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[DIGEST] Will you do it, though?
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Hi friends,
I feel like I’ve hit a deep nerve last week, so I’m going to tell you the #1 productivity hack when it comes to author growth…
…will you do it, though?
Every single time you see something come along, the #1 way to know if it will help is whether you will do it.
If it’s a perfect stategy you won’t do…then it’s actually terrible.
If it’s awkward and clunky, but you’ll actually do it without burning out…then you should do it.
…ooooh, did you notice how I added something there.
…without burning out.
Burning out means a lot of things, but what I mean by it is whether the effort you expend will more than replenish itself before your energy depletes.
That might be monetary, or social, or mental, or just about anything. You can train yourself to do more, or different things, but right now, this minute, you might not have space for a thing, and need to create some.
A candle will go on forever if you keep providing a wick for it to burn. It will burn twice as fast if you burn a candle on both ends.
There are so many things that I want to do, but will never do, so I either hire for those things, plan how to make space for them, or move on from them.
It literally doesn’t matter if it’s the greatest idea in the world, if you don’t have space, can’t make space, or don’t want to make space for it, you should just move on for it.
Productivity is really about doing less things that move you along more than it is doing things faster. Once you know what’s for you, this whole game gets way easier.
If you want to share how you are doing this week, then there are two ways to interact with this post.
1 - If you don’t want to say anything, or bristle at identifying yourself, then you can reply with this nifty poll.
2 - If you’re feeling very brave, then reply below and tell us how you are doing right now on a scale from 1-5.
NEW KICKSTARTER IS LIVE: We launched the Kickstarter for my first NSFW comic, Death’s Kiss, with our publisher Laguna Studios!
She was born of death, and it was only through death that she could survive. As the last of her kind, she was forced to walk the shadows of the world, stepping into the light only when she must claim a new soul.
It was a simple existence, yet she never wanted more. Until she saw him, and somehow he saw her too. The impossibility of their connection drew her closer, and soon she found herself wishing she was more than just a waif condemned to live apart from humanity.
For centuries she merely existed, but now she longed to live. Can she escape what she was to find who she's truly meant to be?
One of the coolest perks this campaign is that we’re hosting a live workshop all about how to turn a novel or short story into a comic where I’ll outline my process for comic book translations.
WHAT WE WROTE ON SUBSTACK: This week, I showed you how to you build an email sequence for a book launch.
Plus, helped you find your writing peers and explores the domestic maid trope in The Housemaid.
My mother would say I was a damned fool for working with the government, but I had been a fool for less than ten million dollars before—a lot less.
I could have entered Hell by myself, of course; gotten out of the underground prison, found the gateway, and entered the Hellmouth. But the government drones that captured us seemed to have all sorts of information we didn’t have about the layout of Hell, a team of soldiers to accompany us, and plenty of tech that would make entering Hell much easier than if we were going to do it ourselves.
Of course, going with them meant we wouldn’t be able to sneak around like we could if it were just the two of us. In exchange for treating this like a paramilitary operation, we got access—and of course, ten million dollars, half of which had already been wired into my offshore accounts, as confirmed by Phil in a quick but terse phone call.
“It’s a bad idea,” he told me. “But perhaps it is the best idea.”
“What do you give my odds?” I asked.
“With the troops, you have a seventeen percent chance of success. Without them, that chance drops to three percent.”
All chapters of The Godsverse Chronicles are now free for all subscribers. You can read the whole series from the beginning right here.
You still only get access to a bunch of free books and stories from my back catalog by becoming a paid member. You can start your membership with a 7-day free trial.
UPCOMING ARTICLE: Next week, I ask whether you are finding arbitrage or building arbitrage in your author business.
When I first started building my career in earnest, Gary Vee was using the term “attention arbitrage” to explain what people needed to be concerned with in the then-nascent creator economy.
I’ll be honest, every time I heard that term for years my teeth started gnashing together.
