This post is part of the Beginner Self Publishing Course from Write Zero
This post is part of the ‘Why Do You Write’ Pillar. This is the First Pillar of the Beginner Self Publishing Course
This post on ‘Finding Your Internal Motivations’ is in three parts
- Part 1: Knowing What to Write – The Single Most Important Author Skill
- Part 2: You have to Find Your Internal Motivations if you are to find The Right Market
- Part 3: You have to Find Your Internal Motivations if you want to Succeed and Be Happy
Let’s start by jumping into the first part
Finding Your Internal Motivations – The Critical Importance of Knowing What to Write
The absolute most important skill you can develop as an Author is – Knowing What to Write
i.e. Creating The Right Product for The Right Market
i.e. Product Market Fit
We discuss this skill in an article titled Levels of Mastery – 3 Core Skills. Please read that article. It’s fine if you don’t understand all of it at the moment. The most critical takeaway from that article is
- Above all else, Knowing What to Write is the most important skill you must master as an author
Let’s look at why that is
Knowing What to Write – The Single Most Important Author Skill
Knowing What to Write is very important because
- If you don’t write what readers want to buy, you will not get sales
- If you don’t write what makes you happy, you will be unhappy
- If you write for a market that does not exist, then no matter how good your writing is, no one will buy it
- If you write the wrong book for the right market, then no matter how good your book is, no one will ever buy it
- If you write for the wrong market, or write the wrong book for the right market, then no amount of marketing can make the book a success
Everything else becomes easier if you write The Right Book for The Right Market
In fact, everything else does not even matter until you figure out
- What is the Right Market you should write for
- What is The Right Book you should write for this market
If you were to spend 50% of your time just figuring out The Right Book for The Right Market, it would still not be enough time spent on Figuring out What to Write
- Because figuring out What Market to Write For is the most important thing an Author can do
- Because figuring out What Book to Write for this Perfect Market is the second most important thing an Author can do
- Because Knowing What to Write is by far the most important skill you can develop as an author
Yes, Knowing What to Write is more important than everything else
Knowing What to Write – Far More Important than Marketing and Far More Important than Writing Quality
If you still doubt the importance of Knowing What to Write, consider that
- No matter how good your writing is, if there is no market for your book, then it cannot sell
- If there are no readers for the book, the writing quality does not matter
- No matter how good your marketing is, if readers are not looking to buy, then your book will not sell
- If there is market demand for pizza, then you have to make and sell pizza
- You could make the best cheeseburgers in the world, and do the best marketing, and still people who want pizza would not buy your cheeseburgers
On the other hand, if you find a market where people are hungry for Pizza and there is not enough supply of Pizza
- Even if your pizza is not very high quality, it will still sell a lot
- Even if you do very little marketing, it will still sell
Of course, in an ideal world you want to create a perfect scenario
- Find a market where people are hungry to eat Pizza
- Produce Pizza of Very High Quality and Produce it Consistently
- Have Excellent Marketing
However, of the three, there is no doubt which is the most important
Finding The Right Market, and then producing The Right Product for that Right Market, takes precedence over everything else
You could even make an argument that creating The Right Product for The Right Market is more important than everything else combined. If you made such an argument, you would be right
Finding Your Internal Motivations – You have to find Your Internal Motivations if you are to find The Right Market
You cannot find The Right Market until you Understand what your Internal Motivations are
Why?
