ART MAKES THE SOUL GROW

 

Kurt Vonnegut once said, “The practice of art isn’t to make a living, it’s to make the soul grow.”

 

When I first started writing years ago, people would talk about the potential I had to make a lot of money selling my books. It’s not something I ever thought of until that moment. And when I did, my writing life suddenly became complicated and stressful.

MARKETING

I began looking into ways to market my books online, only to find out that marketing takes hours of work to get noticed in a world where there are millions of other writer’s trying to do the same thing. Marketing is such an uncertain process. There are no guarantees. What works for one person doesn’t necessarily work for someone else. I tried numerous ways to get my name out there online: Blogging, Facebook, started a website, and doing venues, I didn't really enjoy any of it. It’s partly my fault, of course that I wasn't successful, I simply hated the amount of time and effort it took to market myself. I’d rather be writing.

For years I struggled with my conscience, debating what I thought I had to do (marketing) with what I wanted to do (write). I drove my friends and family crazy with my constant vacillating. I wanted to say to hell with marketing, but couldn’t because I kept asking myself, if I’m not selling books then why am I writing? I needed to re-evaluate what I wanted as a writer, and how I was going to move forward.

MOVING FORWARD

The first thing that happened is that I had to redefine how I viewed success. That’s when I concluded that success doesn’t have to be measured in how many books I sell, or how much money I make. Or even if anyone knows who I am. After all, not everyone who writes is going to be Margaret Atwood, or Louise Penney.  I eventually determined that my success could be measured by the fact that I had written and published two books - with another on the way - that went out into the world. That is no small accomplishment. Not only that, I love writing. I love doing the research that my writing entails, and the amazing people I get to meet in the process. I am doing something that is meaningful and purposeful to me. 

That is not to say that I don't do any marketing. I simply decided to focus on the things that I enjoy doing. Creative things: Women's Retreats, speaking, and face to face networking. Things that would fit into my life very easily because they are not something I have to do every day for hours at a time.

SOUL GROWTH

To get to this point in my writing life was difficult, time consuming, and kept me awake many a night until I was ready to let go of what was making me unhappy and embrace the things I love about writing. And that, I think, is what Vonnegut is talking about.  “The practice of art isn’t to make a living, it’s to make the soul grow.” And I believe mine did. I figured out what was important to me, what would make me happiest, and I let the rest of it go, thus,  lifting a heavy weight from my shoulders, allowing myself more time to do what I love most - write.