That said…he was right, and I hate that he was right. Since sucking it up and accepting he was right, though, I’ve identified two ways authors can use arbitrage in their own business. It’s completely revolutionized how I think about my own efforts.
Let’s step back for a minute and talk about the way I define arbitrage. I define arbitrage as the difference, or delta, between supply and demand. When there is more demand than supply, then there is an arbitrage opportunity.
ROUNDUP: Here are some of my favorite articles of the week.
Business-y:
defends market-rate housing, builds lines not dots, and notices the Ponzi scheme of working for exposure.
finds the golden ratio between payroll and revenue, captures how the world is changing, and offers their start up startup blueprint.
states the state of engineering productivity, and bake reputation cookies, and unlocks the not-so-secret secret to retaining women in the workplace.
speculates on the next big thing in film, compliments a 60-second photographer, and lights a fire under themselves.
breaks off the KitKat methods of winning top of mind awareness, loses when all we do is win, and opts out of ambition.
Publishing-like:
outlines the midlist pyramid scheme, faces the perennial ploy of the ‘marry him’ essay, searches for women's lives around the margins of the scholarship, and starts small with creative goals.
makes a poetry comic, downshifts, got fired from the perfect writing job, and is watched by a panopticon.
plans for the future of book publishing by building communities and defining audiences, embraces all their eras, and soaks up bad advice.
cracks the bestseller code, doesn’t worry about friends reading their work, and aligns creative decisions and business decisions.
tries something new, finds the magic in connecting writers and readers, and swallows the pride and writes for the New York Times.
Subastack-esque:
stumps for a queer category on Substack, puts their CTA above the fold. gets 1,000 paid members, and slides into dms to show you how to slide into dms on Substack.
makes their great escape from the Substack button netherworld, talks sustainable Substack for beginners, and discovers video on About pages, among other upgrades.
Culture-ish:
doesn’t stay stuck forever, loves the world, and doesn’t deserve a cracked iPhone.
gives a wakeup call to narcissistic parents, wants to stop stopping the use of hipster, and can’t love without pain.
tracks shared delusion from the Glass King to QAnon, stands up for themselves, and feels the perks of being misunderstood.
has frank conversations with parents about contentious subjects, goes nuts getting mental health help, and dares not to achieve.
Lifestyle-oid:
left their heart on the moors, , travels with their mother, and won’t end up in a nursing home.
tries to cure their anxiety, is at a loss, and fixes most things with good sleep.
wants to know the worst thing about you, accidentally reads a book that changes their whole life, and feels secure saying they are insecure.
tracks their sleep data for 5 years, and know what their OCD tells them, and relates the aftermath of the four-minute mile.
Find anything you loved enough to swoon over or hated enough to make your blood boil? Let me know.
If you like what I’m doing around here and want to check out the archives, you can do that with a 7-day free trial, or simply go straight to being a paid subscriber. You also get access to my satire narrated by God, Worst Thing in the Universe.
Albert Ross is an anomaly. Karma doesn't think anything he does is wrong. It's a glitch in the universe that God can't fix. Every trillion or so births in the universe, there is a karmic anomaly.
That's not to say karma doesn't have its retribution. For every horrible act Albert Ross commits, karma punishes Vikram Suresh. Poor, sweet Vikram.
He doesn't know why his life is so horrible. He doesn't know why the universe is unkind. It's unkind because of Albert Ross.
That is the crux of the karmic anomaly. Karma thinks everything that Albert Ross does is actually carried out by Vikram Suresh. What a horrible lot in life.
That's why Vikram kills himself. It usually doesn't matter when a poor, miserable schlub dies, but this death has instant ramifications.
With his death, Karma can instantly see Albert Ross again and realizes its mistake. Like a rubber band, all the horrible things that Albert's ever done slingshot back to him at once, and God watches with glee as karma has its revenge.
Paid members can access the entire archive of this series from the beginning, along with 650+ exclusive interviews, courses, articles, and more.
If you are not a paid member, you can read everything with a 7-day free trial, or give us a one-time tip.