Episode 8 - Trusting the Timeline of Your Writing Journey

Recorded September 19th, 2022

In this episode, I talk about how I had to make a change in my writing routine to make it work long time with my day job and all the rest. Then I talk about the importance of trusting that everything happens at the right time and that we do not need to be further along in our writing journey. I needed to integrate this so badly, and I hope it’ll help you to feel more at peace with the timeline of your writing journey too!

Mentioned in this episode:

• Horror Writers Association Mentoring Program
• Save The Cat Writes a Novel!
• Story Grid website
• Story Grid 101 (free ebook)
• Story Grid 101 (paperback)
• Story Grid (original paperback)
• Story Grid podcast
• The Creative Penn Podcast

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Transcript

SPEAKER_00 0:00

Welcome to Leftyobase 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. Hello and welcome to another episode of my podcast. I'm so happy that you're still here with me this week. So the topic for this week is going to be trusting the timeline of your writing journey. And this is a topic that was inspired by what happened this week. So I'm going to get into that in a minute. But yeah, I'm doing this episode as much for me as I'm doing it for you. So um stay tuned for this topic that I think I haven't heard enough about. And I think it's super super important um to stay sane in this business and to be more at peace with it too. Um and not just this business, but this whole writing thing in itself, even if you don't want to make it a career one day. So anyway, stay tuned for that. But before that, here's my update for last week. Uh so last week I worked on chapter nine of my horror novel. So I'm currently doing the line editing, it's the last draft before I start querying. Um, so I started working on chapter nine and I still haven't finished it. Uh, partly because it was the first scene that I encountered that didn't work. So up to now, not like the first eight chapters or scene, they were working well. All I had to do was really work on the line knitting. I didn't have to change major things. And my mentor, who's giving me comments as I go along, she just had like really surface level comments. She didn't have like those big, big things that I needed to adjust. Um, but in this scene, like I was sort of dreading this scene from the beginning because a part of myself knew that it wasn't working. And the first morning that I read it and was like, okay, it doesn't work. I didn't have much time to really dive in, so I spent like all day saying, Oh my god, it doesn't work. Will I be able to make it work? And at the same time, it was like the events in the scene were the right events that needed to happen for the rest of the story, but the scene was just boring to me. And I was like, if it's boring to me, it's going to be boring to readers. Like, if I dread working on it because it's not an exciting scene, but it's a necessary scene, the readers will feel the same, and I risk losing them. And we're so early on in the novel. I don't want to, you'd never want to lose the reader, but they're not as much invested at this point. So, anyway, I was like dreading making it work, and I just basically decided, okay, I'm going to go back to my root and go back to what I love, which is using craft book and craft technique and story methodologies to see okay, what's not working and how can I make it work. So I went back to Save the Cat writes a novel because at first I thought there was like a series of scenes at the end of my act one um that wasn't working. Um, so I thought that was the problem. But looking back with Save the Cat and everything I had done on that, I was like, okay, no, this is the right moment. Like, I'm really in the debate right now, and this beat needs to happen, it's the right thing, it really needs to be there. So, so that made me like confident that the action was really the right one. So it wasn't the problem, it was really the way it was delivered. So, when it's a problem with delivery, I always go back to the story grid. Um, if you don't know the story grid, um what I recommend is starting with Story Grid 101. It's a really short book, uh, and it really goes straight to the point of what the methodology is. In fact, you can have it completely free on their website. Uh, I will put the link in the show notes. They are giving away the ebook version of this book, uh, so you can check it right now completely free. But I love having a paper copy uh because I put some tabs in them and underline and I added some notes uh manually in the book too. Um so I will also put a link in the show notes to my bookshop org page where I have the physical copy if you prefer physical copy. So um this is a great place to start with the story grid. And oftentimes these days when I have to go back, I just go back to this little it's it's tiny, it's a really, really small book, but it really goes straight to the point. And I just go back to this and it's enough to help me. Um but if you don't know anything about the story grid and you want to know and you feel overwhelmed, there is the original book that I'm going to link to, uh, which goes deeper into the methodology. So you can go and start with that. Uh, but there's also the podcast. So right