How Writing Feels

[Paul Whybrow]

Browsing the internet this morning, I came across the work of the Spanish self-taught street photographer Joan Colom.

In a portfolio of shots he took at a market, I saw a photograph that made me gasp in recognition, as it depicts how I’m feeling about my writing career at the moment.

(It’s always amused me that the word career also means to stagger about...which certainly describes my erratic work history!)

Although it’s joyful for me to be immersed in creating a new story, other aspects of writing can be repetitive and mundane. Self-publishing entails self-promotion, and how do I balance that with querying literary agents? I’m currently learning how to narrate and record and edit my voice, so I can add audiobooks versions of my crime novel series to Amazon KDP. But, I should really be adding posts to my writing blog Paul Pens and articles to my Cornish Detective website.

And, what about my presence on Twitter, Pinterest, LinkedIn and Instagram?

There are only so many hours in the day, so I sometimes feel like this market worker manoeuvring his inadequate trolley stacked with crates and trying not to drop any.

Do you ever feel overwhelmed?

 

[gbhunt]

Browsing the internet this morning, I came across the work of the Spanish self-taught street photographer Joan Colom.

In a portfolio of shots he took at a market, I saw a photograph that made me gasp in recognition, as it depicts how I’m feeling about my writing career at the moment.

(It’s always amused me that the word career also means to stagger about...which certainly describes my erratic work history!)

Although it’s joyful for me to be immersed in creating a new story, other aspects of writing can be repetitive and mundane. Self-publishing entails self-promotion, and how do I balance that with querying literary agents? I’m currently learning how to narrate and record and edit my voice, so I can add audiobooks versions of my crime novel series to Amazon KDP. But, I should really be adding posts to my writing blog Paul Pens and articles to my Cornish Detective website.

And, what about my presence on Twitter, Pinterest, LinkedIn and Instagram?

There are only so many hours in the day, so I sometimes feel like this market worker manoeuvring his inadequate trolley stacked with crates and trying not to drop any.

Do you ever feel overwhelmed?

 

[gbhunt]

Hi, Paul. This resonates. I oscillate between naive confidence and nervous pessimism, if not daily, at least weekly. Thing is, I enjoy writing so much it seems worth it for the highs!

 

[Robinne Weiss]

Yep. I feel the same way at the moment. Struggling right now to feel successful at any of the aspects of writing, because I feel like I'm giving them all such a tiny fraction of my attention.

 

[Steve C]

'A picture is worth a thousand words' I'm giving up writing and buying a camera. Reckon I can finish a book/month that way

 

[JosieDom]

You've summed up my life! Currently I should be writing an email sequence for a lead magnet I've created (to get subscribers to my newsletter), but my mind is on outsourcing to illustrators and I have a question on that so popped on here and now am distracting myself with other posts.

 

[CageSage]

But a picture doesn't give you the pain in the legs, the sweat pouring down the back, the grim determination to get the job done in time to [do something]. A picture is only what the viewer interprets, and it's a one-way street.
A book gives you multiple ways to envisage, envision, experience.