Author Journey | Journal Entry 06
When your own family has only recently started reading your blog. And your own friends don't buy their annual guide.
When people request the annual guides for their family members and then ghost you when you message them that the PDF is ready for instant download. And the people who do get their annual guide, let you know they didn't read it.
When you ask your feng shui clients for feedback on their annual guides and get ZERO response. And then the only feedback are typos (much appreciated), complaints about the too numerous "quotes and cliches" and general statements like, "so much information" and "super comprehensive".
I can't even give my annual guides away for free. Clients and friends have politely declined to receive a complimentary copy of their personal element's annual energy guide in exchange for their feedback as a beta reader.
Translation? If the people who know me aren't interested, there's probably not an audience for this body of work. And honestly, I'm fine with that.
I'm doing this writing project for me. And sharing it with anyone who resonates with The 8 Elements™ and who takes the time to read.
I'm doing this for who I will become in the process of writing about what I've observed and discovered.
I'm doing this to articulate and share my awareness of the personal feng shui elements.
I'm not doing this for the money. When I got laid off in 2015, my former employer falsely assumed I'd magically get a literary agent and book deal, publish my book and somehow live off the advance and royalties from book sales. The public, not aware of the way the publishing industry works, are naive. While great fortune can be found for some who already have a household name, for most, there's usually very little money in being an author. With traditional publishing, even if you have a great manuscript, unless you already have a huge fan base, large social media following and minimum 5 figure email list, and have a trendy book that will become a commercial success and bestseller, they won't sign you. And if you choose to self-publish, unless you spend a lot of time and money on marketing strategies, you're lucky if a few hundred people buy your book, including family and friends and their social networks.
I'm not doing this to be famous. I am a very private person. I have no interest in being a public figure or celebrity author. This website is not daraeden.com because The 8 Elements™ is not about me. It's about YOU!
Writing is a labor of love. With my process, it's slow and cyclical as I work my way along the spiral path. And with my commitment to embodying the elements, it's all consuming and highly disruptive to my personal life.
The reward is in doing the work. And like a woman's work, it's never done. There's always more to learn and more to say. Always more areas and ways to apply the principles of feng shui to our personal energy and relationship dynamics.
Every day is Labor Day for me. Whether it's a weekly blog, monthly update or annual guide, organizing my notes in Notion or working on chapters in Scrivener, I'm writing every day. Or rather, every night until 3am. Thinking is hard work and writing is very labor intensive. Arranging ideas into themes, thoroughly researching aspects of each element and then articulating my thoughts to the best of my ability, feels like going into labor every evening.
Labor is the process of opening that happens before the act of giving birth. It's the work a woman does to prepare for pushing her baby out of her body and into her arms. And these birth pangs only begin when the baby is ready to leave the womb and enter into the world. Pre-term labor can result in complications, the most significant being a baby born prematurely. So, timing and trusting the process is everything.
As a Water element, my work has been held in the unnatural state of perpetual utero. Writing is the focused and sometimes excruciating work of breathing through each contraction. And sharing my author's journey through these journal entry blogs, is the opening that has to happen before I publish and finally give birth to this body of work and at last hold it in my hands. But not before it's ready.
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