now the episodes of the podcast are really different from what they used to be. But if you go back all the way to the beginning of the podcast, which I always suggest everybody to do when you want to try out the story grid, um, go back at the very beginning of the episode, and it's basically Tim Groll who wanted to learn how to write, and he went to Sean Coin, who was he had been an editor, an agent um for years. He has been in the business, worked with bestsellers, like he's really the big deal, and he has uh developed this methodology that's really like analytical to how to see a book, a story, and know if the story works or not. So basically, Tim went to him and asked him to help him become a better writer, and through this process, Sean explained to Tim the concept of the story grid in the podcast. And like Tim in the podcast asked all the questions that we have, at least that I had when I started um listening to the podcast. And also you follow a little farther along, you follow Tim as he writes his first book ever. And that's amazing because you see him go through all the things that we go through, and he has the support of Sean Coin through this. So I really enjoy like the first season of the podcast so much. I still get a lot from the most recent episode, but yeah, I changed the format a little, and I add less like big ha-ho moments while listening to it. But anyway, if you want to learn the story grid, that's always my my tip. Um, it has helped me so much, like I mentioned in the first episode of the podcast where I talked about my writing journey. All that to say, big parenthesis to say that because my scenes were working, I took back my story grid 101. I went back to the five commandments uh that needs to be in a scene, and I really checked out with my current scene to see, okay, have I done the five commandments right? And that's where I found out that there wasn't a progression, the progressive complication that leads to a turning point that leads to a crisis and a climax. That was really what I was liking. So basically, what Sean says, the five commandments that you need to have in a scene for it to work, I just didn't have them. Um, so basically, I took my scene and I planned out those moments, and now I'm at a point where I need to just ridigle, like it's not really rewrite the entire scene because, like I said, the events work, but I need to just go back and make it flow better to have really the the commandments super clear in the scene, and I think it will make it more interesting. So that's where I'm at uh with the novel. And um, if you've listened to last week's episode of the podcast, I said that you know my writing routine right now was too much for me, and I was basically getting tired, getting yeah, it was it was getting too much, and I could feel like this moment where I would need to take a decision about my routine, basically about changing it in some way. Um, I knew that it was coming close. But last week I said that my plan was to finish my novel with the current routine that I have, and that after that I would decide what I'm going to do with my writing routine in every day. But I also said that I had in mind with this that my surgery was coming up at the end of September, and I was seeing this as I'm going to be able to rest at this moment when I'm going to have my surgery. Because after my surgery, there would be this sick leave that will allow me to slow down and take more of my time and rest more, and I was looking forward to this as a way to help me keep going until I finished my book. Uh, so on Friday, because I still didn't have any news from the hospital about when my surgery was going to be scheduled, and like the end of the month was coming like fast, and I was like, okay, I'm supposed to know when my date is. I said, I would just I'm just going to check and see if everything is alright. And it's a good thing I did because she said the lady at the planning for the surgery, they are like, I'm not really sure what's going on, but if it's COVID or I know there's a lot of cancer or anything, I don't know, but they have taken lots of delay in the surgery. Already I'm delayed more than I shouldn't have been. My doctor put a date for me to have the surgery by September 13th because I had some problems. And basically, no matter this date that my surgeon put, she just said, I cannot place you. I'm up to the middle of October, and I still haven't put you in, and I have no idea when I will be able to put you in. And I said, So, is it going to be November, December? And she was like, I have no idea. So I was like, basically, I need to just not have any date in my mind. And just to give you some context, like this surgery, the date of my surgery has been postponed. Like, it's the third time that I'm giving an approximate date, and that it's postponed because of circumstances. All that to say that right now I have no dates for when it's going to happen. So, of course, at the moment I was really sad and disappointed. And what that also told me was that I could no longer count on this, basically. So I was counting on the surgery, not the surgery itself, of course, because it's tiring, but more the time after the surgery to take a breeder, take some time, sleep more, and also maybe have a little bit more time to write on my novel because I would be just