Be realistic or find yourself depressed

 

Everything I'm about to say is most likely going to be something you've known for a while now and it's going to make me sound like a complete idiot not to have known. Regardless, I'd like to say it all anyway and just put it out there. Do NOT expect success right away or at all. Don't write one book and then assume it'll fly off the shelves at any point. Don't be 10 books in and start thinking that it's or think that you're about to some variation of a bestseller. Because realistically speaking you won't be, though of course it's very possible and I hope you're able to reach success. My point is that it won't happen when you'd like and you'll just mess with yourself thinking otherwise. PLEASE DO NOT EVER WRITE A BOOK BECAUSE YOU THINK IT'LL MAKE YOU LOADS OF MONEY FAST. The best thing you can do for yourself is write for the love of writing and just put the book out there for a chance at success. Everybody feels like they can write a book and plenty of people have, which means there's already at least millions of books in your genre alone. Hell Amazon has millions and millions of books, by tons of authors. Everyday there's new books and authors, creating competition you're nowhere near ready for. Just think about it, there's millions of books published just on Amazon and there's however many more places for authors to publish a book. Which unfortunately means you and I are probably wedged between at least a million books on a good day. I wrote a book and published it thinking, "this is it and everybody's going to be buying a copy as soon as possible". My dumb actually expected to walk right into the publishing world and become a bestselling author like that. Remember that it is possible and people have achieved that, it's just extremely rare. Especially in 2025, a time where everybody and anybody can publish whatever the hell they want. My first book is currently sitting at 3 sales, 1 of which is mine and another one my mother bought in support of my journey. Which might not and hopefully won't be the case for you, but likely will be. I just want you to know that it's OK to set goals and see yourself as a major success, but it's not ok to actually bank on that happening. Do NOT make selling 10, 100, 1000 or more copies on the first day something that absolutely has to happen. because you will be disappointed and for myself it was a bit discouraging until I came to my senses. Dream as big as possible, then wake up and live amongst the real world.