Welcome to the Dojo Wisdom for Writers Book Club! Every Wednesday, we meet to discuss one of the lessons in Dojo Wisdom for Writers. We’ll go in order, so it’s easy enough to follow along. Read the lesson, then read the blog post, then comment in the comments! Do feel free to comment on each other’s comments. I’ll answer questions as quickly as I can.
Lesson #14. Know Your Target
In this lesson, I talk about knowing your audience, even going so far as to developing a profile of your reader down to the tiny demographic details that will tell you where to find him/her and how to connect.
But today I want to talk about knowing your target in a larger sense. Not that I’m trying to induce an existential crisis in anyone, but I think that occasionally stepping back and asking, “Why am I doing this?” is crucial to our growth and progress. We can forget that question in the crush of deadlines and to-do lists.
I was talking to a friend of mine last week about how I was starting to feel like a nonprofit organization, that the reason I worked to make money was so that I could keep on working. We had a good laugh, but there was also the germ of an important idea in that sentiment. I don’t do this work solely for the money, although I certainly like to pay the bills and I expect to be paid fairly. But I do the work so I can keep on doing the work. In other words, the process is what matters to me.
For someone else, it really is about maximizing profit. I don’t criticize that at all, but I can see where that person would make very different career choices than I would. By knowing what my target is, I know how to make better choices for me. And I’ll have a better idea of what type of guidance I need to seek out.
What’s your take?
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Dojo Wisdom for Writers, second edition, now available on Amazon in print and ebook! (Nook and other ebook versions here)
Catch a Falling Star (by Jessica Starre) and The Matchmaker Meets Her Match (by Jenny Jacobs), two of my favorite novels.
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