R&R Focus: The Wonderland That Is My Writing Career-Vol. 1

I think my determination to get this writing thing off the ground was intensified as I sorted through some stuff that I cleaned out of my room last week. Going through all of that stuff had me reminiscing and laughing at how crazy the diaries and letters written by a 13 year old me sounded. Among the madness I found some plans that I had to start what apparently was a 'zine-a type of homemade, independently distributed magazine that was very popular in the early and mid 90s ( these plans were from '95). I guess if the Internet had been at the level it is now back then, 'zines probably would have been blogs. And ironically, the plans I had for the 'zine I never started sounded a lot like what I'm trying to do with Reasons And Roses today. This irony is really what made me realize that the desire to write and create a media outlet has stayed with me all this time, through the detours to other jobs when I thought that writing was an unrealistic career to grad school and even now, now that I finally realize that I'm not going to be let off the hook about this writing career. It's what I always return to and I owe it to my 13 year old self to make it happen.

My idea about writing up until recently was that a career in it was something that just happened. Meaning that I had no idea that marketing/branding, business sense, and public relations had anything to do with writing. I thought that if you write something, eventually people will love it and they will pay you for it. But as I have learned and am still learning a writer is a business woman, a marketer, and a public relations professional all while trying to maintain the creativity that is at the foundation of what you are. I find it hard to balance all of these aspects--for example, I've been reading lots of business books, branding books, networking books, anything that can help me get a better handle on the business side of marketing and actually making money from my writing. That comes at an expense of reading more of what I really love and want to produce...quality fiction. I think that I'm rounding the bend with that though. The balance is coming and each day I'm getting more and more done and becoming more and more encouraged. It's important as a writer to have a very supportive group of people around you and I think that I'm very blessed to have the family, especially, that I do in addition to the friends that I have.

I've learned so far that if you just focus on the writing and if everything is about promoting the writing and making the writing better, everything else will come in time at the appropriate time. The last part is very important. I know we've all seen people who are extremely talented but things happen at too fast a rate for them to keep up with and it ultimately tears them down.

Keep watching, there's a whole lot more coming from me!