Episode 13 - It'll happen FOR SURE... in 15 years

I’m back! In this episode, I do an update of what has been going on since the last episode (including some insights about what I learned along the way). Then I explain the difference between rushing or dragging in your writing career and how knowing where you’re standing can help you to feel so much peace while you’re pursuing your writing dreams!

Mentioned in this episode:

• My Instagram https://www.instagram.com/leftieaube/
• Epically Aligned https://manifestationbabe.com/epically-aligned
• You Have The Magic by Haley Hoffman Smith https://bookshop.org/a/85049/9780762489213

Recorded on July 1st, 2025.

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Intro music credit: “Cinematic Cello Arpeggio Trailer” by Gregor Quendel, found on Free Sound https://freesound.org/s/555995/

Disclaimer: Some of the above links are affiliates. At no extra cost to you, I’m receiving compensation for any purchase made through those links. Buying through those links supports my writing journey, which I highly appreciate!

Transcript

SPEAKER_00 0:00

Welcome to Left Dio based writing podcast where I share with vulnerability and positivity my journey towards making all of my writing dreams come true. I hope you learn with me as I go from the things that go well and what doesn't go so well. But mainly I wish it inspires you to pursue your own writing dreams. Now let's begin. Hi! Hello everyone, I'm back. I cannot believe that I'm back, and I am back on video podcasts, a new edition for this new I don't want to say season because I never really did season, but a new era, let's say, of my writing podcast. So for those listening on the usual podcast channel, would be interested in seeing the video version of this podcast. It's really just me, my face. If you are interested in seeing this, you can go over on YouTube or on Spotify. Oh, I think there is an option to see video podcasts on Spotify. I haven't checked it yet, but you can go and check there. I just had this option on the script to do video podcasting just so super easily, and I was like, why not try it? What not do it? Maybe reach new writers on YouTube. Who knows? And I know that some people really do enjoy uh video podcasts. So there we are. But I am so super excited to be back with the podcast after being so long away. The main reason why I'm back today, and I'm going to get into this into the episode. No, I'm not a full-time writer yet. But the main reason why I'm starting the podcast again, and why I have really no idea how many episodes I'm going to record or how long this is going to last. But the main reason is that I took the summer off from my day job to spend with my kids, to spend more time with them while they are little, and this just opened up my evenings to be able to spend doing something else than just relaxing from a day of working and then doing the whole bedtime routine with the kids. So I just had a little more time to spend on other projects like this one. So that's why I'm back. I'm going to be recording a few episodes during the summer. I really don't know how much. I still haven't decided if I'm going to release them like as I'm recording them or if I'm going to batch the topic episode and just do updates and release them throughout the years. Like I have no plan right now. I just wanted to jump back and come back to the podcast. This was like the only plan for today. So I'm back. I will do an update. I will try to keep it short because, of course, a lot happened since I did my last podcast. I started querying in the last podcast, so a lot happened. So I'm going to get into that. I'm going to try to keep the update portion rather short because I also have a topic I really want to get into. And I think that's why I also had this big urge to come back to podcasting. Because this topic came to me and I was like, I just need, I just need to get this out to people because it's a concept that have helped me so much in the last year. I I mean more than a year since I last recorded. And I fully integrated and I and because of that I really wanted to share. So the topic is, as you saw in the episode title, it will happen for sure, meaning it, your writing dreams, what you want to achieve with your writing career. So it will happen for sure in 15 years. And so it's a mindset shift, but it's one that you know, if I could have done sooner, I would have. I believe that everything happens when it's supposed to happen, but if I had done this mindset mindset shift sooner, I think I would have avoided a lot of pain and have more joy, more fun in my writing journey. So that's why I really wanted to share it with you. So that's going to be the topic for today. But first, let's get into the update. So if you aren't following me on Instagram, go over there if you are on Instagram, if you want to follow me. But that's really where I share all my news. So people who do follow me on Instagram will know a lot of what I'm about to tell because I love to share it on Instagram. And I also love to do almost daily stories about every time I'm writing, I'm doing a story to tell you that I wrote. So this is a bit of a way of being accountable. Not that I need it anymore, but I know that this can be inspiring to see other writers working on their project, and some day it's going some days it's going great, other days it's like more of a challenge. So I think it helps to see other writers just doing it every day. So that's why I love to do those stories. But I also do posts sharing my news. So if you'd like to follow me more closely on my journey, especially in between my episodes, which are going to be random, definitely go over there and follow me on Instagram. This is the best way to being up to date with what I'm posting. So the big, big news that you would have absolutely seen, I'm sure, if you follow me on Instagram, is that I have an agent. So the querying story ends well. Uh, spoiler alert. So I'm not going to talk in detail about my querying journey right now, today, on this episode, because I have an episode planned with Abigail K. Perry on this subject. It will appear on her podcast, and I think I'm going to share it on my podcast too. I need to sort out the details with Abigail, but I will share this journey. I will share everything that I learned, everything that happened during my querying journey, what I did well, what I could have done better. So I'm going to really share all the details about my querying journey. And I've been wanting to do an episode with Abigail for so long, and our podcast was a lot oriented toward querying. So I just thought it fit, and it's going to be an interesting conversation instead of just me telling it. So having this back and forth with Abigail. So this is coming, you will hear everything. I promise it's coming, the querying journey from where I left it off in the last episode. But for now, know that I found an agent, the amazing Amira Oliday at Serendipity Literary. And we've been working on for a year now. I I celebrated the first year of being agented, and it's been working. It's been going super well with Amira. I'm super happy. And it really made