Two New Years' Resolutions Every Writer Should Make. Plus: Pitch club is back!
Pro-subscribers get free access to the pitching power hour on Jan 2.
Happy (almost!) New Year, my friends
This is going to be your best year yet. You know why? Because you are going to make the following resolutions.
1.) You are going to do whatever it takes to get your invoicing game in order.
Minor things (like the insane annoyance of every publication having their own finicky payment form) and major things (like a deep seating reluctance to ask for money, even though you’ve earned it and the fee is already well established) can play a role in making invoicing a bothersome process. Unfortunately, it’s through this bothersome process that all writers get paid and you know why it’s important to get paid? Nachos, that’s why. They just don’t give nachos away, folks. You need cold hard cash to buy them and if that isn’t motivation enough to get your invoicing system down pat, I don’t know what is!
All joking aside (….. as if nachos are a joking matter), you are the best doctor for your financial health. Whether you need to establish a routine to make invoicing more pleasant (perhaps you do it every Friday while enjoying a treat at the pretty neighbourhood coffee shop) or you need an accountability partner to keep you on track, I guarantee you will never, ever regret anything you do to make invoicing more easier and more efficient.
2.) You will emulate the elegant patience of Jane Goodall.
Poor Dr. Goodall. First, she had to spend considerable time sitting on the forest floor, waiting for primates to do something interesting (like, hurry up and demonstrate that you can use sticks as tools already). Then when she heads into London for conferences to present papers and request grants, she had to deal with something even more tedious and smelly: Boorish academics who said things like “So you’re still into those monkeys, eh?”
She’s been dealing with people (ugh!) for nearly seventy years of research. But does she give them what they rightly deserve (mainly, to fling poop at them, just like any self-respecting primate would do)? No. She just gets on doing what she does best, scientific research and advocacy that changes the world.
This is who we need to emulate when we’re at the New Year’s party and your cousin’s boyfriend asks, with his mouth full of your homemade cheese dip, “So, have you written anything I might have read?” While we want to say “I didn’t know you could read”, we must instead say something very mysterious and intriguing like “Oh, my clients are very discrete” and follow it up with “Did you know you have cheese dip on your face?”
Likewise, when Great Uncle Blahblahblah says “So you still doing that writing thing?”, you do not respond with defensiveness, letting him raise your hackles as you hastily list your recent awards and accolades. A simple ‘Yes indeed” is sufficient. And then walk away to steal what’s left of the cheese dip.
Be it resolved that we will NOT allow people’s ignorance and uncouthness to affect us in any way whatsoever other than it being fodder for a scathing caricature in a future novella. Dr. Goodall didn’t waste her time on man-apes and neither do you. You do not have to defend your work, your industry, or your life choices. You just need to protect the cheese dip.
Will I see you in at the Pitching Power Hour on January 2nd?
On the first Tuesday of every month, I hope you’ll join me at 9:00 AM EST for a pitching power hour. This is an accountability group. We’ll log onto Zoom together, say a few brief words about what we’re working on, and then get on with the task at hand: Tackling those tough pitches as we work together, in silence and solidarity. Then at 9:55 or so, we’ll quickly share how our work went and then get on with our day!
During December’s session, one member had FOUR pitches accepted within a day. AMAZING!
This is a perk for paid members. If you’re on the fence, send me a note at VanessaChiasson@gmail.com and I can send you the Zoom info for January 2nd’s session so you can try things out and see if it’s your thing.
Happy New Year!
Vanessa
Keep reading with a 7-day free trial
Subscribe to The Clothesline by Vanessa Chiasson to keep reading this post and get 7 days of free access to the full post archives.