How to Be Your Best Conclusion

Write your own ending to the story

Imagine this…

You’re a published author. You’re sitting on a stool on stage in front of 2,000 adoring fans — a glowing gold and indigo spotlight centers on you, the star of this performance.

You’re reading an emotional excerpt from your book.

When you finish reading there’s silence, then deafening applause erupts as 4,000 hands send echoes of claps to the highest rafters. In the rafters is a meter measuring the strength and length of the applause. This recorded result will be the basis for your appearance fee.

It’s totally irrelevant whether any one of the audience members has read your book.

It’s totally irrelevant whether any of them bought your book.

The applause is a contagion. Each audience member, affected by the behavior of the one beside them, tries to outdo their neighbor by clapping louder, stronger.

Then one member leaps to their feet, followed by others, bouncing and bobbing like buoys. In a half minute, the entire crowd is standing, stamping their feet. The applause continues amid calls of “bravo, bravo” and shrill whistles.

You look upon this show of appreciation from your elevated perch, a smile, impossible to suppress, stretches across your face. This vision is a dream sighted.

This image is concrete confirmation

Confirmation from your peers.

Confirmation from those on your mailing list, friends of friends of friends.

Confirmation of your brilliant skill as a writer.

There’s a shallow message below the depth of this image. As shallow as the 2,000 members of your audience. They couldn’t care less about you or your writing. They are followers who clap because you asked them to clap.

Wow, your article has 7K claps, it must be a masterpiece. Other readers land on your article intrigued by the image and title. They scan, skittle, and scroll until they stop at the hands’ icon, click, then click out again — a slick, swift, seven seconds.

When they click open other writers’ articles, they lose interest at once. This article may require deep thought and relevant thinking about questions of life, living, legendary authors. This article may require actual reading time. Absorption, depth of reading time.

Your readers don’t have time for this type of meaningful or mindful focus on a stranger’s writing.

Your readers are very much like you. You’re looking for the secret of how to get rich fast. You deserve it. You’ve been writing for a month now on this platform. The significant publications haven’t recognized your skill, so you’ve started your own publication.

Now you’re in control of what you publish and can write whatever you choose.

Daily post

Today, you should write a catchy complaint about how little you were paid last month, how earnings for your skill as a writer are worth much more than the salary you received.

You’re annoyed you didn’t make it into the percentage bracket being paid at least $100. Quote a few numbers to make your followers believe you’ve got your finger on the pulse… er… percentages.

Enough work for today. You break it up nicely with headings and put your bio at the bottom about being a top writer in fifteen topics and mention your 30K following fans.

There’s no need to edit or proofread — that’s for fools. Only writers with amateurish writing and editing skills need to revise.

Now, you’ve time to take a quick look at what’s in your Daily Digest today and glance at a few articles by those on your list of following, add a rapid-fire number of claps, and then check your MPP and stats.

Dismal news

This new algorithm does your head in. Your salary has halved since they changed the focus to readers reading what writers write, instead of clapping.

How to live happily ever after …

You may feel frustration with methods dividing who can, from who can’t. There’s a solution (after all, this is about being your own conclusion to your story).

How to be your best conclusion

Choose one or more of the following;

• stop complaining
• leave the platform
• improve your writing effort
• seek help in editing
• take pride in whatever you do
• understand there’s no free ride
• stop complaining
• shut up and write
• read and comment on great writing
• applaud in a genuine fashion
• join this community
• connect through a great medium.

If you read this far, then you’re impressive, and thanks.

Now …