me understand what people say about you need to have the right fit. It's just not about having an agent, but it's having the right agent who really understands what you're doing, what you want to do with your career, and who loves what you do. I think this is this should go without saying, but I've heard some horror stories of agents who weren't necessarily fan of their authors. It's fun to have this person in your corner, and it's been going really well with Amira. So this brings me to my novel, my debut, where are we? So we are on submission. We've been on summation for eight months. It's going well as well as you can expect it in this industry. So, yes, we all hear the story of those book deals that happen super fast, and we all dream, of course, of being one of those. I'm not, but that's totally okay. I know also that you know, some sometimes it just takes more time. It it doesn't mean anything, it doesn't mean that the book is less good or that it will sell for less or that there won't be as much interest. It's just a question of timing sometimes. So we've had a few past, but globally, like the comments were really good, like there was no big red flag. Otherwise, maybe we would have considered editing the book, but but we didn't, we just kept on submitting. So it's still out with many super interesting imprint and editors, and I'm so excited every time I go in my emails and I check the list of the editors. We're still out too. I'm like so excited. I would be honored to work with any of those editors. So we're waiting, and I still feel good about the whole process. I still feel like this is going to happen. I'm being super delulu and saying that the offer is just around the corner. That's really how I'm seeing it. And I'm deciding to see it this way until until I know otherwise. Because why not? That's part of the lesson I learned with the querying, is that at some point I was going like, it's going badly, like the querying is not going well because I'm accumulating all of those rejections when in fact it was going really well, because I ended up with three offers at the end. So my querying journey was going super well, even when it didn't feel like it. So I'm trying to use like the advice I would give to querying lefty would be trust that everything is working out exactly as it should, and that you'll end up exactly where you want to end up at the end. And so if I'm saying this to past lefty, I'm thinking that my future self, like published lefty, is saying to on submission lefty that everything is going to work out as well. So that's basically the attitude that I'm having right now towards um towards submission. And uh so we're waiting, and yes, it's a waiting game. This is how this industry is working, and I'm learning more and more every single day to be patient, and the best way to be patient is to be moving in other areas where you can move. So I'm moving, I'm working on my new novel, and this was a moment where it's solidified that I was so grateful and so happy to be working with Amira. Is we had a call. I actually had like five ideas of future horror novel that I wanted to work on, and I didn't know which one to be working on next. So we had a call, me and Amira, and I basically pitched her all of my ideas with comps, like not good publishing comps, like it was all movie comps or old book comps, and I just pitched to her like my ideas, and she asked me some questions, and we discussed like the trajectory of my career and what we wanted to do with my career long term. Uh, what was good in the market right now, of course. We don't even know when we're going to be submitting this book, but having an idea of what editors could be looking for and where the market is going in in the orange are was important to this conversation too. And it was so incredible because at the end, Amira was like super excited about one project, and the more I was talking to about to the more I was talking with her about this project, the more excited I also got. And it was just like she was excited to read it, excited to see where it was going to go, and I was excited too. And it was an idea I had like a long time ago, and I thought about working on. I actually did a grant proposal for this project for the Canada Council of the Arts to get a writing grant with this project. So I've actually already dabbed a bit in this project. The grant was refused, though it didn't work, which was like all things considered, it was a really good thing that it didn't work because I wasn't ready to work on this project at this time. By the way, just on that note, I did another grant proposal to edit my first draft. So I'm going to air back in August about this grant. So it would be like super amazing if I could get this grant. It would me allow me to edit this novel while staying at home full-time. I could take like a leave for my day job, so that would be pretty great. So we'll see, it will be coming in August. The answer for that. But anyway, I did a grant a grant proposal on this same project, so I've already dabbed into it. And let's say that when I discussed with Amira, it wasn't this project that I thought would be the one. But we got so excited talking about it that it made me want to jump in uh and start writing right away. So I think I started writing the first draft in November, and now we're in June, and I'm at uh 21,000 words written. I plan this first draft to be about 50,000, although I'm thinking maybe it's going to be longer. Who knows? But I'm close to the midpoint and I'm at 21,000 words. So I think maybe the the 50,000 would be will be a good mark. But you know, I haven't written much since December because I'm never writing much in December, and then I wrote I wrote a lot in January because this is my big prediction month, it's January, and then I had some small health issues, which we gladly solved in February and March. So again, I wrote last during those months, and then I was starting to plan a wonderful trip that I took to Italy with my parents in May. So April was a lot of planning this trip, and then I had the trip in May, so that's why like I've been working on this draft for a long time, but I don't have that many words for the number of months that I worked on it, but like it's all okay, and also that's what happened different with this novel. So for my first novel, I was really like pen cynic. Pen, pen syn? I have a difficulty saying this word, pen sync. Uh, so writing by the seats of my pants the entire first draft. So I had no plan, I was just writing it knowing that it wasn't working on a global level, but I just needed to get the story out. So that was how I wrote my first draft of pretty much anything up to this point. I was writing first draft, all pants, nothing planned. And then I would be editing the first draft to make it into something that worked on a global level. So that was my process for everything I've written before this book. But while writing my debut, the one that is on submission right now, I learned so much about story structure and how it works and I work in it's just showing, the experience is just showing, the years of writing are finally showing into