Subscribe!
Writing a Book During the Pandemic – Mary T. O’Sullivan
By Mary T. O’Sullivan, MSOL
“Writing books is the closest men ever come to childbearing.”― Norman Mailer
What did people do during the 2020 pandemic? Conventional Wisdom said that the pandemic presented the perfect opportunity to do big and different things: start baking anything, bread baking was big – the flour mills ran out of flour; start the craft hobbies again, scrapbooking, knitting, making vases out of soup cans proliferated; people binge watched favorite shows and movies; bought Peloton bikes and strengthened those slacked muscles. Furthermore, many pundits declared that writing a book was the thing to do. We were admonished to be productive, to ward off depression or feelings of isolation.
However, according to studies conducted during the 2020–2021 time frame, many people ignored admonishments to keep busy and contented themselves by cocooning for the time being, preferring to stay home and limiting face-to-face contact with other people. Moreover, connecting via Zoom grew tedious rather quickly, so why not while away the hours by counting the time in between meals and TV viewing?
Many of us felt the emotional drag of spending idle time during those days of quarantine, and after a while, it wore us down. I felt the need to make something worthwhile out of the long, isolated days of 2020. Back in graduate school, I had written many papers and created a great number of projects. I did well, finishing with a 4.0 average. I knew I had the makings of a book, and never followed through, willing to let the work lie fallow. After months of binge-watching TV and allowing the isolation to set in, I decided it was time to tackle that book. I knew some editors, who were anxious to get me started. Little did I know what I was getting myself into!
The work was relentless, taking up every waking moment for months. The writing circulated back and forth between myself and my editors for weeks at a time until we could declare the pieces done. I wrote and rewrote, sitting for hours, actually contracting a nasty infection from sitting for so long. Then the cover designs needed work and approvals, along with the need to create a separate webpage for the book. When done with the writing, my public relations team asked me “Where’s your workbook”, an unexpected request that took almost as long as the book itself to write.
Writing the book, creating the accompanying workbook, kicking off the mandatory book launch, placing strategic social media posts, and generating an Amazon authors page certainly stood as the remedy to the empty hours of the lockdown. In fact, those hours translated into months, as the entire project lasted from late summer of 2020 into the following spring.
Since then, writing that book has had many benefits. Speaking engagements, invitations to appear as a podcast, radio and TV guest, successful exhibits and shows, requests for being a contributing writer have all resulted from the book written during the 2020 pandemic. What started as an escape from the doldrums and seclusion of the lockdown turned into a textbook study of how to create success.
Today, I’m working on the second edition of my book, debuting early summer 2023. It’s not as harrowing as the first edition, as I’ve learned a lot about managing time and working my schedule more efficiently. It is indeed like giving birth, with all the worry, care and anxiety associated with the creative process. Like giving birth, it’s hard work, takes concentration, timing, and devotion. And the end product is surely something to be proud of.
“Having an outlet as an author and seeing that I’m not alone in this feeling of isolation has certainly helped me to keep writing.” – Linden A. Lewis
Connect with Mary:
www.encoreexecutivecoaching.com
https://www.linkedin.com/in/marytosullivan/
Read all Mary’s columns here: https://rinewstoday.com/mary-t-osullivan-msol-pcc-shrm-scp/
Mary T. O’Sullivan, Master of Science, Organizational Leadership, International Coaching Federation Professional Certified Coach, Society of Human Resource Management, “Senior Certified Professional. Graduate Certificate in Executive and Professional Career Coaching, University of Texas at Dallas. Member, Beta Gamma Sigma, the International Honor Society. Advanced Studies in Education from Montclair University, SUNY Oswego and Syracuse University. Mary is also a certified Six Sigma Specialist, Contract Specialist, IPT Leader and holds a Certificate in Essentials of Human Resource Management from SHRM.