doing nothing and resting all day. And I was like, I will be able to write like on the sofa, you know, while I'm trying to rest. I was counting on this surgery for a lot of things, but then it was just not there anymore, and I did not know when it was. And so, like, the brutal disappointment of the surgery being taken away from me made me have to say, Okay, you need right now to take a decision about your routine because the only thing that made you able to keep on going was the prospect of the surgery, and now it's not there. So you cannot keep on going this way, like it doesn't work. Uh at first, like the only two options that I saw in front of me was one, I say that this is all too much for me and I quit completely, or two, I cut down majorly on either the podcast or my writing or both, and I wasn't ready for any of that. So the quitting, I thought about it like just a tiny bit because it was general life disappointment, but it was just like a reminder that I hadn't achieved any of my writing goal, and again, the thought of am I doing this all for nothing? I get nothing in return, and like all the whining that I'm putting all this out work and I'm never going getting any help, and you know, all of this, but I still don't want to quit, like I still love writing, I still love what I'm doing, and I want to see this book through. I want to there is maybe the potential for something with this book, but if I don't finish it, I will never know. So quitting was quickly put aside as not something I was going to be doing. But after that, there was the cut down, and every time I had thought about why this routine wasn't working, I always saw only this option of cutting down. And I love doing the podcast, I love doing it every week. Um I love the reflection it brings me, I love the feedback I get, it gives me energy, I really feel at my place when I'm doing it. So it was like, and I just started the podcast, like I put all that time and I just started, and I want to keep on doing, so I did not want it to cut that. In cutting back on my writing to sleep more, that meant like getting up later in the morning, but I'm already like getting maybe an hour, an hour and a half of writing every morning. I was like, if I get up any later, that will be 30 minutes maybe that I get to write, and I don't want that. Like, and it's not just because I don't want to delay like the time when my book finishes, it's just like I like having lots of time to write in the morning, like my days go better when I had a good writing session in the morning, it just brings me joy, and I just like starting my days this way, so I wasn't ready to cut down on that too. So at first I felt really stuck. Like I was like, I need to keep on working, like I said in the past episode, like it's just not an option for me to quit my day job. I need the day job, I have kids, so it comes with extra time that I need to spend with them that I'm happy to spend, but yeah, it's it's just time in my schedule, and I don't want to cut down on the podcast, and I don't want to cut down on the writing, but at the same time, I want to get more balance. And through reflecting, I realized that this was what was making me so tired and overwhelmed and unhappy with my routine. It wasn't necessarily that I was tired physically, but more like I could feel that this routine was draining me. And it wasn't long for me to realize that the reason why this routine was draining me was because I wasn't balanced at all. Like I mentioned in the past episode, like I do not take walks as much as I used to and like to. I I'm not moving my body as much as I as I like to and should, I'm not reading as much as I should, I'm not journaling like I love, I'm not meditating. So there's all those things that I know help me to stay on top of everything. And I thought that because of all the time I was putting in my writing career, my writing journey, I did not have this balance, and the only way to have this balance was to be a full-time writer. But you know, I didn't get the grant, and now the surgery was away, and if I'm taking a step back, like I have no idea when I will be a full-time writer, it could still be years. So if I don't want to cut down on the things that I'm doing right now, there's only one option. I need to find this balance in this current routine that I have. And once I put my finger on it, it was like, oh, of course. And it even now I'm telling you this, like this was Friday, so like three days ago. Um, now it seems so evident to me. It's so simple. But back then, in the morning, when I got the news for the surgery, like it felt impossible. But so here's the plan is the third way to make this routine work to keep on writing, to keep on having the podcast, to keep on working on my writing career with my day job, and you know, keep on moving forward and having it be sustainable on the long term. So here's the plan that I came up with. Um, first I'm going to respect my bedtime, which I did back in March when um so I started waking up at four o'clock in the morning to write back when I went back to work after my second maternity leave. So back in January. So from like January up to May, when I started the podcast, that's about there. Uh, I was really good at always being in bed by nine. So that was the way for me to have at least seven hours of sleep, which