my process. I actually now feel like I know what I'm doing, with so just parenthesis. I knew that this was short. If you're writing your first novel ever, like it's normal to feel lost and to feel like you don't know what you're doing, and to feel like it's going to take years and years. It took me five years if we include the year of querying to because I edited a bit my novel during this year of querying, but it took me five years from like writing the first word of my debut to like signing with my agent. Like we can say so four years for sure of of intense writing. And during those five years, I wasn't sure I was even going to be able to finish this book. And when it's your first book, it's just normal. I don't think I don't know why we think that this should be easy. I I knew that I think that I thought before it should be easy, but it's something complicated. Like it has lots of steps, lots lots of talents to control at the same time, to olden your brain, uh, lots of new skills to acquire to write an entire book. So it's normal that your first book you're questioning yourself and you're going over and back again, and it's just all normal. And when you get to the second and the third, you get a little more in control. It doesn't mean that sometimes you're not filled with like doubts of okay, can I do this again? Like, is this going to make sense at some point? Like, I think those are normal too. But once your first book is done, like it's and and by done I mean written and edited, and up to a point where you're happy with your project, and up to a point where you can present it to agents or publish it if you're an indie author. So once you've done that cycle, once you've gotten to that point, there like you learn so much about this entire process. Then when you go back with your second book and your third book and your fourth book, I'm sure that it you you have this confidence more in your capacity to do it again, and you know what you're doing more. So, anyway, I'm really filling it with with the second novel. And so I really pants the entire first part, which was like the beginning ook, if you're talking story grid, or the the first acts more in the traditional tree act structure. So the entire first act, I completely pensed it because I knew what I wanted to do. I knew my character, I knew what was going to happen until the break into two, so beats in Save the Cat. I really knew what was going to happen until this point. And when I reached the act two, the middle build, I couldn't just pence anymore. I really I felt like I needed to really know what was going to happen, at least in all the first half of the middle build, like the second act A, like I really needed to know what was going to happen in this part until the midpoint. I just couldn't write scenes that I didn't know if they led me somewhere, because I knew so much about story structure, and also because I had learned so much about my characters and my setting and my world building in the first part that I fanced, that I was like, okay, I feel like I know enough now that I can actually plan. Because before I was fancing, but it wasn't because I didn't want it to plan. Like I really tried to outline to plan my novel, but I just couldn't. Because I need in my brain to pull out some information out of anywhere that the ideas come from. Like I'm super woo-woo. I feel like the stories come through me and not by me. So I just need to grab some pieces of the story and put it into shape, gather my sand before I can make a castle out of it. And start trying to outline when I don't have any sand on my plate. It's just I'm trying to build air. I have nothing to outline or to plan. But because I had written my entire first part, like I felt like I had gathered that sand and I could I had it on my plate in front of me, and I could play with it, I could work with it, and then I'd felt comfortable to actually outline and plan up until I felt comfortable too. So I just said, okay, I'm going to plan, I'm going to outline this, and up until it doesn't feel fun to do anymore. So that's another thing. Like right now, I'm really focusing all my energy on having fun when I'm writing. So I said, I'm going to outline, I'm going to plan up until it's not four anymore. And that just so happened to be around the midpoint that I felt like, okay, I cannot go any further than that. I need to just write this part, know what's going on, write those scenes because as I'm writing, I I learn more about the characters, I learn more about my story, and when I go through this, then I will be able to stop again. Maybe I will see. I don't know. I'm really like just seeing where the story takes me. But what I'm thinking is that when I get to the midpoint, I will stop and plan until it's fun, and then I'm going to write it. Or maybe when I get to the midpoint, I will know exactly where I'm going, and I won't need to plan, and I will just be able to pen all the rest. I don't know. I have no idea. So, anyway, that's why like it's been sort of long to be writing a first draft for for me at least, for my pace of writing, it's been sort of long to be just at 20,000 words. Just like in quotation mark, because it's not just everyone. Words is amazing, but it's because I stopped actually to be able to plot and to outline a bit of the scene to know where I'm going because I really needed that. I also took a step back to do some research. So my books, as of now, I don't know if it's going to be this way all the time, but for my first sets of books, for sure, there is this mental illness presence. Like, I want to tie, I love to use horror to just show what's going on internally, like what you're battling with when you're battling with a mental health condition. And but for that, I also want to be like as accurate as I can be, and I want to be really sensitive with the subject, and it's the one that that's really close to my heart. So for this book, I'm really working with guilt, how you deal with guilt, how you can overcome guilt, how guilt can interact in your life, and and really like it's the corner emotion I'm working with with this book. And because it touches on mental health stuff and how to deal with trauma, I also want to be super sensitive and try to be as close to reality as I can within my supernatural background and setting. So I have an amazing friend who is a psychologist who is helping me. So I was brainstorming things with her, I was asking her questions to see a bit where I could go with this. So this was a very fun part of the process, and I'm so excited to be to have her on my side helping me to work with all of this. So this has been part also of those months of working on this new novel. But yeah, I'm just having so so so much fun writing this first draft and working with new characters in a new setting. Oh my god. Like after four or five years of being in the same universe with the same character, uh um as much as I love them, like it's not that I don't love them, it's this not that I don't love my debut. I love it absolutely, but it just feels good to be somewhere else and to be back in pure creation because although I love line editing, I love