The True Power of Mindset

I love …

This is a true story.

Ten days ago, I decided to radically shift my mindset about my books. (I’m writing fiction under a pen name.)

You see, I self-published my first book early in 2013. By now, I have three books out, and one on preorder that’ll be fully published soon. They are beautiful books, thanks to the people who create the graphics for it, and I also think they tell good stories. (Entirely my bias.)

But sales were frustrating.

It’s a marketing problem, my coach would say. It’s also a visibility problem – it’s not easy to have a book show up among the hundreds of thousands of genre books on Amazon.

So I resigned myself to minimal sales, checking the sales reports once in a while, and trying not to wince. Sound familiar?

I get coaching sessions for myself. (Every coach should.) And in one of those sessions, the advice that came through was: Just love your books. Forget about sales. Forget about frustration. LOVE your books.

So I gave them a prominent place in my bedroom. I went to sleep thinking loving thoughts and feeling proud of my books. During the day, I would imagine holding and hugging them. It was an experiment, but also something that felt right. Plus I had nothing to lose.

The very next day, I found a new review.

The day after, a sale. The first since Christmas. I kept sending love.

Another sale. Another review. More sales.

These last ten days have been better than the last three months together.

Of course, I have moments of doubt creep in. What if this is just a fluke? What if I’m imagining things? What if it’s just coincidence? And it’s not easy to keep that love flowing when doubt raises its ugly head.

Even so, I’m doing my best to stay in that feeling of love. I use mantras that help. And of course, I use tapping.

And ultimately, it feels much nicer to love my books unconditionally, than to be constantly frustrated about them. It makes my life better – and that alone is worth it.

The woo-woo part of the whole thing goes like this: It makes a fundamental difference whether I send out the energy of frustration or the energy of love, in general and in particular.

The energy of frustration simply gets me more of that. No sales.

The energy of love brings in love. Reader love, reviewer love, maybe even fan love.

Which is why it’s a good idea to choose love, whenever possible. A mindset of love is so crucial to everything we do, be it writing, coaching, cooking or running a business. It changes the whole ball game. It changes lives.

Your Turn:
What part of your life could profit from a mindset change? How will you express love for it? Please write a comment, and if possible, report back on the changes.

Image Source: F. Moebius

PS: I send out a weekly newsletter to go with the blog. It contains more advice and tips about being a successful writer. You can sign up to it through the form at the top right.