you know is respectable um not to become sleep deprived. But since I started the podcast, because I first like doing it, I get all excited and I want to get it out as soon as possible, I was a lot going over my bedtime because instead of stop recording when it hit like 8:30, which is the moment I need to stop if I want to do my night, uh, my bedtime routine to be in bed by nine, I would keep on going. I would keep on recording the podcast, I would keep on editing the podcast to to make it out. I wouldn't stop basically. So I was always going to bed, not always, but like maybe three nights out of four. I was going to bed um past nine, and sometimes I would push it like to 10, 10:30 to get the podcast out. Um, and you know, I know that this contributed to me feeling sleep deprived. So this is the first thing. So maybe the episode will come out later, but I know that like you will be okay with that. Seriously, don't know how it's going to look, but I just know that I want to respect myself and my bedtime. So this is the first part. The second part is going of my plan for balance, is going to take my breaks at my day job. So lately, like this summer, my breaks have been social media. And while it's fun to do, I know that it doesn't fuel me, it doesn't fill up the wall like reading or taking a walk or meditating would. And I know that it's a beautiful place that I'm just losing an opportunity to be more balanced. So I said that I'm going to be ruthless about taking my breaks to read, to walk, or to um meditate. That's going to be the only three things I can do during my break at my day job. So I think that doing this just in and of itself will do a major difference in me feeling better and more balanced. Uh so far I am one day into this plan of mine, and it hasn't been a success today. Only one of the two breaks I managed to stay away from my phone. So this is a process, but um Um, yeah, I think it's going to help. Also, I am not putting any deadline on this project, and even on the podcast. So there might be, I already said that maybe some weeks there isn't going to be an episode, and I already did. Um, but also like the book, I like to give me some deadlines. Um, but this lined editing draft just is long, it just takes a lot of time, but I know how good it makes my scene, so I want to do it before I start querying. I really think that it's important. So I decided that I'm going to be really like freeing myself from any pressure of finishing this at any moment. Like me and my mentor, we told ourselves the beginning of December would be our deadline just to give ourselves like a timeline. But at the same time, she said, and I told myself too that if it takes longer, we're just okay with it. And by the way, she's so amazing to want to be with me all the way with this, like, because normally the program is finishing like soon, but um she said she enjoyed my book and wants to keep on helping me with it, so I'm so so so so grateful for her for this. But anyway, so it's going to take the time that it takes, and I know that, for example, I have a friend who she said that she really needs a clear deadline with some clear, like we calculated it together. She needs to do like 1.6 scene per week to meet her deadline. And she was like, oh my god, this is exactly what I needed because she felt like she was taking forever on every scene and she wasn't moving forward because of this. But this is not the problem that I have. I'm I really know what I have to do, and I know I can do it super successfully. I know that when I'm taking time with a scene, it's because the scene needs it. I know that I'm not spending too much time on every scene just because. Like the time that I'm spending, I know that it's necessary. So it's not my the problem that I'm having right now. So if I show up every day and I do this work, eventually the book will be finished. So I don't need that deadline to put some pressure on myself. The pressure I'm putting on myself with the deadline is just making me feel panicked and overwhelmed and making me work less. Um, which it did like this summer. So, as as well as the sabotaging that I spoke in episode four, and the not trusting myself, which I spoke in episode five. So, all of this was making me work slower on my scene, but it's by freeing myself of deadline and fear and trusting myself that I know that I can finish this book. So, this is another part of my plan, not holding myself to any deadline. And the last part of my plan to be happy in my writing routine is to just have fun writing, going back to the fun, going back to why I'm doing this and why I will keep on doing it, even if I'm not a full-time writer in like five years. Because I like it, but when I start to get like overwhelmed with I want to be a full-time writer, I want to see my book out there, I want to have readers, when you get overwhelmed with all those external things, sometimes you lose the fun. And I certainly at some point lost the fun of writing. And this week, with this scene that I worked on, that I went back to the story grid, like I really like this more analytical way and view of seeing it with methodologies and lots of books on my docks. I went back to the fun, and I like I need to stay in the fun. I think it's super important. So that's my plan. We'll see how it goes. But um, yeah, for now I'm I'm