousand people can self-publish books, but only one will have it sell more than 500 copies. Or, 1,000 people can open a restaurant in town, and only 1 will survive more than five years.

Were the other 999 total crap, built by people who half-assed it? Nope. Very often, it is a matter of bad luck, and not having the relationships you need in order to succeed.

To succeed, you have to be willing to be uncomfortable. I imagine 99% of you would say “Oh, I’m well acquainted with sacrifice and discomfort in my work.” But in this instance, I mean SOCIALLY uncomfortable.

This is the worst kind of discomfort. The kind we avoid at all costs.

The kind where we refuse to ask for help because we don’t want to seem weak.

We don’t want to ask a question in a meeting because we are afraid we will look stupid.

We won’t walk up to someone we want to meet because we are afraid of rejection.

We don’t submit our work for publication because we convince ourselves it isn’t good enough.

 

Yes, I Know You Are An Introvert

I would bet that 99% of you reading this are thinking, “But Dan, I’m an introvert. I have rights too.”

And you are correct. Here’s the funny thing: I’m an introvert. So are several very close friends I am thinking of who also run their own successful careers as creative professionals.

If you are an introvert, I totally respect that. I would just encourage you to not use it as an excuse for limiting your own potential for success. There are many ways to honor your introversion while still collaborating with others. I would recommend Susan Cain’s book Quiet: The Power of Introverts in a World That Can’t Stop Talking, as a starting point to explore this topic as an ecosystem of choice, not a single word excuse.

Aspects of the Creative Process Benefit from Social Interaction

Too often, we think of a perfect creative process as one of isolation.

Jackson Pollock alone in his barn splattering paint.

J. K. Rowling alone in that cafe, writing Harry Potter.

James Brown writing lyrics and coming up with dance moves from a place of pure singular genius.

This is the romantic vision of creative work that simplifies it to something we can understand and control. If I just sit in the cafe (where I am writing this) long enough, eventually, success will find me.

Except, that is usually only part of the story.

Jackson existed within a community of artists. Jo had to submit her work for publication. James collaborated with many others.

Yet, so many creative professionals slave away at crafting their work, yet DEEPLY RESIST sharing and interacting.

They scoff it off with as an aversion to social media, or how they don’t want to market their work because they fear being a spammer. Or they simply say, “I’m an introvert.”

So, they don’t even talk to the folks that they hope their work reaches.

Perhaps you are a novelist who simply wants to sell 5,000 copies of your next book. Let’s consider how collaboration is a part of your own creative process:

1. Finding an agent.
2. Negotiating a contract with a great publisher.
3. Reaching out to other authors to blurb your book.
4. Having a great relationship with your editor.
5. Being a great partner to your marketing and sales teams.
6. Marketing – from embracing bookstores, to encouraging reviews, and engaging with readers.

These are social interactions, and there are 1,000 choices along the way on how to be a great partner versus a distant partner.

Embracing Collaboration With Your Work

In January, I’m launching a couple things to focus a lot on these topics, to help you develop the skills and relationships you need to find success.

Questions I am trying to solve for are:

• How can you find more time and energy to devote to your craft?
• How can you forge powerful relationships with great partners, that help your work reach the right people?
• How can you fill your days with things that inspire you, not check-boxes on an endless to-do list?

What other challenges should I add to this list?

Thanks!
-Dan

A writer shared this with me recently:

“I hate social media so much it’s not funny. I wish that I didn’t have to use social media ever to promote my books. It’s such a colossal waste of my writing time.”

Today, I want to give an update on my thoughts on social media, especially on the aspect of managing it on an emotional level, day in and day out.

In the past, I have shared other posts on this topic:

• Attack of the Social Media Zombies (August 2013)
• I Am Changing How I Use Social Media: MORE Social, LESS Media (January 2014)
• The Mindless Robots of Social Media “Best Practices” (July 2014)
• How to Stand Out on Social Media: CARE (November 2014)

My response to the writer above — the one who told me that she hates social media — was to encourage her to find the joy in it. The joy in sharing her work. The joy in connecting with readers and like minds. That, from both a personal and business perspective, it should be both joyful and effective.

In 2014, I did change how I use social media, and I found that many of my friends and colleagues did as well. These were early adopters who had been tweeting for years, and watched the ecosystem change as it went from:

• Point A: Insider back channel of passionate people excited to meet each other, to…
• Point B: A firehose of media, advertising, and people seeking attention.

In other words, it just didn’t feel good anymore.

