How To Get Back on the Horse
Lesson 1: Remembering what works.
On my journey to recapture my former daily writing practice, I had a bag of tricks to use, if only I’d could remember them.
Then it came to me, why I’d been successful out of the gate in 2019 and why now, having stopped writing a year ago, I was struggling to start up my daily habit of writing an article or more a day.
Expectations.
I had to rewire mine.
In May 2019, when I started here, I had none.
I’d heard about Medium years before, signed up, and left it in my rearview mirror. Then, fast forward, a friend mentioned some writers were making bank here, and I thought, why not me?
So, I decided to give it a shot.
Lo and behold, expecting nothing, I got a lot.
Not just money but satisfaction, friends, readers, and yes, money in the bank.
With a little success under my belt, I just kept going. Of course, I had many decades of writing to my credit. I’d published traditionally and independently and edited professionally. I saw Medium as a side hustle. Then, it quickly took over my life. In a good way.
Until I ran into the pandemic wall.
I’ve written about my determination to start up again, many, many painful months later.
So, today I’m holding myself accountable, telling you how it’s going, and revealing my lessons.
What I mean by having a writing career under my belt is not tooting my own horn but just to explain that, unlike many Medium writers, I didn’t have to learn the craft. I’d already published many books. I did, though, have to understand the specifics of the personal essay and how to build a following. Which I eventually accomplished.
But achieving those goals unhampered by expectations was much easier than where I am now, facing a huge mountain knowing that while I have 5200 followers, many of them have left Medium since I last wrote regularly or have found more reliable writers, or have simply forgotten about me.
So, I am now back at square one, trying to figure out, not just how to get my writing mojo back but how to get my readers back. In May 2019, I didn’t know what I didn’t know, and it wasn’t quite so daunting.
If one person read an article, I was thrilled. Today, with two new pieces out, I have to beat my disappointment into submission that only a few hundred readers read them and not thousands.
And it’s much harder to write with disappointment hanging over your head.
See what I mean by expectations? Excuse me while I attempt the back-breaking work of throwing them out the window and practicing gratitude for the few readers who do find my articles.
So, lesson 1 for today. Lower my expectations that writing for Medium and getting readers will be as easy today as it was back when I already had readers.
Not only has Medium changed its algorithm, which I no longer understand, as if I ever did, but I have to regain my writing momentum.
I have to give myself a break and just keep on going.
I remind myself that if I did it once, I can do it again.
Maybe I won’t have the same success, but this time around I want the satisfaction of publishing and reconnecting with readers, even a few. I want to connect with the friends from the old days and to make new ones.
These are expectations I can handle, goals to keep me going rather than slam me into another wall.
Stay tuned for tomorrow’s episode for how to get your writing habit, actually, any habit up and running again after you’ve let it go when life and the best intentions got in the way.