feeling more at peace, really, uh, already, even though I haven't really applied the plan yet. Just having it, knowing that I don't have to cut down the podcast, knowing that I don't have to cut down on my writing, all of this is helping me so much to just be able to see myself long time in this writing routine, which is so amazing because this is what I want to do, and I don't want to let things out of my control, like grant or surgery, or any other thing in publishing come in between me and my writing, and that's the way to do it, I guess. This turned out to be a biggest writing update than I first thought it would. The last part of it is that I now have two new writer friends that I made on Instagram this summer. Like it's really it's it's a really new friendship. Um, but that I really like I'm so happy to have those two women with me on this journey. One is one I mentioned earlier, uh, the one we need at the deadline. So basically, they have both accepted to check out my novel as I write it. I'm going to send them the scenes. And the other one is the the friend I mentioned in the episode before, the one that fit exactly with like the readership I'm targeting with this book. Like, she's the reader I want to reach. So uh I'm super excited about this too because I had some great and amazing beta readers who gave me such awesome feedback on my full manuscript. But I wanted some new eyes to look at the line editing version and also of the change that I'm making according to the comments of my other beta readers, uh, my other writer friends. So it's really fun to have these two women who are great writers, who are really like they are learning a lot. We are all listening to like the same writing podcast, and like I can see that we're going in the same direction. We are all in the same space with our book. All in the last draft of our novel before we start querying, we will all be in the query trenches together, like soon, which is amazing. Uh, so yeah, it just feels so great to have them backing me with this draft of the novel, uh, knowing like not a lot about my novel, and I can really get their feedback. So I'm super excited, and I'm going to be reading both of their books too, which I'm super excited about. Uh, because I had no better readings these days, and I was just missing it, and I really love doing doing this, reading other people's works and giving feedback. So um, I'm super excited about this. So in episode three, the one about uh writer friends, I said that social media was like not a way that I made that much friend at that time. I'd made like just one really good writer friend thanks to Instagram. Uh, but right now I can say that there is three total. Because like, yeah, I can feel that those friendships will keep on going through being in the query trenches together and finding our agents. I I just know that there is an agent in all of our future uh book deals for all of us, and I just wish that I will meet all of my writer friends at a writing conference one day when we are all published. That would be so amazing. So uh yeah, that's just the the good and fun news that I wanted to end my updates on. So, trusting the timeline of your writing journey. With what I said in the updates about me wanting to get away from deadlines and also finding a routine that I can sustain on the long term, it all inspired this topic because a lot of times in my writing journey, I've been eager to be further along the journey, to uh finish a book sooner. It was like, oh, if only I finished a book sooner, if only I discovered Story Grid sooner, if only, if only, if only maybe I would be farther in my writing journey. And I've also heard many other writers say exactly the same, wishing there were farter along. And what I'm telling you today, and what I'm telling myself also, is that there is no hack to writing, there is no hack to developing your writing skills, there is no hack to finishing your book, it's going to take the time that it takes, and that's okay. It's just the way it is, and it's just something we have to all accept and be okay with. The more I'm listening to the stories of different writers who have Make It, who have an agent, and let's just say right now, making it means having a book deal, a book published or multiple book published, let's just put that as a common parameter for making it. Like, let's let's just have this common ground for what making it is, just for the purpose of this conversation. So the writers I'm seeing who have made it and they they are telling their story, they all have spent like years and years and years and years. Most of them close to 10 years, if not more, before they got to that point of making it. It looks all different for all those writers. Some writers will spend 10 years on the same book and then it will work. For some others, they will spend this time writing multiple books and trying to query them all, and it will not work until the last one works. And for them, it will look like the big numbers of I have queried six books and gotten 300 rejection letter. It will look so big, but it's just the way that they went about it. Instead of rewriting the same books for years and years and years and years, they wrote a lot of books and tried to query them. But at the same time, it took them about the same time than this other writer. Um, there