One of the most disconcerting realities of becoming a published author is that you MUST use social media to market your work. I didn’t believe this at first. Writers of old didn’t have to do this! I thought the people who whispered this must certainly be wrong. Or crazy. Then two years ago I attended my first writers’ conference.
Stunned and appalled, I listened to a prominent agent say, “No one will read your manuscript if you don’t have at least a blog and connection through some form of social media.”
What! I came home and began to blog. I’ve posted every week since, now twice a week.
But social media is a different beast. A writer needs a contemplative life to produce words that flow from deep thoughts. Social media and contemplation are not friends. Frenzy and constant interaction do not allow introspection.
The internet-driven world also brings us face to face with the conundrum of motive.
Why do I check the feed so often? Am I an attention grabber? Is this shameless self-promotion? Am I a people-pleaser? What are my motives? Am I sinning? A believer must sift through their motives.
My publisher is promoting a competition between two options for my novel’s front cover. I’ve been tweeting the dickens out of it. On Facebook and Google+, I’ve been publishing explanations of the voting process. When people vote and the numbers move, I hasten back to tweet and post again, trying to gain an accurate assessment of which cover works.
Click here to Tweet and you’ll contribute to my tweet bombardment.
With all this crazed activity, there has been no time for contemplation. This cannot be the norm if I want to write. I’m pondering a strategy.
In the morning, if I turn on my computer and open any form of social media, my quiet hours are gobbled up. I must resist a quick peek at the novel-cover competition, a hurried check of my blog’s readership, and a sneaky look at my Facebook page’s likes and comments.
I must cease and desist. I must exercise self-control. All of this is a problem, because I must turn on the computer. I study online on Logos and esvonline.org.
Ella’s Dad via Compfight
I write bible studies and biblical fiction. For me, it is imperative that I spend a large portion of my morning in God’s word. How can I write about him and his words if I’m not intimately connected and driven by them, if his thoughts have not permeated my mind with light and truth? God’s word is the fuel for the day, the powerhouse behind my words, and the soothing balm for my soul.
When I’m face to face with God, I can check my motives. I can ask: Has my social-media checking slipped from a work requirement to ego stroking, bruised-sense-of-self-worth assuaging, or people-pleaser medicating?
Jesus is the only solution to those needs. He keeps my ego in check. He repairs my heart wounds. He poured out his blood for me. I am his, and he is mine. His opinion is the only one that matters. Once I’ve met with him, gaining power from his words and the knowledge of him, I am healed and balanced. I gain self-control and godly wholeness in him.
No matter what your line of work, time with Jesus restores.
In the morning, I pause before him with bent head and bowed heart, combing through the Greek or Hebrew, analyzing the passage, digging through my deceptive and fragile heart, ascertaining my needs, and placing all before him. Then I wait and listen to his voice.
If I do this before I face the social media monster, all is well. If I don’t, it’s a back-and-forth battle all day. How about you? Are you managing the beast?
P hotos: Creation Swap.com Bottom photo: aaronburden,sweethourofprayer,creationswap.com
So true! I have thought about this irony several times during the past few months of having to check and feeling strange about so much attention being on me. I’m getting ready to release my book tomorrow and have struggled with the constant checking of social media. Thanks for writing from the heart. God must be over and in all of our social media for it to be truly profitable and worthy. Love reading your blogs. Would love to hear more feedback as to how others handle this, as well.
Thanks for sharing, Susan. Congrats on your book release TOMORROW! I bet it is a frenzy for you today. How we long for the old days when the author lived a quiet and contemplative life, while the publisher did all the marketing. But, alas, we live now! Therefore, God will enable us to rise to this challenge, hold fast to him, and find the quiet to think. But, we’ll have to swim against the current and constantly assess our hearts to do it. All by his grace!
Starting with prayer is so important!
Absolutely! Guidance, clarity, wisdom, direction, yieldedness, plot untanglings. True. 🙂
Even if one is not an author, as I am not, it is imperative that the priorities be kept in order. I find that if I don’t go straight from the breakfast dishes to my quiet time–for contemplating on the 1000 gifts that God has given me, for studying His Word, for prayer and listening–the day will be off to the wrong kind of start! Today, I stopped to water the garden first, thinking how good it would be to get the watering done before the sun got hot on it. I could not then get the time I needed for making my spirit quiet before God, and I soon found myself wounded and angry at my husband for the silliest thing. So I fled to my quiet place and soon realized that Satan was indeed lurking around like a hungry lion seeking whom he could devour. We had both fallen into his trap. How I hate what the curse has done! So lookin’ forward to the New Heaven and the New Earth!
Yes! No matter your line of work, time with Jesus, and the prioritizing of it, is essential!
This was so much fun to read – I love it when a post makes me giggle – and the idea of a “contribute to my tweet bombardment” did just that.
But I know where you are coming from. I have been talking about finding my balance on my own website – because it is so easy to get sucked up into the stuff of the world.
You have it right – focus on Jesus and the rest will work itself out.
Thank you for sharing.
Thanks, Kathryn! It’s nice to have other authors alongside while we pick our way through a crazy world that requires us to bombard our fellowman with odd little missives called “tweets”! Good grief!