"Has your book been successful?"
It's a question I get asked regularly these days when I tell strangers that I am a writer। And I'm never quite sure how to respond. I could say, "No. It has sold less than 2,000 copies," and that would be a true (although a bit of a conversation stopping) response. Numbers never lie, right?
I guess it all depends on my notion of success. If it's based on book contracts and royalties and bestseller lists, by all measures, my writing career so far is an utter failure. But if it's based on whether I learned to write stories, with dialogue and themes and a cogent plotline and characters... if it's based on taking risks, working hard, telling a story as truthfully and carefully and beautifully as I know how... if it's based on the relationships that have grown out of that story, if it's based on the responses of readers who have been blessed by the story... well, then, yes, it has been a success.
Flannery O'Connor, my current muse, wrote to a writer friend of hers, "You do not write the best you can for the sake of the art but for the sake of returning your talent increased to the invisible God to use or not use as he sees fit" (The Habit of Being, 419). She also wrote, "When you write a novel, if you have been honest about it and if your conscience is clear, then it seems to me that you have to leave the rest in God's hands. When the book leaves your hands, it belongs to God. He may use it to save a few souls or to try a few others, but I think that for the writer to worry about this is to take over God's business" (The Habit of Being, 143).
What's true of writing is true of any other good endeavor. Fill in the blank... "When you are a parent and your child goes to college, if you have been honest about it and your conscience is clear, then it seems to me that you have to leave the rest in God's hands..." "When you teach a class..." "When you design a building..." "When you clean a kitchen..." "When you..."
I want to measure success by the honesty of my labor and the clearness of my conscience and the desire to trust that the labor has been handed over as an offering. What happens next--whether it be considered success or failure--that's up to God.
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7 comments:
Those are great thoughts. I'm currently working on the first draft of my very first novel, something I've dreamed of doing for years. Whether or not it's "successful", just the fact of finishing it will have changed me as a writer forever. God never wastes what He teaches us, so I'm confident that He has a purpose in putting the wind under my wings to get this thing written. And what does worldly success matter in the light of that?
Love this post. I find myself enthusiastically telling a new acquaintance about what I "do" (write about 22 hours a week) and later wonder why I talk about my work with such enthusiasm, why I feel so successful. I have yet to make a dime off my writing. I won't see royalties from my current book contract until Fall 2012--and they are likely to be modest. I am getting things published, but all are unpaid.
I feel successful because I am doing what I love, doing it well (most of the time) and reaching people with my words. My dad was a college professor and his work and his life were one and the same. His work was (still is, though he is retired) so much a part of who he was that, though it could be stressful, he didn't separate his life into the "fun/leisure" part and the "work/drudgery" part. I always wondered if I'd find work like that. And now I have. I hope someday to make some money at it--enough to pay for summer camp or go out for an anniversary dinner without hyperventilating--but I already consider myself a success, because I am as certain as a human can be that writing is God's call for me.
Just what I needed to hear today, Amy Julia. The term 'success' is such a a tough one and we so often look to the material world to write the definition of success for us. Thanks for your words, yet again.
I needed to read this, this morning!
This post was helpful to me. Thank you, Julia. I consider my blog self-published and successful in the same way that you consider your book. "by all measures, my writing career so far is an utter failure." Me as well. Barbara
Hi everyone,
I'm so glad this post was received by you all. Sometimes when I talk about, or write about, the "lack of success" I've had in writing, people pat me on the shoulder and say, "no, dear, you're wonderful." But that's not the point at all, and you all get it. Thank you for your affirmation and I'm glad we're in it together. To the glory of God.
Amy Julia
I'm late in saying this, but want to say that I love this, Amy Julia. It's so spot on!
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