could be some other writers who decide to go the short story route, and they just like write and submit lots of short stories for years, and that's the way they develop their writing before they go to their novel, and then boom, like things happen. Um, and when I say boom, like it can be still a year or two, but anyway, they didn't write all those books before. There is some other people who will end up publish before and then they will transition to traditional publishing and then it will work. There is other people who will do fanfiction even as a way to develop their skills before they go into like the querying process and everything. So it will look completely different from writers to writers, but I have yet to heard a writer in the podcast interview say who has like made it in the parameters that I've told you say that they just like sat down a year before with no writing experience whatsoever, and they just wrote a book and they achieved success. Like the only writer who I heard say that was an editor before, and I think it counts as developing writing skills. I think you will agree with me. So developing your writing skills just takes a lot of time, and learning about the publishing industry also takes a lot of time. So there's just no hack around it, there's just no way of shortcutting it. You need to spend this time on your craft, on your book. Like writing a book takes a lot of time. Of course, you will hear those writers who write a book a year, a book in six months, a book in a month, even, and you will say, Oh my god, like, but this isn't their first book. It would be like a complete a liar to write their first book in six months and it being so good with no writing experience. Again, like no short stories, no editing other people's work, nothing. Like they just it doesn't happen. So we just need to accept that those writers who write this fast, they're most likely full-time writers, and they have most likely written a lot of books before, so they know what they're doing, they know their process, and that's why they manage to do and they have developed their skills for years, so that's why they are able to produce a book that quickly. But as an author who has never published a book, who has never completely finished a book up to a point where they can actually show it to agents, which is the place that I am right now. I cannot expect myself to write a book in six months and have it be good. Like maybe right now, now that I've done it, who knows? Maybe I would be able to do it, but before it was impossible. Not with the life that I had, not with having kids, and not with my skills, which still needed to be developed. So it's important to just accept this and accept that the book will be done when it's done. Accept that the agent will come when it comes with the right book at the right time. You may think that the book you're working on right now absolutely must needs to be your debut, but maybe in five years when you've written four other books, you will realize oh right, that was yeah, I'm glad that wasn't my debut after all. I still needed to learn, I still needed this and that and that. So right now you don't have the whole perspective of your entire writing career and writing journey to be able to know if this is really the perfect debut for you. So you just have to trust that whatever happens is the right thing to happen. And the way I'm able to fully accept this, even though it's hard, because again, I can't wait for the moment, I will be a full-time writer, because it will bring more space and ease in my routine. Like I will take away 35 hours a week that I need to give to my day job. Of course, it will free up some space. That and the freedom. Like, and I can wait to have the freedom of my time when my kids are sick, when I'm sick, not to have to think, oh, do I have a sick day left? I I can't wait for the moment when I can just say, my kids are feeling down. Okay, I can be there. The school is closed today, okay. I can stay there, no problem. I don't have to check in with anybody, I can just take this decision. I'm feeling down today, I'm going to go back to bed because I need it. Like, I want this freedom of my schedule. So, of course, I can't wait to be a full-time writer. But no matter that, if I look back, I'm glad of the timeline that I had had because it brought me things that I wouldn't have if things have moved along further or faster. So, for example, I'm so glad I didn't make it based on the parameter that we gave earlier before, because in my early 20s, I don't think I would have been mature enough to deal with social media at a large scale. I know this right now, and I really prefer that I have not been given a big following up until like this moment. And even then, it still scares me the idea of having a big following. But I know that back then I would have made probably some mistakes, and of course I would have gone through it, but I'm still glad looking back that this didn't happen when I had less maturity than I have right now. Personally, like I know how I was on the internet back then, and like I'm glad that yeah, it was just to my friends. So for this, I'm super glad that I didn't make it before. Another reason is that if I had found lots of success, if I had made it before when I was still writing in French, I don't know if I would have