I’ve spent my morning daydreaming and planning how I am going to share my book Rainbows Over Ruins when it is published. The prospect of reaching out to others has been looming over my head for months. With only a few items in the editorial notes left to address, this could be happening within a very short time frame. Of course, it’s also part of my work in television. We are always asking questions about developing an audience. What I have been learning is that building an audience for a network program and building one for a personal project is surprisingly similar.
First, finding our audience is a natural outgrowth of creativity. At some point in our creative process, we are going to want to share our creations. This is especially true if you make multiple items that require storage, if you want to move a project along in order to make room for new ideas, if you need additional resources in order to continue to create, or want to recoup the costs of what you have already done. It helps to know what you ultimately want from your creativity.
In my case, after a landslide destroyed our home, I became fascinated by the creative process and the power of the mind, especially when I saw that my own steps to rebuild paralleled the process involved. I set out to describe it. What happened to me next led to greater depths of understanding than I expected as each step was revealed and the corresponding life lesson learned. I believe the information contained in the story I tell can improve people’s lives.
Was I thinking about sharing the story when I set out to implement the idea of writing a book? Of course, it was in the back of my mind when I started to write, however, as I got inspired with the project and working through all the details involved in order to see my vision come to life as a published book, how to share wasn’t front and center.
It is now. Once I have a box of books on my dining room table, what am I going to do with it? I’ve been reading and now have scraps of paper, pages in my notebooks and white boards of information designed to help me create a plan to raise awareness of my book so that people will know it exists. All this study has provided me the basics to know what to do. What remains is to activate my willingness to make it so.
It’s a little daunting as I begin to introduce myself to strangers and share what is a very personal journey through the creative process. Yet each time someone comes up to me to ask me a question or tell me how much they are looking forward to reading Rainbows Over Ruins, I feel better. And it feels good to be able to encourage others to share their creative projects as they see me going through the experience as well. Each conversation is helping me realize who needs what I have to offer and I’m glad – and grateful – that they are willing to share that with me.
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