every part and I aim them all at some part at some point too. But as much as I love line editing, like I think it's the last two years that were just solely line editing because like the main structure was going well and it was just perfecting the line editing. This is really the part of the process that's the longest for me, and so it was good to be back in pure creation and just coming up with ideas and just seeing where what this story is because that's the fun of being a discovery writer for me, of not knowing everything up front. It's just I'm going to discover the story, and I'm so excited to see what this story turns up to be. Like I'm just I'm just so excited to see what it is because I don't know yet. And I have lots of ideas, but I don't know the full picture yet. And it's just the fun for me of writing, it's just discovering this story, discovering those characters. And at first I had just one point of view, and now I have two points of view, and this is the first time that I'm writing something with two POVs. And it's exciting, it's fun, it's a new challenge. So I'm working with like what information comes in which point of view, and I'm starting to think that the time will be a bit like distorted. Like you think things are happening linearly, but they are not really. So I'm having just lots of fun with it, and yeah, I don't know if I said this before on the podcast, but I know I've told people in real life a lot. And it's like before you make money with your writing, before this becomes like your job or something that supports you, an additional way to support you and to to allow you to treat yourself and treat the people you love. Before any of that, the only pay that you get for writing, like the only thing it gives you back is the fun that you have doing it. So I decided like I need to have as much fun as I can while I'm doing this, because this is the reason why I'm doing it right now. Like, I want to share my stories, I I wanna I want this to be my life. Like, it's right there, like in the description of the podcast. Like, it's no mystery, it's no secret that I want to be a full-time writer, but while I'm making this work, then it needs to be fun because otherwise, what why do it? Like, we have so few years in this life, so we need to use them and to enjoy them as much as we can. So, yeah, I'm just really trying to have the most the most fun that I can, and with this project, I can say it's working pretty well so far. So that's where I am with uh with the new novel. And also, I've been back into my short fiction, not writing any new additional short fiction because I'm really focusing my writing hours on the novel, but I've been submitting my short fiction a lot, and when I mean a lot, I mean a lot. I actually have uh five short stories right now, one that would be a reprint, but I still really love it, and I would love for more readers to be able to enjoy it. So I am submitting them a lot right now because I really um want to have them all published. Like those are these are not all the stories that I wrote, but these are the five stories that I still love today that I went back and reread with my new eye for storytelling, and there is one actually, my science fiction novella, that I I did that too. Yes, that's true. I stopped in May to line edit my novelette. Uh yeah, so I did not write the novel in May too, so that's why the word count is again quote unquote small for the time, but I stopped to to line edit the science fiction novelette because there was an open submission for for it. And novelette is like 15,000 words around that, and it's a tricky length, like it's too long for short fiction market, and it's too short for long fiction market, so there isn't that many places where you can submit it. And I had submitted to maybe like 10, 12 markets, they had all rejected, sadly, and I was like out of place to submit it. So for years it was just in a drawer, and when I saw that this super interesting market was opening for an Ovelette, like I just jumped on it, and they were saying they were going to be open in June. Uh, they had a cap at 300 stories, so I was like, okay, I really need to make the cap, have it ready for June. So I spent when I came back from Italy, I jumped back into the story and I re-line edited it with my new skills, with my new confidence. Also, like this was a big part of this editing was like going back into the story, and the place where you can feel that I wanted to be sure that the reader understands what I meant. I went back and I just cut and trusted myself and the reader to be able to understand what was going on without me like writing it out in the story. So so I did that and I resubmitted that. But B three other short stories I reread them and I just love them the way that they are. So I didn't change a word and I just submitted them a lot because I just realized and I did a post on Instagram about this, you can go and check it out. But if I want to get this published, I need to submit it. And to get more yes, yeses, you have to get more no's. Like it's just it's just math. Because in publishing, the the only reason why some writers get things published easily is just because they have made a name for themselves and the magazine or the imprint know that they are going to sell copies if they publish this author because of the readership that the authors bring with them. So, yes, you can say that they are better, and of course, when you have like 20 years in the publishing industry, of course, what you're writing is good quality, of course, but there's also the fact that you can sell copies, and that's attractive to markets, and that's just normal. Like it publishing is a business, we we have to remember that. So the only reason why you get so many no's as a debut is because you really need to strike a chord with the editor, either of your reading your short story or your novel, but you really need to make them completely and madly fall in love with your story for them to say, Yes, I want to publish this, even though you have no readership coming with you, and even though like I won't sell a copy because your name is on the cover. And that's a risk that the publisher is taking. So I think we need to remember that as writers, too. Like for us, it's our work, we're so close to it, and we want it to be published so much, but it's a risk to publish an unknown writer for any market. But if they love the story, they will do it and they will be happy to do it. But it just takes like a step further when you're unknown to be able to get that. Yes. So when you're starting out, you will get lots of no's. That's just how it works, and that's just normal. And I think that's why I'm capable of staying super calm and collected with the rejection I had for my novel, because I just know that it's how it works, and I just know that it doesn't mean anything about my book, it's just how it works. And we just need to find the right editor who will love it, will get it, in the right imprint which the story will fit into for their readership. So it's just about this like perfect combination of everything working out. But the only way that we can find