Well, from my own perspective, I have fallen back in love with social media again. No, I never gave it up, but there was a period there where it just didn’t feel as good as I wished it would.

Below, I would like to frame this analysis in terms of how I think about social media, so I asked myself: “What would I lose without (insert name of social media channel)?” This is what I came up with:

What I would lose if I weren’t on Facebook:

Without Facebook, I would lose connection to 80% of the people from my past. Those to whom I have a sentimental attachment, but are not people who exist as part of my daily life. Those I met in school; those I met at various events and interests during a moment in time; colleagues I used to work with, but have now long since moved on to other careers; distant family; so many others.

I try to keep Facebook “small” and personal, I tend to only accept friend request from those I have met in person or have had long conversations with. I want to have had a personal connection with people on Facebook.

I have chosen not to count how many times I check Facebook per day, because I honestly believe it is more than 50 times. I just pop in for a moment, and pop away. CONSTANTLY.

To me, my entire motivation around Facebook is joy. Maybe 1% of my Facebook activity has anything to do with my career; my time there is spent mostly “liking” and commenting on photos and status updates from friends and family.

None of these people are “influencers” I am hoping notice me. They are the kid I sat next to in third grade. The person I thought was cool in high school. The friend from college I lost touch with at age 21. The person who sat one cube row away from me at a job.

You may feel these people should be insignificant. But I don’t. I deeply value what these people have brought to my life. And it is incredibly meaningful to me to experience their lives via Facebook.

Is there too much political stuff on Facebook for my taste? Sure. But I will say this: I NEVER block or unfriend someone who has the opposite political view as I do. In fact, I have found that Facebook has been the primary thing to allow me to understand “the other side” of contentious issues. Because I see a normal person who I have a personal connection to openly state why they believe in something. That creates empathy in me for what that issue means to them. Honestly, I think we need more of that in the world today.

What I would lose if I weren’t on Twitter:

Twitter is the social network that caused me the biggest social media mid-life crisis. As it matured, it felt more and more impersonal, more crowded, and full of people seeking attention for the sake of attention. The “best practices” that used to be intriguing started to get annoying. For instance, thousands of links to “aggregated” articles. Constantly.

With Twitter, I got tired of reading the world’s most disorganized newspaper of links to news and articles.

So I did two things to help change this:

1. Even when I felt the most disenfranchised with Twitter, I never left it. Yes, I changed how I used it, I used it much less for a time being, but I kept showing up to try to find the joy in it.
2. I focused. Years ago, I created a special Twitter list called “focus” which allowed me to choose a smaller group of people to pay special attention to. So, when I followed 1,000 people, the Focus list would consist of maybe 80 names.

Because all of this evolved over the course of years, the things that some of these people tweeted about became less relevant to me. My work evolved, as did theirs.

This past year, I created a new list: “Focus 2.” It started with zero names. Then I added Rachel Fershleiser. Then Tina Roth Eisenberg. Then Austin Kleon. Then Sean Blanda.

I chose these people as PEOPLE, not “feeds.” These were folks who I deeply admired. They were voices I felt honored to have in my life.

The “Focus 2” list currently has 33 people on it, and it evolves. I will say that limiting Twitter to 33 names has brought an incredible amount of joy to my life.

Is that the only way I use Twitter? No, of course not. I absolutely browse the other lists I have created in the past, and am always looking people up on Twitter and checking in.

But on a day-to-day emotional basis, focusing Twitter to 33 people who inspire me has allowed me to find joy in Twitter.

What I would lose if I weren’t on Instagram:

What I love about Instagram is that it feels more personal than other social networks. It is largely filled with original photos that people take, not aggregated and curated content.

Because I’m tired of aggregated and re-shared content. I’m tired of the firehose of content. I want connection to people, not things.

My least favorite Instagram feeds are those filled with nothing but inspirational quotes. No offense to anyone who does that; it simply doesn’t interest me.

What does interest me about Instagram? SEEING WHAT YOU CARE ABOUT. SEEING YOUR JOY.

This is why I am never offended when people share photos of their food on Instagram. That person is feeling a moment of happiness and sharing it. How great is that?!

Everything Else

Those are the three social networks that I actively share stuff on, but clearly there are so many others worth mentioning. Okay, let’s do a review of the other social networks on my radar:

YouTube is my favorite social network overall because of how personal it is, especially for vlogging — which are basically video diaries. To be able to see people’s eyes and hear their voices is an incredibly personal connection. Recently I wrote about Casey Neistat’s vlog, and he is a great example of being able to truly experience someone else’s life via social media. Twice a day, I sit down for a break and YouTube is always my companion here. To check in with the YouTubers I follow.

