I’ve Been Mentioned On Medium Creators For Talking About Gothic Literature
A little story of when “too niche” becomes “a great niche”
At the beginning of June, Medium Creators proposed an Open Threat where they asked who we write for.
Even though this seems an innocent and easy-to-answer question, the truth is that for me it was a challenging one.
Since the beginning of my Gothic journey, I’ve had all sorts of reactions to my niche. Even I was not sure, when I started, that this could be the thing that got a lot more traction than talking about what I’d been doing professionally for more than 20 years, which is teaching English as a second language.
Reasons why I felt insecure about my niche
- Most people don’t know the real origin of the word “Gothic” and its evolution
- The aesthetics part of it sometimes gets in the way
- I was still learning about it and had strong doses of imposter syndrome in my system (but who ever stops learning about anything?)
- Successful niches seemed to go around helping others figure out the “how-to” and I was burnt out from doing that
- It falls greatly into the psychological and entertainment arenas, which I deeply respect and love but I am not an expert on
When did I stop being scared of showing my true colours?
- When I listened to other people’s experiences in their niche and their suggestions without feeling I had to follow their advice
- Testing and failing at what I thought were better ways of making money with my niche
- Going all in only thinking about the audience that really resonated with my message as if they were my clones (the experts call it an avatar, but I don’t really like that term)
It has been a bumpy road until I got to express that very initial reason that started it all. The same one that got me into Gothic literature and everything that branches out from it. The same reason why back in 2006 my sister helped me create a website road map where I could talk about my passion:
Help people learn more about themselves through Gothic literature
And this very original need is the very essence that got picked by Amy Shearn on Medium Creators and stood out most together with other eight Medium creators: Heather Cooper, E. Ardincaple, Ju Wakabara Romualdo, Richardwachara, Saif Farooqi, PhD, Kit Desjacques, Nita Jain, Claudia Koomson
A few Gothic breadcrumbs for you
- If you love something so much that you could talk about it all day long it means that it’s part of who you are
- Knowing who you really are is a solo journey where you need to have many meetings with all your fears
- Too niche is never too niche, there will always be people who are cognitively wired similarly to you. You just have to be out there talking away about your passion and followers will soon come
- The road to building your little empire can get muddy at times and certain encounters will pull you down. But there’s light in darkness and darkness in light. Finding your gothic ying-yang takes a lot of analysis and self-reflection
What about you? Whereabouts are you in your writing journey? What is your idea of niche or otherwise? Since we are all similar but different, I’d love to know about your experience so far.
Thanks for reading
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