this all thing working out is by submitting a lot to a lot of magazine, a lot of editor, and that's the only way that we're capable of finding the editor and the imprint, the market will be able to get it, will love it, and will want to take a chance on us. So that's why I'm doing that's what I'm doing with my short fiction. And I've also started to submit to lower paying magazine. My flash fiction, I've even submitted to non-paying markets because I really realize that I'm at a point with my writing journey where I want to be read, I want to share my writing. This is like my main motivation right now. Of course, I want to get paid too because I want to make money with my writing so I can write more. This is just like this is the simple mat of it. But I also need to be read right now. This is really like a driver because I'm not writing just for myself. If I was writing just for myself, I would be super happy and I would not work on the same project for five years if I was just writing for myself. So, so I want to share my writing, and I wanna make people feel the way I feel when I read a story dial you love, and it's just as simple as that. So that means that I need to submit a lot, and that means that I need to be ready to get a lot of no's. And I've started to get those no's, and it's okay, it's just okay. And I've realized that the more that you submit, the less the attached you get to every single submission. So every single no feels less big when you're just submitting to one place, like right now for my novelette, it's just that one place that would be great. So I'm a little more attached, but I'm trying to say, like, if it's supposed to be, it'll be, and like I'm trying to detach myself because I can get like quite attached is the right word to to my stories getting published in one place. But the truth is, I don't know where is the right place, and even if I even if I read everything that a market published, you just never know what's going to be the best experience working in with an editor. You never know what readership is the best. Like, so that's why I think in this industry you need a lot of trust and just know that things will fall the way they're supposed to. At least working this way brings me a lot of peace and a lot of comfort. So my attitude right now towards publishing, the publishing side of thing, not the writing side of thing, is just to I submit. This is the only thing I have control in, is submitting. So I'm submitting, and then what happens will happen, and there's nothing else I can do basically. So I'm capable right now, and I'm happy to be able to say this without like faking it, but I'm capable of just like letting go, submitting, and then we let go, but I submit a lot because I'm like the more I'm submitting, the better are my chances of getting published in the end. So there we are. I said we were going to have a small a small update part of the episode, but as always, I love talking about writing, so it's really hard for me to keep it small, but anyway, so um yeah. So the topic of this episode, which is it'll happen for sure in 15 years. So the first part of this, this is really just a mindset shift to help you feel as vast as possible during while you're trying to make your dreams come true, basically. And it's one that has helped me so much, like I said in the beginning, and I really, really wanted to share it with you because of how much it helped. So there's two parts for this. So the first part is in Lapin for sure, and there's the certainty element to it. So I've realized that for a long time in my writing career, the most pain I felt was every time that I doubted if I was going to make it or not as a writer, if I was going to get published, if I was going to become a full-time writer. The most pain that I felt was always when I was doubting if it was going to happen or not. And it felt a lighter, easier at the very, very, very beginning of my journey when I was a totally Dululu young adult. And when I was 16, 18, even my really early 20s, and when I was absolutely certain that I will be a full-time writer, it was just inevitable. And because I was so certain, I I didn't felt like this this weight of dread, you know. And then I started submitting and the rejection started coming and the doubts started to appear to arrive. But feeling like maybe this isn't going to work was really like a big pain. And you know, we we don't know. I have no idea. Maybe I will never republish, maybe I will never be a full-time writer. I really don't know what you know future is out there for me. But the the thing to remember and the thing to put into perspective is does it really matter if we know or not? And the truth doesn't really matter. What matters is what is helping and what is not helping. And believing that maybe I could be doing all of this, all of this work, all of this learning, all of this hours I'm putting into my writing without it ending up in publishing and being a full-time writer, thinking this, allowing this thought in my head was causing me a lot of pain. So it wasn't helpful. It was really not helpful. It wasn't something that could help me to once just feel good every single day, but also to keep on working on my stuff and having fun doing it. Whilst thinking that it's inevitable, that of course, for sure, 100% I'm going to be a full-time writer one day. 100% for sure I'm going to be published one day. I'm going to have the career that I want. I'm going to be an established name in horror. Thinking this is helping, actually, because it feels like the horror I'm putting in are well invested, and it's making it feel like it's all for a reason, you know, and it's taking away the dread and the heaviness around it to be like, oh no, of course, for sure. But the element that's important in all of that, and I think at some point I shifted back towards being certain. So about the time that I learned about manifesting and everything, I went back into certainty mode a little bit, not fully, but a little bit. I went back into certainty. But what I started to do is I started to rush everything because I really absolutely knew that it was going to happen. I needed to make it happen tomorrow. And that's the other part of it. That's why I have the element of in 15 years. Because, and but this also, I I need to put like a little caveat on that. It's not going to be for every writer to have this particular mindset. It's going to be for the writers who are rushing. And you need to know if you're rushing or dragging. So if you love Whiplash as much as I do, you will know that I took this from them. But you need to know if you're a writer who is rushing through their writing journey, or a writer who is dragging through their writing journey. And I've been both. At the beginning of my career, I was definitely I was super the Lulu in knowing that absolutely for sure it was going to work, but I was dragging it because of certainly other reasons that I won't get into right now that had something to do with mindset. But I was dragging, and what I mean by dragging is when you're not working on your stuff as much as you should. And it's not to say that you need to