“The End” Means another Beginning

So you have an idea for a book.

You then decide to write a book. 

You spend days, weeks, months, maybe even years, working on the idea and the book until you have something worthwhile to show others.

Throughout this phase you may drink a lot of the liquid of your choice, you will use a lot of paper, write early in the morning or late into the night, you put off things until tomorrow, or the next day or the day after that, and you feel guilty about spending less time with your family while proclaiming to your conscious it will all be worth it in the end.  You may feel the guilt but it is overshadowed by the excitement of what it means to create, to bring life to something, to live out a dream.

Once you have finished your manuscript, you spend even more time with the edits to prep it for publishing.  After many changes and much tweaking, you finally publish the book.  You hold a book signing, trusting the event will help get the word out, promote the book and help with sales.  And after the book is made available on-line to just about anyone under the sun, you hold your breath…wait for sales…wait for reviews…watch the stats…and wonder just how far this whole adventure will take you. 

After spending so much time on one project, it is quite a high to finally complete the project and it is exciting to promote all your hard work, receive feedback, and hear from those who want to see more. 

But then it is time to turn your attention towards your next project.

It is time to write another book. 

To start the process all over again.

To begin, you have to release your hold on the first project in order to submerge yourself in the second.  It is admittedly somewhat difficult to let go of the excitement and feelings of accomplishment from the first project in order to bury yourself in the next.  In doing so, you know your focus has to change because you are starting the process all over again and you must be prepared for the uphill climb towards “the end.”

So the focus must change and the creative process must begin again. 

It is not a difficult process when you have a strong creative idea; it is just a lengthy process.  The trick is moving away from the first project, now a comfortable place to be, and moving onto the next project, a foreign land to be mapped out. 

When you do that, there is no doubt it will all be worth it again in the end. 

You will feel inspired during the creative process.  You will feel accomplished after finishing another book.  You will feel the excitement once again after the book is published and you gain feedback during the promotion period.

But you have to start at the beginning to reach “the end” once again. 

 

So submerse yourself in the writing, in the characters, in the story.  

Let the process begin and watch the magic happen.