While I have been creating more videos as part of my consulting and courses, and I have experimented with vlogging in the past, I haven’t made public vlogging a focus for myself right now.

YouTube is a social network that I consume, but don’t contribute to as much as I could.

Tumblr. Oh, Tumblr, I want to love you. But Tumblr eludes me for a few reasons. I began exploring them in length in this post, but then just cut all 800 words of it. I need more time and space to fully explore certain aspects of Tumblr.

For now, I will say this: I LOVE LOVE LOVE how Tumblr empowers people to express their creativity in ways they can’t anywhere else. How it can connect people with ideas and with each other.

Medium is a publishing platform that has a built-in community. That is a powerful thing, and something I will be looking at more closely in the coming weeks.

I will add this, an interesting example of the power of Medium, as shared by David Heinemeier Hansson, whoannounced that the 15 year old blog that he runs with Jason Fried is moving from their own platform to Medium.

Snapchat is a social network I have been experimenting with, and is one of the “newer” social networks that took me a long time to even understand. It upends so much about what I had known about social media. It doesn’t do what Twitter does: encouraging people to grow as many followers as possible, and post everything publicly for the Library of Congress to archive. Snapchat is more private.

The more I experiment with Snapchat, the more I understand why it is so immensely popular, and how it serves a need that Twitter, Facebook, and others didn’t.

That you can share with who you WANT to share with. That everything you share doesn’t have to be a statement that is attached to your name forever. That it encourages different ways of sharing moments.

LinkedIn is the most boring thing on the planet, yet a social channel that I constantly use to research others. Okay, that’s enough about LinkedIn.

Conclusion

I think it is important to assess your social media health now that these are such mature channels. Not from a strategic standpoint, but from a joy standpoint.

The person whose quote started this post — the one who hates social media — I can’t help but consider ways that she makes a similar shift. Replacing an obligation that she doesn’t like in social media to something that brings her joy. That will be a process unique to her.

I would like to end with a little excerpt from another post I wrote in 2014 called “Truly Embracing Your Audience,” which focused on Amanda Palmer’s ability to connect directly with fans of her writing, music, and art:

But Amanda chooses to. This choice is hers. This choice creates meaningful moments, and I have to say, it’s pretty inspiring. This is how she pitched her appearance in New York: “Just come and hang out. I will leave no human unhugged.”

Writers and other creative professionals are often overwhelmed with ideas for how to connect their work to the world. They may look for “marketing tactics that scale,” such as publicity, social media, getting reviews, blog tours, book tours, strategic partnerships, events, giveaways, bestseller lists, awards, and so much more.

Now, these things are good, and I work with authors every day on many of them. But I never lose sight of the goal: that real human connection between a writer and a reader, via their work. And that the 1:1 connection creates a powerful effect in the world.

Have you had a social media mid-life crisis? If so, I’d love if you would tell me about it.

Thanks!
-Dan

A bit more than a year ago, I dumped 75,000 words into a book manuscript over the period of about a month.

Judging by word count alone, I had written a book.

But of course, like all first drafts, it was a crappy book. I sent it to my editor with the false hope that she would magically fix everything. But of course, she called me out: “Um, Dan. This book is a mess.”

What I want to talk about today is what to do in that moment — when you’re glowing with immense pride in what you have created, but you realize it simply isn’t enough. That to truly craft a work of high quality that has a positive effect on the lives of others, you have to commit so much more than that first, messy draft.

As I write this, the annual National Novel Writing Month (NaNoWriMo) event has just ended. Thousands of people have written a novel in a month. They dumped tens of thousands of words down on paper.

That is a towering achievement. But it is also just the first step in a much longer journey. So let’s talk about that process… what you do when you realize you have a strong vision, and a pile of crap, on your hands.

Understanding My Goals Clearly

The book I’m working on is nonfiction, and called Dabblers vs. Doers. Along the lines of this post, it focuses on how people can bridge that gap between dabbling with their creative work, to truly doing it.

For the next phase of crafting my book, I had to be super clear about my goals. That took time.

Part of me did want to rush through editing, and get this thing done in an insanely short period of time. Setting such a goal felt empowering. It would feel like I was in control. It would feel bold.

And it would be total bullshit.