be like working so much, and that's why I'm saying like rushing, rushing is one thing to be working all the time and have no other things in your life, and you're just working, working, working to make it happen. That's rushing, and that's as bad. But being dragging is also bad, it's also not good when you have actually, if you're being honest with yourself, and that takes a lot. All of this, I have super lots of love for you. Okay, you're doing the best that you can with the tools that you have right now. But sometimes if you're dragging, you need to be taking a hard, good look at yourself, at your schedule, and be saying, I could be doing more, and I'm just not doing it. And you need to say, Why? Sit with yourself and why am I not doing more? It could be out of fear, it could be that you need more certainty. You're so afraid that you're doing this all for nothing that you it stops you and frees you from working. It could be that, it could be so many reasons. But if you're dragging, if you're not put in the work when you have time in your schedule, and you're saying to yourself that you're too busy to write when, in fact, you're spending like five hours a day on social media or things like that. Or you finished a book like super long ago, and you've written three books before, but you haven't queried them yet, or published them if you want to be indie published, you're dragging on your career. And with a lot of compassion, with a lot of love, you you you have to be looking at yourself and saying, okay, why am I dragging? Why am I not doing what I should be doing? Like, if I wanted my goals to be real, or the version of me who has made those dreams come true, what did she do to get there? And you see what this person has done, and you need to do this. So, for my draggers, for some of you who are dragging in your writing journey, like what I'm about to say about in the 15 years, like it doesn't apply to you. For you, I think you be you need to be thinking a bit more that it could happen sooner than you think, if you just went after it. And I think that for people who are more on the dragging side, there is something stopping you, and it would be a good idea to just stop and look and see okay, what's stopping me right now, and take the time to address this. But if you are on the rushing side, which what I was before, and I think if you go back and Listen to my my episode from the podcast. I'm sure the rushing is all over the episode everywhere because back when I was recording, I was rushing like crazy. I was like sprinting toward my dreams, like nothing could stop me. And things stopped me. Like my health stopped me. And also it didn't feel good. It just didn't feel good in the long run. So when you're rushing towards your dreams, I really felt like arriving there, making it to my dream, getting published, getting an agent, getting a book deal, becoming a full-time writer would fix me, would fix my life. It was the the way to be happy was having those goals happen. And that's why I was rushing because I was so eager to be happy, to fix my life, that I needed to rush there. So I needed to work as much as I could. So I had to write at every chance I got. And even though the idea of balance was there, like I I know, I know that I had this idea of balance, and I was applying it at my routine too. Like I need to say that I was not the type to be writing every single waking minute. So I was still spending time with my family, I was still moving my body, although this too could have worked before more. But I was still putting time in other things. But my attitude, and that could be also the thing with your dragging. Like maybe you're writing every single day, but you're never submitting. That's a former dragging, too. If you want to be published traditionally, you need to submit. So even though in my routine you could say that I was still pretty much, like, pretty much balanced in internally, like in my mind, I was rushing like a crazy. And I really had this attitude that my writing dreams coming true would fix me, would fix my life. So I needed to get there as fast as possible. But what this had was a layer of nothing was ever good enough. I was never far enough in writing my book. I was never, I never had enough. And I could feel that this will spill over to other things. So with this mindset, like I felt like having an agent, I would not be appreciated as much because I don't have a book deal. But changing this mindset allowed me to not fall into that trap. That's why, like, right now I'm just so incredibly grateful that I have an agent, and I'm just like in certainty and in fate that this book will find a home wherever it's supposed, whenever it's supposed to, like maybe it's not going to work right now with this run of submission. Maybe it's supposed to be like the second book in a two-book deal with my other project. Like, I don't know. And I don't need to know. That's that's the factor in all of this. I don't know. I don't need to know, but I'm working on my dreams anyway because I know for sure they are going to happen, but I don't know when, and the rushing energy is not helping, it's making me feel miserable. So the the mindset of saying, okay, it's going to work, but in 15 years, it's not right now, it's in 15 years, it allowed me to take a step back and say, okay, I need to build a sustainable writing routine. Because if you go back to my other episode, you will know that I was waking up at 4 o'clock in the morning to write. And it wasn't working. My body told me, it's not working, girl, you need to change that. And so I tried writing in the evening, and it wasn't working either because I was tired. My brain had worked too much, I had taken too much decision in the way, and every time I was sitting down, I made decks because I wanted to keep working on my goals. Remember, I was rushing, I needed to be producing, producing, producing. So when I was sitting on my desk and I wasn't feeling like writing, I would feel bad about not wanting to write. I was like, I have time to write, I'm supposed to do this, I want to do this, and I don't feel like it. But it was just the time of the day that wasn't working. So then I was like, I need to find a way to make this sustainable. And so I decided I'm so extremely privileged at my day job to be able to take what we call an aménagement de temps de travail. So it's like you're working with your schedule, you're lowering your pay to have more time for yourself. Basically, that's what it is. And what I took, the option that I took was to work 30 minutes less every single day. And I use this 30 minutes every single day to write, basically. So my my pay was cut, and at first, that's why I had this option since the very beginning of this podcast. Like since I started working on my debut, I always had this option on the table. I could always take this option. But I also worked on my money mindset a lot, like with the manifesting stuff. I worked on my money mindset and I realized that I had this fear of I'm never, I'm not having enough money, never. There was never an amount that would be enough. And so I worked on that and I realized that okay, if