The game has changed for writers. Or so they say.

It used to be that the gatekeepers (publishers and agents) kept out the masses and only a select few (primarily those with the right connections and prior celebrity) could publish--let alone make a living as a writer.

Today everyone can publish.

The technological revolution for creative workers is intense. Writers, musicians, visual artists and even artisans making traditional crafts have suddenly found the world wide open. There is, in theory, a giant market out there, just a few clicks away. If only we could find our niche.

Lightning strike - Creative Commons image by John Fowler (cropped)

And as with all opportunities, the pitfalls have multiplied too. When the virtual doors were flung open and those hoping for a chance at creative work swarmed out into the sunlight, others fixing to make a profit off of their hope started popping up like mushrooms after long rain. Today there are hundreds of self-help books, courses, programs and websites devoted to "helping" writers who want to earn enough to make a living from their work. And it's similar for musicians and all other creative people. Are these helpers and "allies" really on our side, or are they primarily hoping to make a profit?

The vast majority of this self-help material centers on the idea that all creative workers really need is "motivation" and "discipline."

"If you keep track of your word count every day, you'll get that novel written in a few weeks," they say. "If you are generous and prolific on social media or a blog, you will no longer be lost in obscurity. If you aren't successful, it is simply because you need to become a better writer. Study and work hard. You too will climb the mountain, if you put one foot in front of the other long enough."

On the one hand I appreciate that many of these inspirational books and blog posts are helpful to people who are struggling to find time for their creative work or to those who have the requisite wealth or media industry connections to make a career of writing, if only they could get motivated and organized.

But those aren't the circles I move in. Mostly I know writers who do find time for their work no matter how hard it is, who stay up half the night and give up their family time to do the work and improve their writing. Many of them are excellent writers but still have little chance to get paid for their work, even in today's supposedly more open world.

The problem is finding the people who want what you have--readers, listeners, viewers, your tribe. And that is as big of a problem today as it ever was.

While anyone can theoretically publish today, traditional publishing wasn't traditionally about only printing and distributing books. It was about getting the information out to readers. There was a time when publishers ran ads, hosted events and worked out deals with bookstores for special book displays. And not exclusively for celebrity authors. Back in the day, it might have been difficult to get a publishing deal, but those who did had at least some help from publishers in reaching readers. A completely unknown writer could, if he or she was very very good at spinning a tale, go from nothing to a successful author. J. K. Rowling did it after being rejected 20 times after all.

(People are still telling me that is why I should drink the Kool-Aid, even though that was a different era. Rowling is fantastic and deserves all she got, by the way. But she isn't my favorite British author. My favorite British author is Ann Pettitt. Never heard of her? There's a reason for that. Being fantastic doesn't mean you get in the door.)

In 2015 whether you go with a big publisher or not, unless your name is already fairly well-known, your work might as well be sitting on your coffee table in terms of the chance that readers will see it.

The rough news

The message I have for fellow writers and other creative workers is not as sunny as the inspirational self-help books and websites out there urging us to bootstrap our way to success. I might be more popular if that was my message, but that kind of message would also be quickly forgotten. I have been a writer for more than twenty years. For most of that time I have made my living from writing in one form or another. I have seen other eras come and go, even in such a relatively short time.

My conclusion is that there is both gold and dust at the heart of our favorite inspirational phrases. Gold because those who are drawn to creative work must find ways to maintain focus. Dust because the hard truth is that this era is not that much different from any other. Most of us will never be able to make a living doing creative work in the current economy and the system for choosing who has that great privilege is still not based primarily on merit and market viability.

A story of another era

When was eighteen I had a dream to become an international newspaper correspondent. At the time, in the 1990s this was a similar dream to being an author who actually makes the bulk of their living from book sales today. It was a reasonably popular ambition but statistics said that one in ten thousand young people who wanted that job would ever get it and the professionals knew that 95 percent of those successful ones were promoted through relatives or friends in the business.

It was ridiculous odds for a broke kid with no connections to speak of. But there was that whisper, "It's extremely unlikely but it's possible." I pursued it. I got scholarships, so I could get the right education and work for free for years without having to pay off loans. I beat the pavement and the mud of reporting locations for years. I did the work and wrote the word count and perfected my craft and learned the business side of writing and journalism.

Then one day while I was washing the dishes in a tiny apartment in a squalid neighborhood in Eastern Europe, the phone rang and a successful reporter was on the other end. He had a job he couldn't do and he needed to give it to someone. He picked me, and that was my big break.

I got into the elite club. That job was quickly followed by more. I built on my success and hopped from success to success for a couple of years. It only lasted a short time because the whole profession of stringer journalism collapsed a few years later, but I'd made it.

And I have never forgotten the lesson. My experiences before and after that break showed me that all of my motivation and hard work counted for a very small portion of the success. What really mattered was that phone call. And it might well never have come. I knew others just as motivated, just as good or better, who it never came for and I knew those who had it made easily through lucky birth who were not nearly so good.

I know. This is the opposite of what inspirational people are supposed to tell you. I'm supposed to say that my luck was just a bit of it. That really it was mostly sweat and sleepless nights. But it doesn't correlate. Those who got a break were not primarily those who worked hard. They were those with connections and luck. Some had lots of connections and thus didn't need to work very hard. Some had to work extremely hard and also had a bit of luck or a minor connection. Many who deserved it, both in terms of hard work and talent, never got in.

