Nearly every day, I find myself thinking about ways to get people to read my writing. I tell myself to update the design, start a newsletter, tweet more, or optimize SEO. I say to myself, “If only I spent more time on those, then I would be successful.” Maybe I have to wait and get lucky.
It is easy to think about these things. I can read endlessly about workflows, tools, optimizations, and success stories. They distract me from thinking about the effort needed to write.
There is one solution to getting more people to read my writing: writing more.
The problems with my writing are solved by writing more. I pretend like I have published a large amount, but I am lying to myself. There are plenty of people who publish an article every day that is better than anything I have written.
I have a long list of excuses I have told myself:
- My writing isn’t good. It will get better as long as a keep publishing.
- People aren’t reading my writing. The more I write, the more likely someone will read it.
- I don’t have a good niche to focus on. The focus will come over time.
- I don’t want to waste my audience’s time. People who think it was a waste of time will forget instantly, and there is someone out there who doesn’t think it is a waste of time.
It is more fun to think about a new project than it is to grind one towards completion. Starting something new is the path of least resistance, it is cheating. I know that writing is a battle with my mind. If I don’t take the action to write and publish, I never will.
Trust the process. The readership will take care of itself.
Ian Vanagas 