Invisible AND Impactful
I’ve read books that I love, love, love and keep re-reading.
I’ve read books that are meh. After I’m done, they sit on my shelf and that’s that.
I’ve read books that, well, I never finished reading.
Don’t we all want to write a book that falls into the first category?
Sure. But your “love-love-love” pile may look vastly different than mine. And your discard pile may have some of my favourites in it.
So how in the world are you supposed to navigate every reader’s whims and desires in their writing taste?
Obviously you can’t. You focus on your ideal reader. Aim to reach one person. That’s it. It’s not a plan to overwhelming financial success, but, then, most plans in the writing life aren’t. 🙂 But it is a plan to feeling successful. Knowing you’ve made an impact on one person’s life is huge. It’s worth it.
But here’s the catch: you may never know who that one person is. I have only twice in my life told an author directly how much their books impacted me. And that’s because I had the opportunity to meet them in person. All the other authors whose books moved me don’t have any idea how their stories impacted me.
Just because they don’t know that, though, doesn’t make their books any less valuable.
As a writer, your impact may feel invisible. But invisible doesn’t mean it’s not real.