I'm trusting money, if I'm trusting myself, and I'm trusting that I'm going to be okay financially, and that I'm in a good place financially, and it's going to be okay, that's when I was actually capable of saying, okay, I can take a cut in my pay to give me time, to give me space, to give me a way to have a sustainable routine that I could still have in 15 years. Because waking up at four o'clock in the morning, that wasn't a sustainable routine. And really, the way that I approached it at the time, and I remember saying it, it's not forever, you know, it's just until I become a full-time writer. But when is that? And I also felt like the rushing was also with which book deal I was going to have, because I was like, I need this gigantic book deal so that I can quit my day job and not put my family under financial stress. And that's the only way I can be a full-time writer because I was rushing again. But when I pulled back on the rushing and said, okay, it will happen for sure, but in 15 years, it was like all of a sudden, like having a smaller deal, one deal, another deal, and building up over like seven, eight books before I could like securely, you know, leave my day job and still be able to support my family because my salary is very much needed in this house right now. So it became suddenly like, okay, yes, I could do that. Like with this this amenagement travail, it was like, yes, I have 30 minutes more every single day, and it turns into like sometimes it turns into an hour because I'm not rushing my schedule anymore because of this 30-minute gap that I have to play with. It can seem like not much 30 minutes, but with two kids and the day job and everything, like the 30 minutes make all the difference. So because I had like this wiggle room in my routine to work on everything, it allowed me to say, like, yes, I could keep my day job and I could like be working like this on my book slowly at the pace that I'm comfortable with for 15 years until my dreams come true. Because I took this time, and when I said that I worked on my money mindset, it really worked because I ended up having like two pay raise since then that happened just like we we signed some new convention with the labor union, and I just had two pay rays that were not planned, and right now I'm making more my pay is bigger right now than it was before I took this lowering of my salary to have more time to write. So just to say that I it was a good thing that I trusted money, that money would come back because it did, and even more, and now I feel super good. So working on my money mindset in this space was also good, but it helped me to build this sustainable routine, and I also did another exercise when I did the Epicle Align from Manifestation Babe. I I do this course every year now, since 2021, and one of the exercises we had to do uh during the course was to write our perfect day that in the life that we're manifesting. So, of course, I'm manifesting being a full-time writer. So she said to write this perfect day out with workout every day. So I planned myself like okay, if it was in January that I did this, and I was like, okay, if in a year from now I'm a full-time writer, what would my day look like? So, okay, my two kids would be both in school, so they would take the bus in the morning. So it's like okay, I would wake up like at 5, I would do my workout right when I wake up because this is the period I love to do it, and then I would have the routine with the kids, and then I would get ready, get my coffee, and then I would write. And I took a step back and I said, okay, with with the age of my kids right now, and with my health being super good right now, I can actually already wake up at five to train, to do my workout when I'm working from home, not when I'm going to the office. So three days a week, I can already do my workout that I love to do in the morning to take care of my body, which you know I learned a hard way, super important to be moving my body, to taking care of myself long term too. So I really love to start my day by doing a workout. And I realized, you know, I can do it right now. Like I don't need to wait to be a full-time writer to get up at five and do my workout. It was actually already working within my current day, my current schedule with the kid. But if I hadn't done the exercise with the this manifestation course to write my perfect day, I would have never realized that I had this lot available in my routine to already do what I wanted to do in the future. So again, it was a way that I could right now build my routine in a way that's sustainable. Because again, before when I was rushing, I was saying I have no time to do a workout. Like it's impossible for me to train regularly. I will do workout regularly when I'm a full-term writer. So I was again like putting in far away in the future when when I was stopped rushing and started to say, okay, it's going to happen in a long time. And I looked at what I wanted my perfect day to be, I realized that I could already do it. And again, it's making it sustainable in the long term because I don't need to make it work right now in order to work out and take care of my body in the way that I want to be. I can actually like do it right now with this sustainable routine that I was able to build because I stopped rushing. So all of this stopped rushing, all of this like building a sustainable routine, it's to find a way to have as much fun as you can, to love your life as much as you can while you're making your dream comes true. Because, like I said before, today is a day of your life and it's not going to come back. And if you're just waiting on your writing dreams to come true before you can be happy, you're missing out of all those days. And the writing should be part of this beautiful life, not something as a means to an end to create a beautiful life at the end. So I think to realize all of this, like I can be happy today. Today is a day of my life that I could be happy and have fun while I'm pursuing this, while I'm making this dream come true, because my why were so strong. And that's something that you can do for yourself too. Like, if your goal is to get an agent, get published, be a full-time writer, you can take a step back and say, why do I want this? Like, truly, why do I want this? And why? If it's oh, because I want more time, why do you want more time? What do you want to do with that more time? And then, oh, I would like to have more time for myself. Okay, why do you want more time for yourself? What would you do with that time? So, really going back to the basis, and you could realize that maybe what you're going after with your writing dreams, you can maybe achieve before you get to that big writing dream, at least a part of it. And that's what I did with this routine is I tried to be as close as possible to the version of myself with a full-time writer. What does she do with her day? How does she feel her time? How does she feel inside? Being as close as I can to this version of myself right now. What can I do right now with the resource that I have right now that leans only on me? I'm not waiting on any agent, any