- Because The Right Market for you is inextricably linked with who you are and what you want from life
- Because you cannot create The Right Product for the Right Market until and unless it matches your internal motivations and your identity
- Because choosing a Market based on External Motivations (Surface Level Motivations) is almost always a huge mistake
- Without strong internal motivation, it is hard to succeed
- Without congruence with your internal motivations, you will usually create a low quality product
- External Motivations have very little staying power. When times get tough, and you have to fight through adversity, extrinsic things cannot sustain you
The world outside is a reflection of the world inside
When you are aware of, and at peace with, your internal motivations
- You can make them congruent with your external ‘desires and aspirations’
- You can figure out The Right Market, which will deliver both your Internal Needs and your External Needs
- You can create a very high quality book as you will be performing at your best (or close to it)
- You can create high quality books consistently. You will be energized by what you are doing
- You can give your best. Remember, when a goal matches both Your Internal Motivations and Your External Motivations, that is when you are most excited and do your best work
To fully understand this, let’s consider why
Your Internal Motivations are Far More Important than Your External Motivations
Examples of Internal Motivations include
- Wanting to Leave a Legacy
- Wanting to Make a Positive Difference in the World
- Wanting to Share Your Knowledge
- Wanting to Create a Conversation with Like Minded People
- Wanting to Spread a Powerful Idea which will create good things in the world
- Wanting to Make People Happy
- Wanting Others to Learn from Your Experiences and Mistakes
- Wanting to make Your Family proud of You
- Wanting to Give Back to Your Country or To People Who Helped You or To Your City
- Wanting to Share Expertise in Your Area of Expertise with people in that Area
Notice how these are extremely powerful things. Notice how these are generally things that benefit lots of people
Examples of External Motivations include
- Achieving Social Recognition
- Getting External Validation that you can write
- Getting Popularity
- Making Money
- Becoming a full time author
- Becoming Wealthy
- Becoming a Bestseller
- Being Recognized as an Expert in Your Area of Expertise
Notice how all these External Motivations are EXTRINSIC things. They do not really tap into Your Deepest and Strongest Desires
While External Motivations can motivate you to an extent, it is Internal Motivations that are truly powerful
There is no Book Dedication that ever says – I would like to dedicate this book to the $27,000 I got for my last book deal. Through all the tough times, that cold hard cash was there for me when I needed it the most
Book Dedications are like Internal Motivations – they get to the most important things in your life and to the most important people in your life
You Must Figure Out Your Internal Motivations BEFORE You Start Searching for The Right Market
Here is an example of why. Please adjust this example according to your personal situation
If your internal motivations are
- To share your experiences as a Biography & Memoir
- To help other people have better lives by learning from the tough times you went through
- To help people become successful and happy without going through the adversity you had to go through
- To connect with people at a very human level
- To give people hope and courage that carries them through the darkness to the light
Then it makes absolutely no sense to start searching for The Right Market based on extrinsic things that are unrelated to these core motivations
If you search for what books sell the most, and what books make the most money, you will never arrive at Biographies & Memoirs
However, that may very well be the Best Category For You to write in
Your Perfect Market is something very unique to you, and almost always derived from Your Unique Internal Motivations
Finding Your Internal Motivation – You Have to Find Your Internal Motivation if You are to Succeed and Be Happy
Now, we come to the most perplexing thing
- You are most likely to meet Your External Motivations, if you stop caring about Your External Motivations, and chase Your Internal Motivations
Yes, as crazy as it sounds, you are most likely to have financial success and popularity if you chase very ethereal things such as
- Leaving a Legacy
- Doing your Best Work
- Giving to the People you Care For
- Making Your Art Proud of You
- Committing to Excellence
It is people who go all out chasing their internal motivations, who are the most likely to create beautiful work. They are also the ones most likely to create beautiful work consistently
THAT is what leads to success
The less you focus on money and success. The more you focus on giving value and creating something of beauty
The more likely you are to succeed
Internal Motivations vs External Motivations
While we have an entire article on External Motivations (it is the next article in this Course)
While External Motivations have their place and are quite important
It is critical to realize that each of us has only a hundred years to live. Do not give up on your true dreams, your internal motivations, to chase other people’s dreams
Most External Motivations, such as making money and getting validation from others, are other people’s dreams. They cannot give you the power and fire that your own dreams can
Finding The Right Marketing is as simple as Chasing Your Internal Motivations
The Right Market is The Market Which Will Satisfy Your Internal Motivations
Give to the world what you most need yourself
Give to the world what you most want to give
The World will give you back everything you truly desire
If we get stuck in External Motivations and Dreams that are not Our Dreams, then we cannot find The Right Market. We are finding The Right Market for Someone Else
To Find the Right Market for Yourself, you have to figure out Your Internal Motivations and use them as a Compass to Find The Right Market
Closing Thoughts On Finding The Right Market
Finding the Right Market is a very tough thing
What makes it tough is that we constantly look at things that do not matter, instead of looking inside ourselves and finding out what it is that we truly desire
As an Author you have a very unique opportunity – You can create a Legacy and chase what you most desire. You can give to the world what you are uniquely qualified to give
The Right Market is where you can give the best of yourself and where you can achieve the things that will complete your journey as a human being