The self-publishing window

And now I find myself in the slush pile again and I have researched the business enough to know that the game is the same. The authors of inspirational self-help for writers would like us to buy their books and believe that an unknown author without capital for major advertising can bootstrap their way into making an income with genre fiction. But when you look at the details, how the systems of publicity and book selling actually work, it doesn't add up. And worse yet, if you know excellent writers who take all the right steps and still remain lost, the picture is all too clear.

There will be one or two exceptions, but those will be lucky breaks helped along by an enthusiastic Amazon or BookBub editor whose hobby happens to correspond to the book's themes (or a similar fluke). There will be those who were celebrities in another field or simply had the money for a lot of ads to start with or had a cousin who works at one of the major distribution channels. And these will all be held up as proof that anyone can do it, if we only buy this inspirational book and try harder.

And many of the writers who were fortunate and smart enough to get into the self-publishing business between 2009 and 2012 continue to misunderstand this. They bootstrapped their way into publishing! Why can't others do the same?

The problem is that the window between 2009 and 2012 WAS a lucky break, like the time I got that phone call. It was a fluke created by the jockeying and competition between Amazon and the big publishers.

Part of the fallout was that a few authors who were positioned just right at the time, took a risky leap and landed well in self-publishing. But what they did is no more replicable by writers in 2015 than my "strategy" of washing dishes to await a phone call from a colleague that would send me to the elite club of international journalism was something I could advise rookie reporters to do.

In 2009 to 2012 I was drowning in huge medical problems and very needy babies. I wasn't one of those well positioned this time. Even though I heard about the opportunity I couldn't take advantage of it. .And by the time I got my head above water that window was closed.

Gold and dust

Back in 2001, when I got my big break in journalism, I might have been sick or had commitments in a day job. Plenty of things could have held me back. I was lucky that, when that break came, I could drop everything and seize it. And in that respect the inspirational slogans of the self-help books are dust.

But the gold in there is that luck or no luck I would have lost that opportunity if I had not been driven to do the creative work even without being paid for it. If I hadn't been already motivated, if I hadn't been doing the work for free for several years, if I hadn't practiced the craft of writing high-powered newspaper and magazine articles, if I didn't know how to do hard reporting, I would have missed that opportunity no matter how lucky I was.

So, here is my not-so-inspirational message for fellow travelers in creative work, particularly those not born to an easy leg up: I hear you. I know the struggle.

Whenever I have had a job that required writing all day, I was in bliss. Yes, it can be hard. But even the pain of creative work is somehow sweet. Some of us have a burning fire at the core that will not die. I have never been very good at anything else. This writing thing is the one place where I excel and yet I am intelligent enough to calculate the odds. Most writers will never be able to write full time, no matter how good our craft is and no matter how much readers love to read our stories.

The inspirational books say you should log a word count. They spend a long time talking about how to start and the discipline needed to keep writing. I'm mystified by these lengthy discussions. Certainly it's hard to find time with kids and day jobs and everything else tugging at you. But I have no trouble keeping up a word count. I've been doing it since about age seven.

The inspirational blogs urge us to strive to improve our craft and promise that those who can work magic with the written word will someday reap the rewards--somewhat like preachers promising eternal life in heaven to those who refuse all sin. I love to read craft books. It's fun. I love to tinker and improve my writing. If I didn't have kids and the necessity of making a living, I could crank out a novel about every two months in good condition. Why do we need to be urged to do this?

Some of the more practical inspirational books tell us to spread the word and be proactive in our attempts to reach an audience. I don't exactly love the marketing and business end of the job as much, but I know how to do the research and develop strategy. And most of the work is still writing in some form. Thus, I'm doing that too in those few hours I have free.

Real hope, no fluff

Writers write because we can't help ourselves and generally we don't need any motivational encouragement to do so. It's possible that some fluke or chance or lucky break will come and I might just be ready for it because of all this work. But it's much more likely that it will never come, that most of us who do all the necessary steps and have what it takes to make a living writing will never get that chance. When I went into journalism as a young kid, I knew that. I knew the that the chances I would make it were ridiculously small and I did it anyway.

I didn't go into journalism with some motivational book or speaker telling me, "Just keep at it. Practice makes perfect. You can achieve it, if you climb the mountain."

Nope. My mentor told me, "You have chosen a damn hard business, but I see that isn't going to stop you, so here are a couple of tips that might slightly help your chances."

And that was both a comfort and a help. It was a comfort because someone actually cared and was giving me real encouragement rather than a fluffy dream. And it was helpful because I went into it with my eyes open. I went because my inner drive wouldn't take "no" for an answer and I gathered every skill I could to slightly increase my odds.

And that is what writers need today, I believe. We don't need a pep talk on good habits and reaching goals. We need to know the real odds and the true mechanisms by which most paid writers become paid (even if those mechanisms are depressingly rigged). Writers need to know the mechanics and how to do the business right, and also that even if you do everything right and your books are excellent, you will most likely never be able to make a living at it. We need to know that lightning does sometimes strike and if you are ready when it does, you might just be able to ride it.

Now, I'm just hoping lightning might strike twice in the same lifetime.