editor, any reader, nothing, just me. What can I do right now today to be as close as I can to this version of myself? What can I do today to love my life as much as I can? What can I do today to enjoy all of this as much as I can? Because that's a point at the end. And when I did that that little exercise, I realized that okay, I would like to have a hobby. Like the this version of myself, she has a hobby because she's writing is her job, so she does other things to distract herself. And I was looking for this hobby, and I just stumbled it back into playing piano. And I loved it when I was a kid, but I was too perfectionist, I wasn't good enough for my own taste, and so I stopped doing it, and also I didn't like the song that I was learning to play. But I hope is that this desire to play an instrument. I love the piano because you can play on your own, and it's like it's easy to do. And I was just attracted to the piano, but I didn't do it for so long. And when I was looking at okay, how can I have my life be as much like the life of my dream? What's in my power to do right now? I realized, like, oh, I could start playing the plant piano right now. It doesn't have to be a lot, it sometimes is just 15 minutes after the kids are asleep, or um, sometimes it's an hour because I don't see time go by when I'm playing piano. I just love it. And it could be like three times in one week and not at all in another week. Like, I'm not putting any pressure on this, it's just for fun, but at least I have it. At least I have this part of myself who can just have fun playing piano. But if I was still rushing, again, it would feel like okay, I should be reading because I need to advance my writing skills right now, and I cannot just be having fun playing piano. But right now I feel like I can, and it's helping me, and it's making me feel better to be sitting on the piano and to be playing instead of just rushing, rushing, rushing toward my dream. So it's really this entire concept is for you to be able to say and to find how I can have as much fun as possible while I'm still pursuing my dreams, while I'm still working as much as you can. Because again, you don't want to fall back into dragging, like you're rushing, but you don't want to fall back into dragging because, like I said, it's not it's not on your higher purpose to be dragging on something that you know that you could be doing. So you still want to be taking action, like action in making your dreams come true, it's super important. You need to write your book, you need to sit down, you need to submit. Action is important. So, how can you work as much as you can while still having fun as much as you can, while still building a writing routine that's sustainable on the long term? And that that's really by applying all of this that I really found a way to feel like I'm at a good place, I'm going in a good place, we're having fun, we're going there, we're enjoying the cruise, we are enjoying the journey, knowing that we will get where we're supposed to get. I don't know for sure, but right now that's the Lulu I'm in because it makes it feel good to just think that no, everything's going to work out. So I my my tip for you, my my advice for you with this is to take a look first, determining if you're dragging in your writing career or if you're rushing, and then seeing, okay, why the why of both. Like, why am I dragging or why am I rushing? And then seeing how you can adapt your daily routine in a way that you can sustain for years until you make your dream come true, for sure they're going to happen. But finding a way to build a routine that allows you to feel good while you get there. So that's my homework for you today. And also, I've been talking a lot about like things like manifesting and seeing the why behind and what's blocking you and everything. But I read an amazing book lately, and I really had by I had to finish by telling you about this book, and it's You Have the Magic by Ailey After Smith. I will make a link in the show notes. You can go and see this book there, and it's really talking about all those blocks and those limiting beliefs and those false stories that you have in your head. And I've been working a lot on my blocks, on my false stories, on the limiting beliefs that I had. I've been doing that for years since I discovered Manifestation, but with this book, like it just solidified in a way, and she she has this process that's just it's just an easy, well explained, easy to apply in your in your life. It doesn't take that much time. She has questions that you can journal on to see okay, where are those fears, where are those resistance, where are those blocks of limiting belief. And then you can work through them, and she teaches you how to work through them. And it's just been amazing. And the how much good I'm uh I'm feeling right now while I'm telling you all of this, it was there, it was brewing inside of me for years, but it really solidified in the last month. I read the book uh in May. Uh the last two months, like it really solidified with applying what was in that book. So this book is absolutely amazing, and I will for sure talk about it again on the podcast. But I really recommend that you can't check it because, like, that's why I was talking before about like checking with compassion. Even if you're rushing, have a lot of compassion on yourself. And because you don't want to sabotage yourself just for fun of it, like you want to make those dreams come true. You have stories inside yourself that you want to share with people, and that's amazing. And we need your stories, really need them. So we need you to to to work through your issues to publish them because I want to read them, I really do. But sometimes, like, those blocks are so big, those emotions are so big, and your nervous system is just trying to protect you. And if a rejection feels like you're about to die, then of course you don't want to submit. So have compassion and go check out what's going on inside. So I'm I'll probably do an episode about that in the future, about limiting beliefs and everything, and what I figured out inside myself because it could be helpful to other writer to see what another writer can have worked through is in terms of limiting belief and blocks. But in the meantime, you can check the book. So, oh my god, this is long. Again, I think you're starting to get that with me. The episodes are long because I love to talk, and it's been so long, it feels like catching up with a friend that I haven't seen it so long. Like I have so much to say. But yeah, I'm just happy to be back. Like I said, no idea when the next episode is going to be posted. It's going to be like a little surprise in your feed to see a new episode pop out. But I'm so happy that you're here after all that time, that you're still here, still again listening, like really at the bottom of my heart. I'm so happy that you're here. I'm wishing you all the best with your writing journey, with your writing dreams. You can do that and have a lovely, I don't know, a lovely month, week, day of writing. But we'll see you, we'll see each other again next time. Bye.