There is that desire to be able to say, “I’m a published author!” that can take you off track. Shopping it to agents and publishers too soon would have felt immensely validating at a time when I had little confidence in the quality of the manuscript. These actions would have been a crutch, masking the time it takes to craft something truly original. And let’s face it:

Dependence on external validation is death for creative work.

So I backed up. I realized that my goals for this book were much longer term, and much deeper. So I went back to the well to assess what this book meant to me, and what it could mean to others. At the end of that internal audit, I realized I was pursuing this book to:

• Craft a work that would be wholly unique from anything I had done before.
• Craft a work that was relevant 10 years after publication, not just 10 days.
• Learn how to become a better writer.
• Develop incredible partners in this process; specifically, an agent and a publisher. To do so, I had to deliver to them something uncommonly good. Not something adequate.

All of these things take time.

A Year of Research

In the past 12 months, I have done very little writing on the book. Instead, I have had hundreds of conversations about themes within it.

Now, there were quite a number of times that I sat down with the 75,000 words with the intention of “just fixing it.” Each of those times was a pathetic failure. Did you know that there are cat videos on the internet?! These are the realizations that came to mind when I tried to tackle the 75,000 words before I was ready.

So I set out to really understand how I can make this book amazing. I had a vague sense of the themes and why I was writing this, but I didn’t feel it in my gut.

That’s a problem.

So I spent the past year doing the following:

• I made everything public. I announced the book when it was still a mess. I shared blog posts on the the process as I went through it (Heck, you are reading one right now!). I shared interviews for the book as a podcast. I added “Book” to the navigation on my website. I announced the current title of the book, registered domain names, and shared social media updates on the process. In other words, I committed publicly, inviting anyone around me to know that I’m on the hook for this. If I fail to finish this, it will be a very public failure. You can see most of this work here.
• I did primary research. The book focuses on how people can bridge that gap between dabbling with their creative work, to truly doing it. But some of it was really weak. I made a rule for myself: “No Steve Jobs stories in this book.” Which meant I had to cut out all of the Steve Jobs stories I had already included. Why? Because it was incredibly lazy of me to include them. To pull from the same over-used stories from the one man that everyone cites whenever they want to make a big dramatic point about something. Writing about Steve Jobs just makes you feel Steve-Jobsian. And if I truly wanted this book to be something unique, it had to be a Steve-Jobs-Free-Zone.

  This commitment prompted me to seek out new stories — original stories that no one else was talking about. To that end, I began seeking out mid-career creative professionals and interviewing them. I would do loads of research on each person and spend an hour asking them everything and anything that didn’t turn up in the research. The truth is, I have no idea if all of these people will end up in the book or not. But I will say, that I have spent hundreds of hours studying how the theory of Dabblers vs. Doers matches up to the reality of what it looks like for people.

• I vetted the concept via thousands of conversations. Because I had made everything public, because I was seeking out people to interview, I got in the habit of talking about themes from the book constantly. What was great about that was that none of this was promotion for the book, and nuggets of insights would show up in the oddest of places. I became comfortable enough with the topic to be able to have light casual conversations with family, friends, strangers, colleagues, and really anyone I came in contact with. I can’t tell you how many authors I meet who are firmly in book launch mode, who are wildly uncomfortable talking about their book for even a moment. I’m still more than a year away from publication, and I have to say, it feels great that this book doesn’t feel like a product to pitch, but a conversation to explore.
• I launched courses, webinars, and blog posts experimenting with themes from the book. These weren’t subtle things; they took me and my team months to create, and we made huge efforts to not just get them noticed, but for the courses in particular, have them earn real revenue. It’s one thing to tell someone an idea and have them say, “Wow, that is interesting.” It is another entirely for them to say, “Sign me up, here is my credit card. “For the book, this is a critical distinction. If I partner with a publisher, there is a reality that publishing is a business. They need to know that the idea of my book is not just something I can write, but something I can sell. That there is a thriving market of people waiting to spend money on these ideas. In the process of crafting and launching webinars and courses, I had to understand how to talk abut these topics in a way that attracted attention, and were compelling enough for people to pay for. It’s not easy. I even wrote a blog post that alludes to this called “This isn’t easy.“
• I did marketplace research. This focused on creative professionals, art, podcasts, courses, workshops, books, events and so much else. The book I am writing will exist in a marketplace filled with others exploring the themes in their own ways. So I need to immerse myself in this marketplace to understand it
   
  
  I read a lot.