transitioned to writing in English. It was because I had difficulties with French that it prompted me to try writing in English. And I'm so happy with writing in English. I feel so aligned, I feel so at my place when I'm writing in English. I'm glad that it didn't work out when I was writing in French, because what if I hadn't made the transition to writing in English? So things happened as they were supposed to, and the same thing with horror. So I started with horror, but then I tried my hand at literary writing. Uh and then I tried like more like the fantasy and everything, and I finally went back to horror, and I'm so glad that it didn't work out with these other books and these other short stories in other genres because I now know that to brand myself as a horror writer, this is my true love, my true passion in writing, this is the genre that I have the most book inside of me. I will write my fantasy series at some point. I know it. I will probably write some science fiction book too at some point, too. And who knows what other genre I might come up with. But I know that what will always be true and what I will always come back to is horror because this is the jar that I love the most as a reader, as a viewer, but also as a writer, this is the jar when I feel most at home. So if it had worked before with something else, maybe I would have never found my way back to horror, and that would be a shame. So I know that the timeline I have so far, even though it was hard, I'm still glad for it, and I wouldn't, I would still go back and not change anything. Like if this book I'm working right now is my debut, I would be so happy that this particular book is my debut. So I would not want to change anything. So if right now I'm so happy with my timeline, no matter how hard it is, and no matter if like often I feel frustration for not having reached more, if I'm seeing it from a more detached point of view, I'm glad of where I am right now and I wouldn't change anything. So why do I not trust that the timeline in front of me is as perfectly right as the timeline behind me? So you need to trust that there might be a reason why you haven't reached your goals yet. You need to trust that there might be some reasons why you haven't reached your goal yet, and that there might still be some lessons that you need to learn, and then success will come at the right time when you're ready for it. You need to trust that because really, what's the opposite of it? Right? If you do not trust that the timeline is perfect, that you will finish your book at exactly the right time, that you will find your agent at the right time, that you will get your book deal at the right time, that you will become a full-time writer at the right time. If you don't trust that, what's the opposite of this? It's being bitter, it's being delusioned about this whole thing, being angry and sad and whining all the time like I was. Um, and that's not getting you any closer to your dreams, and that's not getting you any closer to finishing your book. Those are not, while normal emotions to feel, those are not emotions that you want to dwell on because they are not helping you, they are not products of emotions. So going to that thrust, going into Your life, and it it doesn't even have to be written writing, you can check at something else that happened like later than you thought it was going to happen, or later than you would have wished for it to happen. And when you look back, you said, Oh my god, it was such the perfect thing that this timeline was this way. Um, I'm sure there is something that you can find in your life where the timeline wasn't the one you would have chosen, but it turned out to be exactly the perfect timeline. This could be a way for you to really find that trust in the timeline is the right timeline. But you can say, yeah, okay, but maybe you don't really have this example, or maybe you have one, but you're like, still, I still don't care. I want to have finished my book and I want to be further along. I want to be having my more money with my writing, or I want to have my agent, or anything. How can I come to a place where I truly accept my timeline exactly as it is? And I think the solution is to put everything in place to be sure that you are enjoying writing right now as much as you can. To be sure that you're enjoying your life exactly as it is right now, without a book finish, maybe, without an agent, without a book deal, without having making it, without being a full-time writer, finding a way that you can really enjoy your life exactly as it is right now to its fullest. That you can enjoy writing on the book you're writing right now, with the skills that you have right now, not wishing you have more skills, with the skills that you have right now, finding a way to enjoy it and have the most fun that you can right now with everything that your life is. That's the way that you'll be able to be in peace with your timeline. Because if you are enjoying things the way they are right now, there's no rush, you are enjoying it. And yes, that's easier said than done. That completely is, but if that's something you wish to achieve, I'm sure that you can. Check out your routine, check out what you can change the way that I did that I mentioned in the update part. Look at a way that you can make sure that