WRITER'S DREAM; Counselling By Column

It's 9 o'clock at night and already, it is dark.  I am in my study, sitting at my escritoire desk, where I have been writing my column and sipping on gingerbread tea.  I'm burning the last of a Yankee Snowflake Cookie candle, which is making the atmosphere warm and comforting.  I hope that it burns out tonight, so that I can start to burn one of the new autumnal scented candles I bought last week. 

These darker nights always drive me to the page.  There is something about hiding away in a book-lined room, as darkness falls, with only a laptop and my books for company, that makes me want to spend hours in my study, writing. I love it. I am always more productive in the darker months and this autumn has already seen the harvest of one of my literary goals, with the launch of my new psychotherapy column.

I can't really describe how much fun I am having writing this column.  It's great to be free to write whatever I want, for a new publisher.  Before, when I wrote a column for Spirit&Destiny, my work obviously had to fit into a Wiccan framework, which could sometimes be quite limiting.  Now I can write about anything at all, and I don't have to come up with a spell to match at the end!  It feels incredibly liberating.

It seems that people thought that they had seen the last of me, in terms of publishing, but that was never the case.  I have simply switched from one genre in Mind, Body, Spirit work, into another, more enduring and universal one, in Psychotherapy work instead, but still within the women's magazine industry.  Switching genres is never easy for a writer, but I have managed to do it in a fairly short space of time - less than two years, to go from one column to another.  I feel incredibly grateful to have done so and it is a significant leap forward for me as an author. 

I am also gratefully aware, that I jumped straight into writing a regular psychotherapy column, with a popular magazine, as soon as I qualified as a counsellor.  That is virtually unheard of!  I've lost count of the number of counsellors who have all been at pains to tell me how hard it is to get such work published. They've all been trying for years and getting nowhere fast. Over the course of my training, they have pointed out that it is impossible to get published on this topic, but that certainly hasn't been my experience.  I've been publishing freelance features on various psychotherapy topics throughout my training. In fact, all the features I've had published since 2014 have been psychotherapy based and the fees helped to pay for my studies!

Once I knew I was definitely going to qualify, the first editor I approached - an editor I had never worked with before - immediately snapped me up, as a regular contributor and her new psychotherapy columnist. She accepted my submission the very next day!  Even I didn't expect it to happen as fast as that. I was thrilled beyond measure and I took it as a sign that I was on the right track!   In return, I plan to make my column one of the best of its kind and a firm reader favourite. 

This is the kind of thing that makes people say I have the Midas 

Touch, but in truth, I already had a good name in publishing; one which I have built up over the past twenty-two years, so I'm sure that reputation had something to do with this new success. In addition, I am a commercial author, so I can write complex psychotherapy topics in an accessible style.  Perhaps other counsellors are clinging onto the academic style of writing, or they are trying to sell their essays, which is why they remain unsuccessful in publishing. 

All I know for certain, is that where they have had difficulty, I have enjoyed a smooth path to success. I didn't let them put me off my goal. And while my work with Spirit&Destiny is over, my career as a columnist is most definitely not!  I also know that sabotage, rejection and career disappointments never stand in my way for very long - I just move on and succeed somewhere else instead!  

I have no idea how long my new column will run. As it makes me happy to write it and the editor is pleased with it, I am happy to continue writing it for the foreseeable future.  Recent feedback from my new editor indicates that it has been well received by their readers, which is fantastic and we are all excited about how the column will shape up in the coming months.  I have a notebook full of column ideas that I am eager to start writing up and seeing published.  I like to keep track of every column I write, so as not to repeat issues or topics. Jotting down the theme of each column in a special notebook helps me to do this.  The notebook I chose for my new column has a silver mermaid on the front. She makes me smile each time I sit down to write. 

It is important to be happy in your work and writing makes me so very happy.  I enjoy my job; I love being published; I love being a columnist; I love helping people in this new way, turning my counselling skills into professional copy that is regularly published and enjoyed by my readers.  It's the best feeling and I am really glad I didn't allow the negativity of other counsellors to put me off my goal of becoming a psychotherapy columnist. 

Whatever kind of writing you like to do, don't let the negativity of others put you off. Just because they have been repeatedly rejected, doesn't necessarily mean that you will be. You might well be the one who succeeds where they failed. As I am. 

One thing the last two years has taught me, is that just because other people think your career is over, it's only going to be true if you agree with them.  If you actively disagree and keep working at it, none can stand in your way and you will go on to achieve even greater success.  Don't let the Muggles get you down!