Yesterday I released a new book, Dangerous: A Go-to Guide for Church Communication. It’s a collaborative effort published by one of my clients in cooperation with another awesome organization, Creative Missions. I got to work with some great contributors and some great co-editors. You can read more about the basics of the book over at Church Marketing Sucks.
I’ve done enough last-minute marketing about the book. Rather than do that here, I’d rather just talk honestly about it. Four quick lessons from this project:
1. I didn’t want to do it.
When the idea was first pitched we had about three and a half weeks to pull it off. Honestly, I’d had the same idea months earlier but I kept it to myself. Why? I don’t know. It seemed like something we could do eventually. I knew it would come down to a rushed project and I dreaded that. I think deep down I wanted someone else to come up with the driving vision and make it happen. Let someone else take the responsibility. That’s about what happened. (Confession: I’m not a leader.)
Now that’s it’s over, I’m glad we did it. We’ll see what the results are, but I think it was a smart move. It’s well-timed to be a good resource.
2. Fast is good.
This project happened fast. Like, 20 days fast. That’s a little crazy. But sometimes I think we need that. Too often we over-think ideas and turn them into these big huge things that can’t stand up on their own and collapse under all our expectations. Sometimes it works better to shut up and crank something out.
3. Help is good.
We had a lot of great people helping on this project. We had a team of three people giving editorial direction. We had more than a dozen contributors. We had someone do the layout. Someone else did the design. Someone else got the ebook working (long story). Collaboration is an amazing thing. Sometimes I wish we had more. (Marketing plan? Oh yeah, I guess we could use one of those.)
4. Scared.
I’ve published several books now. I’ve got a once-a-year streak going that’s kind of fun. You think I’d be used to this by now. But to be honest, I’m scared. I’m a little panicked about how people are going to respond to this book. Are they going to hate it? Did I forget something? How many horrible, ridiculous typos are there? Did I make some huge mistake and I should be embarrassed to call myself an editor? Will they be mad because it’s too short? Will they be annoyed that the content is available elsewhere? Will it be worth all the effort? So many doubts. So many fears.
I think that’s part of being a writer. I think that’s part of being creative and putting yourself out there. It’s scary.