Writing for Publication > Writing for Self?

If the music industry has taught us anything it’s that artists should be artists and the CEO’s should stick to CEO’ing. But, these days everybody and their grandmother must be a better marketer than their own marketing team. That’s fair. (sarcasm) But really, no one is going to be as passionate for the success of your product than you. It’s your baby. To most everyone else it’s just some smelly kid with cheese doodle fingers.

Yeah. Cute. Just don’t touch me.

If the business minded truly knew what customers wanted, every product would sell like cotton socks. Mainstream blockbusters wouldn’t exist because everything would be a blockbuster. And if the creative minded knew exactly what their audience wanted then they would have some kind of an audience, big or small, once they put themselves out into the ether.

So whom should you listen to: yourself or the experts? Should you write for publication or for artistic merit? You Internets love pros and cons. Check these out:

Writing for Publication

• Pros: Better chance at getting published. Better chance at becoming a bestseller.
• Cons: Soulless and less likely to be the most fulfilling

Writing for Yourself

• Pros: Less chance at getting published and becoming a bestseller
• Cons: Soulful and more likely to be most fulfilling

I have news for you. The above pros and cons are both false. No matter which you write for, publication or for yourself, there is equal opportunity to get published and still feel fulfilled in your life—and to also fail at those things.

But how does one write for publication anyway? In any other art forms the artist attempts “greatness”. That’s usually how they get noticed in the first place. People bear witness to the “greatness” and latch on.

Honorable mention: Great Balls of Fire

A million dollar recording contract may be the (unlikely to be achieved) goal of a musician, but the best road to MTV Cribs is to be at least somewhat talented or get enough people to recognize and vouch for what you have to offer.

A writer must tell a “great” story regardless of the skill level. Do that and you win. And “great” is surrounded by quotations because it is always, always, always subjective. Scientists have yet to be able to put “great” in a lab, observe it and reproduce it. Thus, there are zero predictions that are useful to determine whether or not something will be “great”.

Taking advice only from those you highly respect is most advisable. But the best any of us can do is make educated guesses based on past experience. You can’t really count on anything except your God given (or Darwinian evolved) instincts.

Subjectivity is the reason why some people don’t even recognize “great” when they see it (as many an Agent has been told by many a rejected writer). And why some people disagree with greatness bestowed onto a piece by the masses (as many a bestselling Author has been told via Amazon reviews). Yet, sometimes a creation is a true pile of dung and everybody who comes in contact with it recognizes it for the planet of garbage that it is (fortunately for mankind, those vampires never see the light of day). While, sometimes a creation is such a piece of holy crap that it automatically gets elevated to greatness by its sheer hilarity (insert unintentionally funny YouTube clip here.) And sometimes the book really is great, everybody stands and applauds and it makes the bestsellers list deservedly.

An agent/publisher/reader falling in love with your writing is out of your hands and totally in theirs. You have a few choices: (a) Go insane constantly ruminating over the whole thing or (b) Accept the chaotic nature of the universe and enjoy the act of writing.

Only you can determine which is of greater cost to you. Option B will at least keep you sane enough to appreciate the solid gold mansion you’ll buy for your mom when you top the charts.

Popularity: 31% [?]