HOW TO NOT GIVE UP (?)

One year ago this week, my first nonfiction book came out. While I had co-written two YA novels before, this release was different. I felt that once-in-a-writer’-lifetime sense that I had stumbled upon an idea that hadn’t been fully done before. An entire book that looked solely at the intersection of romantic relationships and mental health? Following a pandemic that exacerbated both areas of people’s lives? I couldn’t wait to hit the bestseller list and get featured on Good Morning America. My time had come after what felt like years of a steady decline in my career. And then…nothing changed.

When I say “nothing” I say it with a grain of salt and a negativity bias. I know that a lot of people read my book and I know that, for at least some of those people, it was incredibly helpful and maybe even game changing. Big picture, this is what matters the most. But when it comes to my day-to-day as a writer and creator, I can’t say it wasn’t incredibly disappointing. To make it all worse, I would poke at my wound by following other authors on Twitter whose books were getting glowing reviews from huge outlets. I monitored adaptation announcements while every network I pitched my mental health focused dating reality show to passed on the idea. I saw in real time as people’s lives transformed after publication, while mine stayed exactly the same. If not a little worse because if Overthinking About You--a book I gave my heart and juiciest personal details to--wasn’t good enough to propel me into a new level of success, what the hell would be?

At this point in my career, it’s difficult to not feel like I missed my moment. Back in my 20’s, I had success after success without fully realizing the rarity of my situation. I took it for granted that if I could sell four TV shows to a network, I could sell a fifth one. But that hasn’t happened (yet). We’re taught that as we get older, we are meant to hit higher and higher levels of achievement. That this is the natural progression of a life well-lived and worked. Just this past week, as I was creating a registry for my wedding at Bloomingdale’s the woman helping us said she often tells couples who live in small apartments with queen beds to still register for a lot of large stuff and king sheets because eventually they will live somewhere bigger and nicer. I bit my tongue even though I wanted to scream, “IN THIS ECONOMY??!!!” My heart hurt for all the people who have unused king sheets in their closet waiting for a day that might never come.

It is mentally and emotionally draining to live in a constant state of hope. I don’t want to give up on my dreams of getting to work in TV or sell another (more widely bought) book. As I write this blog, I currently have one TV show with a production company attached and one novel out for submission to a variety of potential editors. I know that I could get a call at any moment that could change the trajectory of my life. I also know I might never get a call at all because bad news always comes in an email. I’m not sure if it is better to be optimistic or to assume the worst and then be pleasantly surprised. While I don’t normally engage in magical thinking, this conundrum has gotten me so unsettled, I’ve found my brain worried that if I don’t think positively about my novel’s future somehow my own thoughts will negatively impact the outcome? And for someone with OCD this is a dangerous slope to go down.

What I’m realizing, yet again, is that I need to learn how to hold two things at once. I need to learn how to hold onto my dreams while not being so acutely tied to them working out. I have to remove the critic in my head who says that if I don’t get what I want I am a big failure who should have never bothered to try in the first place and replace that voice with someone who see the value in trying at all. I can strive to walk a middle ground where my financial security is not solely tied to creative pursuits without giving them up all together. I can also start to redefine my idea of successful. Because I don’t need to be a household name or have my book or podcast written up in a bunch of lists in order for the people who do engage with my work to be meaningful. As the song says, “I'd rather be nine people's favorite thing than a hundred people's ninth favorite thing.” (Even though I’d argue being someone’s ninth favorite is still a pretty big deal. There are so many things out there!)

As my pub date anniversary approaches, I am going to try to focus on all the good the book has done and not all the ways it fell short of my dreams. I’m going to post about it and encourage people to buy it, share it and review it. I don’t know if this kind of marketing will have any kind of sizable impact, but I am going to do it anyway because--even if the world didn’t notice--I wrote something I’m really proud of that I think can help people.

I also won’t beat myself up if I feel waves of disappointment from time to time. It takes a lot of energy to maintain hope and sometimes I don’t have enough of it in me. There are going to be days when I feel anger or sadness that I am not getting the results I so desperately want. To not feel those things would mean I have reached a level of Zen that is hard to come by. Punishing myself for being human isn’t going to help the problem. All I can do is hold on even when the waves of rejection and disappointment hit me so hard I start to want to give in and float away. And maybe one day I will do that. But for now, I’m going to keep going until I want to stop.

Xoxo,

Allison

P.S. It would mean a lot to me if you hit the like button to increase chances of engagement! Also, if you are able to upgrade to paid subscriber or share my posts with a potential reader, I would be incredibly thankful! One of my main goals is to grow this thing so I have to post things like this even though they make me uncomfortable!

P.P.S. In the theme of being uncomfortable, here is a link to that book I kept talking about. Also, if you’ve read it (and liked it), it would be so awesome if you left a review!