The Publishing Dopamine Trap

I'm addicted

In my old job, I knew exactly what my financial reward would be every month: a salary and a pension. I knew I’d miss that security when I decided to write full time, but there was something else that, it turns out, I miss more:

Daily dopamine hits.

Mine came from the little extras that come with a normal job: small wins like praise for a comment in a meeting or a piece of work done well. Feedback and promotions. Perks like office drinks, an annual party or biscuits in the office kitchen. The ‘you handled that client well’ or ‘thanks for adding that paragraph’ from a colleague.

All those external rewards worked for me, like collecting coins in a computer game. They made me feel validated and keen to keep going.

Creative life doesn’t work like that. Writers need to go for long chunks of time without validation. We might work on a project for a whole year before anyone sees it and somehow, we have to sit at our desk and plod on even when the story isn’t yet working.

So I find myself searching for praise. If a week goes by without a nice email, a sweet review, or any good news, I slump more than I should.

Social media doesn’t help. There is always someone posting about their amazing news or party invite. Sometimes I’m the one posting, but, even then, the dopamine hit doesn’t last. It only takes a few days after an event is over before I find myself craving the next reward.

My book was in Waterstones Stratford so I did the dance of joy. Then, a few days later, it was NOT in a different Waterstones. (Little Fairy Godmother is illustrated by Leire Martin)

In part, it’s because of the endless ladder of publishing. First, we want an agent. Then a deal. Then we want the book to sell. Then a second book. Then a bestseller. Then a TV adaptation. The next rung is always waiting.

Plus, our job is never finished. We think we’ve written a book but then our agent changes it, our editor wants major structural edits, and sales and marketing ask if we can change a character because penguins are in but camels are not.

It doesn’t help that we have little power in this industry, and little security. There aren’t many careers that depend so greatly on trends, whims, fads or fickle sales - all of which are out of our control.

It’s hard to remember that, although we are creatives, we are also freelancers in a commercial industry; one in which author care isn’t always the best. This is usually not the fault of an individual editor or agent. They are insanely busy, and receive hundreds of submissions every month. But the structure of publishing as a profit-making company means authors are sometimes ghosted or dropped, as if we are brands with no feelings.

(The Society of Authors has a toolkit on author care here).

I know publishing is a business. I know I can’t control those external rewards, and yet I still find myself craving good news: a yes from an agent, a party invite, or praise from a reader. But becoming reliant on external rewards can be harmful. I’m trying to wean myself off the need for praise. It’s not going all that well. I find it helps to:

Reward myself – I can have my own biscuits, by Jove.

Collect writer friends I love – we hype each other up, swapping manuscripts, daily messages, gossip, whinges, have our own parties.

Avoid comparing myself to other writers. Everybody is having a harder time than they make it seem.

Measure the input not the output. 1000 words done is a great achievement.

Find joy in the process. Remember WHY I write – I do love it (mostly) and I’m lucky to make a living out of it.

I’ve posted before on the value of deciding what you want from your writing life. For me, success is still getting to do what I love and (just about) making it work.

I try to remind myself that writing is what I do, not who I am. It takes up so much of my time and headspace that I can slip into thinking that being a writer is my whole identity. It isn’t. I do loads of other things in my life, and I could always go and get a proper job if I stopped loving writing.

But the thing that’s helped me most is perspective. I have a whole friendship group that knows nothing about publishing (from my lawyer days). I love seeing them and it gives me a healthy dose of distance. When you’re in the industry it’s easy to be in a bubble, to think that everybody knows the top authors shouting about their successes on Instagram. But my lawyer friends have hardly heard of any children’s writers. Other than the old ones – Blyton, Dahl – they can pretty much only name Julia Donaldson and Jacqueline Wilson. That’s oddly comforting.

A while back I was watching the skating championships and realised I couldn’t name a single competitor. When one of them fell, I thought, “Oh, poor them,” and then immediately moved on. To that skater, though, that fall probably felt like the end of the world.

We’re the same. Missing out on a prize, a launch, a party or a deal can feel enormous inside publishing. Outside it, hardly anyone notices. Nobody even notices if we don’t have a book out for a few years. Our career is long. There will be falls and spins and trophies (ok that’s enough ice-skating analogies now). Most people aren’t counting our launches, our rankings or our Instagram posts. They’re just getting on with their lives.

I don’t need constant little rewards. I do need to earn a proper income, keep my copyright and be treated respectfully. But I can have all that without party invites, daily praise, social media hype.

And I can have biscuits.