you have the most fun right now. And I often heard people say, and I've hated this for the longest time, but I've often heard writers say, Oh, you know, when you get a book published, it doesn't change anything. Oh, you know, when you get a full-time writer, you don't get that much more time to write because you have all those other um responsibilities, and then you have to fight even harder for your writing time. So you don't get that much more writing time. Um, you don't feel really different after you've reached like the New York Times bestseller list, you still feel like a fraud. I'm sure you've heard this too. So if reaching all those goals doesn't change anything in how you feel inside, you need to start feeling better inside right now without those goals. Because obviously we all try to fool ourselves thinking that reaching those goals will help us feel better, but everybody says that it doesn't. And actually, I had a proof just last week that no two weeks ago that it was true because for the longest time my goal as a writer was to make my first dollar with my writing career. And I really thought that I would feel somehow different after I would make my first dollar with my writing career. And I told you that I had a pay uh Ko-Fi supporter who gave me my first paycheck as a writer. But I I'm not even sure I said it in those words because at that moment, although I was super happy for this person to choose to give me money, choosing to support me, I didn't even realize what that meant. I didn't even realize that this is your first paycheck as a writer with your writing career, because this person supported you because of the podcast that you're doing, because you're a writer and you're sharing everything that you do with your writing career. Like, I really consider this podcast to be part of my writing career, my writing journey, my body of work. Like Joanna Penn says all the time in the Creative Pen podcast, which which I believe it's true. Like the podcasts that you do are part of your body of work as a writer. So it is my first paycheck as a writer, and I didn't even realize it at the moment. So, do you think it changed a lot? Like, no. Now that I'm thinking about it, like I'm able to say, okay, so you see, you bring out value which comes back to you in terms of money, like which was I think what I was waiting for. Like somebody actually enjoying what I was doing enough to put money into it. Because I think there's really like there's energy that comes with money, like it's one thing to say that you love something, it's one thing to support something that's free, but putting in money, it it's a level up. So right now, because I'm talking about it, I'm able to say, like, wow, this is really cool and this is a cool milestone. But on the moment where it happened, when I didn't think about it, like it didn't change anything. So if reaching those goals will not make you feel better, you need to feel better right now with what you have. And then when those goals are reached, you can just put that on top. And it will just bring out more ease, more fun, more like publishing. No, it doesn't change anything to have a book out, but at the same time, it changes everything when you have the right mindset because at last you get to meet with your readers, you get to talk to them, you get to know what they think, you need you get to share your story, you get to make people feel the way that you feel when you're reading a good book, and it helps you escape and live something. So, of course, it makes a difference. But it's so easy to just move the goal further and say that, oh, okay, I'll be happy. Yeah, now I have a book out, but it doesn't sell enough, and I haven't made any like bestseller lists, so okay, I'll be happy with this. But no, like finding a way to be completely at peace with the time where everything happens, it's okay to want all those things. I'm not saying you shouldn't reach for the book deal or the bestseller list or the money, like I I still want all those things, but I don't want those things to be the definer of how happy I am as a writer, how happy I am in my routine, and how good I feel on a day-to-day basis. So find back this joy, find a way to enjoy your writing life as much as you can right now with all the circumstances that you have, while you hope to make it all better, of course, but still enjoying what you have and trust that everything will come exactly when it's the right time for it to come. And I'm telling you, if you truly believe this, it's going to happen. Positive thinking. So I really hope you enjoyed the episode this week. If you do, please subscribe to the podcast, not to miss any new episode. And you can also uh rate and review the podcast on the platform that you're listening. I I would really appreciate it. I haven't had my first review yet on Apple Podcasts. So if you're listening on Apple Podcasts, uh please leave a review. I will be so happy to have my first ever review. So uh as always, you can go and check the links in the show notes to my Ko Fi page if you want to support me, my Instagram if you want to follow me there. Uh and there's links to everything that I mentioned in this episode, so you can go and check them all out. So I will be back next week with another episode. But in the meantime, I'm wishing you a lovely week of writing.