Change The World With Words

You’re either part of the solution or you’re part of the problem.

- Eldridge Cleaver

It’s been a while since I took up the weekly challenge posed by Christina Katz via her Prosperous Writer Ezine. Christina (author of Get Known Before the Book Deal and Writer Mama), highlights a different quality needed by prosperous writers each week, and invites other bloggers to join in the conversation with a post that covers the same theme. If you want to participate you can subscribe to The Prosperous Writer here. This week we’re blogging about trouble shooting.

We all need to trouble shoot, in our professional and personal lives, and how we do it largely comes down to the spin we put on things.  Troubleshooting is actually about whether we’re positive or negative, proactive or reactive, ready to take responsibility, or eager to apportion blame.

Christina suggests that:

“… you can’t be a troubleshooter unless you are already a person who takes 100% responsibility for your lot in life. But a lot of folks take responsibility in other areas of their life but neglect to carry that over into their writing careers.”

I think there’s a reason for this. If we’re going to produce high quality writing that resonates with other people we have to reach deep inside our psyches, bare our souls and come up with something that is unique. Add to that the fact that writing is, for the most part, a solitary activity – something we do alone to produce an end product that reflects our own ideas, experiences and perspective. It’s hardly surprising then, that a lot of writers find it harder to deal with problems in their writing careers than in other areas. They (understandably) tend to take things personally, instead of treating their writing as a business.

This can make many people ‘problem amplifiers’ instead of ‘problem solvers’ when it comes to their writing. That attitude will lead to different actions in the face of writing related problems. The following are all common reactions to writing problems. Recognize any?

Problem amplifier:

I got a rejection letter. That piece of writing must have been terrible. I’m a terrible writer. I think I’ll moan about my lack of talent, delete/throw out that piece of writing, then decide I do have talent and that editor is an idiot, and I’ll never contact her again.

Problem solver:

I got a rejection letter. Let’s look at why. Did I make a mistake sending that piece to that editor? Maybe I should research somewhere else it would fit better. Or I could re-write it/contact the editor with an alternative idea based on his/her comments.

Problem amplifier:

My new ebook isn’t selling. People obviously don’t want it. It was a bad concept, and I wasted all that time, effort and money on producing it.

Problem solver:

My new ebook isn’t selling, but I did my research and I concluded there was a market for it. Why am I not reaching that market?  I need to draw up a new marketing plan to sell more copies.

Problem amplifier:  

My webite/blog isn’t getting many hits. Maybe I should give up and stop creating content that isn’t getting read. Maybe I should just hit delete and permanently remove the problem.

Problem solver: 

My website/blog isn’t getting many hits. Maybe I should create some more great content, promote it on social media, and write some high quality guest posts for other popular blogs. Perhaps I should makeover (or at least tidy up) the site to make it more attractive/valuable/readable.

This post is not meant as a criticism of problem amplifiers, or even in praise of problem solvers. I’ve been both in the course of my writing career, and I’d even suggest most new writers need to go through the problem amplifier stage.  As we slowly build our writing confidence and detachment we progress to the problem solver stage. So if you’re amplifying your writing-related problems right now, push on. Work at learning detachment. Stop taking problems personally. See your writing as a business and not as an extension of yourself. Learn to trouble shoot your writing problems with the same objectivity you might apply to other areas of your life.

Join me in my aim to evolve right through the problem solver stage and become a solution finder. That’s when you don’t even see the problem as such. You just focus on solutions to situations. I’m not there yet, but I’m working on it.

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• Running a Freelance Writing Business
• Becoming a Professional Writer
• Empowerment for Writers
• Are You a Visionary? And is Your Vision Unique?