How Do We Define Success As Authors?

To all of my author friends - how do you view success? Is it the amount of books that you sell? Is it your Amazon ranking? Is it the amount of followers that you have on social media? Is it the amount of people subscribing to your newsletter? Is it successful podcasts? Is it being asked to be a guest on another author's podcast? Is it being able to book signings? Is it being asked to give talks? Is it publishing two or more books per year? What exactly allows you to feel successful? 

I see success as being able to sit down and write consistently, to have a fluid story line and interesting characters, and to have a finished product that is as well written as it can be, without typo's or grammatical errors. Newsletters, social media, blogs, podcasts, marketing - this bogs me down, it doesn't make me feel successful. Amount of books sold (and money made)? To me, this is an end product of having written an interesting book.

I write every day (with no set number of words or pages that I need to accomplish), I allow myself to be creative (I can always go back and edit), I write about things that interest me (which is why my mysteries will have a tendency to include metaphysical side-roads), and I set my own personal deadlines. The deadlines can always be extended, but if I find myself doing that too often, I have to admit that I just might not be interested in the project at all. I also set goals for my writing, and make an effort to meet them. 

I recognize that for me other people will be part of my success - of what makes me feel successful. Some of these people will be people that I bounce ideas off of. Some will be people that I can use as reliable resources - I have three individuals in mind for my WIP. One individual is a pilot that owns his own airline. He can help me make sure that a small but important part of my WIP (flying in and out of private airports) will be accurate. Two more individuals are people that I am going to ask to be Beta readers. I need people that function in the writing world, but also understand the metahysical world. 

As an author - how do you define success?

(c) July 2018 Bonnie Cehovet

Reproduction prohibited without written permission from the author.