A Question To All The Creative People Out There Who Publish Their Work

[DocHoliday]

My current situation is that I just finished writing a book that I was working on for the past 3 years. Now I'm in the process of reading through it all again for the last time before the final version gets published and printed and so on.

I've never before published or released anything else that I will profit from financially, so I'm very concerned about the quality of the book and the final product in general. I really want it to turn out as good as possible because I wouldn't want to make people waste their hard earned money and I also wouldn't want my reputation to be ruined in the form of people remembering me as the horrendous author who just wrote a bunch of crap and basically scammed people into buying his expensive book.

So, my actual question is: Do you also sometimes wonder whether what you created and are about to publish is actually not even worthy of being published/released and/or sold in the first place? Do you also occasionally have certain doubts about your own credibility and the quality of your work?

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Now, don't get me wrong, I'm definitely going to publish this book and let it be printed eventually, no matter what. It's just that I have this strange feeling that whatever I do to improve it further and further, it will never be good enough and that, therefore, people will somehow judge it as bad writing.

Are some of you able to relate to this? If so, how do you deal with it or have dealt with it in the past? And what results did you get by publishing your work?

Edited August 27, 2019 by DocHoliday

[Jamie Universe]

I've maybe had a little of this experience before, but my advice is make the choice that will make you happy. Which in this case is accepting the fact and reality that it could be crap, of course it might not be, but have realistic expectations so that if it is bad, you don't give up on writing forever, stop trying to improve, or get bummed out. 

[eleveneleven]

2 hours ago, DocHoliday said:

So, my actual question is: Do you also sometimes wonder whether what you created and are about to publish is actually not even worthy of being published/released and/or sold in the first place? Do you also occasionally have certain doubts about your own credibility and the quality of your work?

--------------------------------------------------------

Now, don't get me wrong, I'm definitely going to publish this book and let it be printed eventually, no matter what. It's just that I have this strange feeling that whatever I do to improve it further and further, it will never be good enough and that, therefore, people will somehow judge it as bad writing.

Are some of you able to relate to this? If so, how do you deal with it or have dealt with it in the past? And what results did you get by publishing your work?

Yeah, I used to feel that way a lot. Nowadays, I still do sometimes, but it diminishes with experience--not really with skill per se, just with the experience of getting used to people consuming my work.

The truth is that you will never be "good enough" because different people will get different kinds of value from your work. Some will think it sucks no matter what; others will think it's a masterpiece no matter what. It's all very relative. There is no such thing as "perfect," and in fact you can make money creating relatively unpolished works that people will still greatly appreciate (especially if it's a niche thing they can't find anywhere else).

A lot of writers are paralyzed for years, obsessing about the merit of every word they write and hiding their work from people because they are afraid of judgment. A lot of writers think that it's unethical to sell anything less than "perfect." But this is just pedestalizing ones work. These writers are the ones that rarely or never produce a finished work that anyone can enjoy in the real world.

You will be judged for your work no matter what, by all kinds of people with all kinds of ridiculous standards. None of it is objective (even your own opinion). None of it has any ground to it. The work will never be above criticism (no matter how much you "improve" it) because people will both love and criticize anything for any reason.

Think of a recent book (especially fiction) that a lot of people think is crap, but that sold well anyway. (For an extreme example, let's consider 50 Shades of Grey or some chick literature like that.) Why did it sell well? Was it because people were "tricked" into buying an inferior product? No, it's because a lot of people like that sort of thing and so they happily paid for it knowing full well what it was. It didn't matter that other people made fun of it; the people who don't like it aren't the target audience and would not have bought it anyway.

People don't buy a book because it is perfect or the author is a genius; they buy because they're into the subject. As long as it's readable (not full of typos and other obvious mistakes that take the reader out of the zone) and it appeals to the target audience, don't worry about it. If you're concerned about ripping people off, then set the expectation of what they're getting ahead of time. Offer samples of your work. Be very clear, so there's no question about what they're getting. As long as you're clear and you give the audience what they expected, what does it matter how "good" the work is?

You will naturally improve over time. That basically takes care of itself, so don't worry about it too much. My advice: Write the work, edit it to a reasonable degree, and then put it out there as fast as possible, so that you can move onto the next one. Don't get too attached to a single work. Keep moving, keep improving. If it sucks, it sucks. See it through to reasonable completion and polish, then move on.

Don't put your work on a pedestal or it will be hard to improve. Ideally, you will eventually view people reading your work as something mundane. This takes time and acclimation, though. Beware of the impulse to be perfectionist, which is really just fear of judgment in disguise.

Good luck.

[DocHoliday]

@eleveneleven Thanks a lot for your elaborate reply!:) There was a lot of helpful stuff in there that was nice to read for me right now.

My biggest concern is not actually beong criticized or judged for that matter, but it's failing to live up to the responsibility of not misinforming people about what they will read in my book, so that they don't get any wrong ideas about the topics etc. But I guess I just have to have more trust in that reagrd because I always did my very best to present the topics as clear and understandable as possible, even though that may just be so in my mind. 

I think it will all be a lot clearer when I get some people to test-read it all. That's very likely going to give me the certainty I need that I can't give myself exclusively from my own perspective. Because, sure, from my point of view, it's absoltely perfect. But I just gotta be sure that that's not self-bias and all...