When I published my book back on August 24th, there was an excitement in the air. I had spent the previous months writing and editing, writing and editing. I spent countless hours trying to figure out what my cover would look like, submitting different proofs and ordering new copies to see how it would look in the physical version. I even went back and forth on the title multiple times.
Publishing a book is quite an experience. You spend all of this time agonizing over the smallest details to ensure you don't put a piece of crap in the hands of your audience. The last thing you want is someone sending you a picture of page 74 where you misspelled a word or wrote something with an inappropriate meaning by accident, or even worse, you leave your editing notes in a chapter for the world to see.
The absolute best part of publishing a book is hitting publish and submitting it to that Amazon storefront. The second-best part is ordering your first copy and holding it in your hands.
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The worst part of publishing a book is realizing you only sold 11 copies, and knowing you bought 3 of them yourself.
In a lot of ways, you could laugh at me. You could call me a major failure. You could chuckle to yourself and think, "How embarrassing to admit out loud."
Writing this article might even jeopardize the way you see me as the guy who gives out career advice and has a small following, but none of that matters to me. What matters to me is authenticity and telling true stories, and what you should know is I don't give a shit if I sold one single book.
What matters to me is I did the damn thing, and you can too. In fact, you can do anything you want to do; you just have to draw a line in the sand on your goals and go do it.
Something weird happens when we decide success only counts if enough people clap for it.
If the book sells 10,000 copies, then suddenly writing it was worth it. If the video gets a million views, then making it was worth it. If the business makes money, the risk was worth it. We have somehow attached the value of doing something to how many people validate it after the fact.
I don't buy that.
There are things in your life that are worth doing simply because you said you were going to do them.
There are things in your life that are worth doing simply because you said you were going to do them. Finishing the degree. Running the race. Starting the company. Publishing the book. Applying for the role. Launching the podcast. Taking the class. Whatever it is, there is value in proving to yourself that you can take an idea out of your head and make it real.
That is the part people underestimate. Every time you do something difficult, especially something public, you build evidence. Evidence that you can start. Evidence that you can finish. Evidence that you can survive the awkward part where nobody seems to care. That confidence carries over into the next thing, and then the thing after that.
Maybe someday the book sells 1,000 copies. Maybe it never sells 100. I genuinely have no idea. What I do know is that I can look at the shelf, see it sitting there, and know I made it. Nobody can take that away from me, and no sales report gets to rewrite what the accomplishment meant.
So whatever you've been talking yourself out of because you're worried it won't work, maybe that's the wrong question. Maybe the question isn't whether it will be successful. Maybe the question is whether you'll be proud of yourself for doing it anyway.
Start the business. Make the thing. Take the leap. Let the world decide what happens next. Your job is to stop waiting for perfect conditions and finally prove to yourself that you can do the damn thing.
Oh, and if you want to be buyer number twelve, you can order it on Amazon here.
For the eight of you who bought it, thank you. I'm pretty sure it was Emily, Cameron, Jim, Jesse, my parents, Spencer, Dan, and Zack & Lindsey. So thank you for the support!