Strategy Session – The Climb #973

Friday 22nd October 2021

It’s been an odd sort of day today.

I’ve been running a secret little project the past couple of weeks. The reason it’s secret is because it’s been a challenge to myself – to step into an area of writing I know nothing about and prove myself.

I won’t go into details, but in some ways it’s not been a great year for my writing (in others it’s been a great year). I had my confidence knocked, and yes, I dusted myself off and carried on going, but I think there was some doubt whether situations were because they were shitty or because there was something wrong with my writing.

I’ve seen friends who’ve been making slow steady progress with their careers become a little more distant this past year. It’s never been directed or deliberate, but I’ve felt their doubt and whilst I’ve kept beavering away, it’s really knocked my confidence and made writing a bit of a trail sometimes. It’s been fun, but not as fuin as it once was. I’ve been at this game for a long time, determined that I’d rather take time to do something exceptional than settle for second best.

I’ve had to learn to be less of a perfectionist and more of a strategist.

I’m starting to hear between the lines that my situation was a result of things outside my control, and whilst that makes me feel a little better, those doubts of others have still eaten away at me.

So I’ve tried different things, not to necessarily be good at them but to widen my skills as a writer. I’ve always been open to learning, but in the last few months I’ve taken to doing.

Writing a novel takes a long time (at least for me) and so I once again stepped outside my comfort zone this time to try something that required me to be fast and strategic. Fast results, fast feedback.

I’ve had to absorb so much, but the information was out there. I just needed to read it, understand it and action it. So for the last 2 weeks I’ve been doing that, in secret, because this is for me and not for anyone else. The moment I share that victory and make it public, friends can cast doubt. Mentally, I’ve staked a lot of validation on it. Could I walk into a different market as a writer, one where the feedback loop is very short, and make an impact?

There are many markers of success. It varies dependent on the market and where you are in your career. I had a milestone I was aiming for. I had data from others in the same market with which to gauge my success.

And in just 12 days, I smashed it. I won’t be making any headlines, and that’s fine by me, but what takes successful writers in this field 6 months to a couple of years, I did in just 12 days. I had help. People who don’t know me gave me a ton of support and advice. Without that I’d be nowhere. But I took that advice, acted on it and iterated.

So today was part celebrating that success but also, working out where to take it next. I’m having fun without expectation for the first time in a while, because this doesn’t matter. This is a pure validation exercise for myself.

I’ve still got The Worthy to work on, but the best thing is that this is different enough that it works as a palette cleanser between writing sessions. It’s teaching me to write faster, edit better, iterate and learn quicker.

I’m feeling I’ve been growing as a writer these past few months, not so much in terms of skills (although I am skilling up) but also in the way I strategize and plan my work. There’s still much to do and much to learn so I won’t make any bold promises. I’m just going to try and see what comes out of it.