I read this week that there are two reasons why birds fly in formation. One is to conserve energy—the bird in the front of the formation typically breaks the air and forms a slipstream for the others—and the second is to facilitate orientation and communication among the birds.
We’re not all that far off from these birds, us writers. I’ve talked before about how a friend of mine wrote for The New York Times many years ago, breaking the air and creating a slipstream into which many of us fell, too. And I’ve also talked about the effect your writing community can have on you. If everyone around you is talking about what a difficult industry it is, how hard it is to make money, of course you’re going to believe it as well. But start surrounding yourself with people who are not only making good money, but loving their work and living the life they want, and suddenly your perspective shifts, things that seemed unimaginable before start becoming possible.
I started talking about making a six-figure income last year. I ran the numbers and trying to earn $8,300 from my home in India seemed like a stretch, even for ambitious old me. It seemed like a humongous number.
But I kept talking about it, both online and off, I kept running numbers, I kept figuring out ways and means by which that number could become more attainable, and most importantly, I started reading blogs about and from people who were easily crossing the six-figure mark regularly each year. Less than a year later, the $100,000 number doesn’t seem so big to me any more. In fact, just this week, I got two assignments at $1 a word, tipping me over the halfway mark for this month.
It’s a mental shift, and that mental shift never happens on its own. It requires the help and the guidance of other people. People who have been there and faced the challenges you’re facing with your writing today.
I’ve been thinking about community a lot in the last few months because I realized that for someone like me, a writer and journalist who is globally-minded and interested in writing about the world but also in being paid exceptionally well for it, there is a not a single place on the Internet that serves my exact needs. It’s a large part of the reason I separated The International Freelancer from my personal website. I want to create that community. I want to run those experiments. I want to provide those answers.
Repeatedly on the 30 Days, 30 Queries Facebook page, writers talk about finally finding the community of writers and journalists who are interested in writing about the world and are not interested in spitting out corporate brochures or writing copy for small businesses. There are a lot of people who will tell you that the only way to make money with writing these days is to write five blog posts a week and I am proof that this is simply not true. My students of the 30 Days, 30 Queries course are proof that this is not true. TWO 30 Days, 30 Queries students have stories in the current edition of Marie Claire (US edition) this month. To say I’m proud would be a massive understatement.
Journalism is flourishing. Writing is flourishing. People are reading and consuming more than ever before. I think it’s time for us to join forces and create a community of international writers who break the air and chatter loudly enough for the formation to have impact.
Are you in?