  Other books new and old that explored themes I was obsessing over. This helped me learn where my book was unique, and how I can help it align to the market, while being unique within it. It also gave me a deep sense of respect for so many writers. I looked at anything that touched aspects of the book. I reviewed blogs, podcasts, speeches, workshops, courses, articles, and anything else I could find. To me, this helps my work become stronger. But again, this will make me a better partner with my publisher. I need to understand the marketplace deeply because they will need this book to stand out. To be well-positioned, instead of being “yet another book on the same staid topics by yet another wannabe who doesn’t know how to sell it.” I want to be an amazing partner for my publisher. Someone who delivers a book that is incredibly well-crafted, and knows how to connect it to the hearts and minds of readers.

• I forged relationships with people who focus on these topics. I can’t even tell you how many people I have researched this year. Those who do creative work in a wide range of fields. For many of these people, the research ended there. But for some, I reached out. I emailed, I called, and we met. Can I just tell you how amazing this felt — to get to know these people? If nothing else ever comes of this book, just getting to know these people is an incredible gift, and made the investment of time worthwhile. To have my life filled with those whose ideas and work I admire.

The bottom line is, I immersed myself in the topics of the book, until now I can say, “YES, I feel this book in my gut. I know its purpose.”

But let’s face it, everything I did above will also help this book find an audience, make me a better partner for an agent and a publisher and help it succeed in the marketplace.

Knowing When Research Is Done

It’s easy to feel safe and comfortable in research. It protects you from having to actually finish your work, to put it out in the world, and see if it succeeds or fails.

But then, the other day, something happened. I received an email that as a writer, you both dream about, as well as dread. It read:

Just found WeGrowMedia online and am loving your work!

Have been searching around but can’t find the answer to this… approximately when is your book coming out?

Looking forward to its arrival!!

Obviously, you dream about receiving an email like this because it means that someone cares about your work.

But you dread it, because there is now an expectation that you have to live up to in your creative work. And immediately you fear that you will let this person down. Even worse, that you will let yourself down.

I mentioned above how external validation can be a trap for a creative professional. But sometimes it is exactly the kick in the pants that you need.

So I have now moved onto the next stage of the book: finding the right partners. My intention is to publish this traditionally, and the first step there is to find an agent.

Why do I want to publish traditionally? This video by John Green pretty much sums it up. I deeply value great partners, and have a profound respect for the work that agents and publishers do.

Now, the nice thing about moving ahead is that I don’t have to make all 85,000 words (yes, it grew by 10,000 words over the course of the year) of the manuscript perfect. That was just some crazy idea I had. The reality is that when you are trying to sell a nonfiction book, you just need a great proposal and a few sample chapters.

So that is what I’m working on at the moment.

As usual, my friend, book coach Jennie Nash, is helping me with this process. In case I haven’t said it often enough before, Jennie Nash is a genius. If you are a writer, you should obsess over everything she is doing.

Going the traditional publishing route, the fact of the matter is that the book wouldn’t be published before 2017. Ideally, it would be published in 2017, but it could be later.

What if I don’t find an agent and publisher that I LOVE? Partners that just feel right, that I think add more to the mix than I could ever do on my own?

Well, if that happens, I will 100% self-publish this. I have zero qualms about that. As I said before, I have a deep respect for what agents and publishers do, which is why my intention is to partner with these incredible folks. But it, of course, has to be the right fit.

If it isn’t, that doesn’t stop me or my work, but simply changes how I will traverse this path. I definitely prefer to have an agent and publisher as my partners on the journey. If that doesn’t happen, I am making the journey regardless.

That’s what I love about writing and publishing today. It has nothing to do with “traditional vs. indie,” and everything to do with the choice for the creator. I am never boxed into a corner with zero options. Instead, I have choices to make. That kind of empowerment is profound in the history of mankind.

And I plan to take full advantage of it!

I would love to hear about how you are traversing your own creative journey. As you end 2015, how are you reinvesting in sharing your work with the world?

-Dan

You want success with your creative work? Well, get your 2016 started off right.

I’m giving away an incredible package of resources to provide clarity and momentum for your work: The Creative Success Book Package, which consists of six incredible books to inspire you:

• Big Magic, by Elizabeth Gilbert
• Rising Strong, by Brené Brown
• Still Writing: The Perils and Pleasures of a Creative Life, by Dani Shapiro
• Steal Like an Artist, by Austin Kleon
• The Art of Asking, by Amanda Palmer
• Essentialism, by Greg McKeown

One winner will receive everything listed above!

You can enter the giveaway here.
The deadline to enter is December 4, 2015 7:00 pm EST.

Thanks!
-Dan