Facing my greatest fear

Do you consider yourself to be an anxious person?

I do.

I can spend hours planning for life-changing events that may never happen.

I’ve been afraid of many things—dying, sickness, poverty, abandonment. The future of our country, of our world.

Existential things, too. (Like: What if everything I’ve built my life around is a lie?)

And the older I get, the more I realize that maybe my greatest fear isn’t any one thing.

It’s the uncertainty itself.

It’s the fact that life is like an engine with so many moving parts, so many things that could go wrong. It’s having to accept how much is outside of my control.

And recently, I was thinking about how...

As an author, I control almost nothing.

I still remember when I finished my first full-length novel more than five years ago.

At the time, I was thinking about how much fun writing was, and about the fact that someday I wanted to get published.

But that meant a few uncomfortable things.

1)      I would have to revise. A lot.

2)      I would have to get outside my comfort zone, meet other writers, and learn much more about both the craft and the business.

3)      And eventually, I would have to put my work in front of actual readers.

What if no one liked it? What if everyone hated it? What if no one even bothered to read it?

What if all of this turned out to be a waste of time?

And now, here I am, facing my greatest fear: the uncertainty.

I recently put my first short story out into the world, which you may have read: It Doesn’t Have to End This Way. (If you haven't, check it out here!).

I’m preparing to release my debut novel, Observation, next summer. I have no guarantee that anyone will read it, or that it won’t simply disappear into the endless sea of self-published books.

And in spite of that uncertainty, I’m continuing to work on future projects anyway.

Here are a few quick updates:

• I recently finished a Christmas-themed horror story that I’m planning to share with you soon. (And the best part is that it’s not too cheesy, unlike some Christmas horror stories.)

• Over the summer, I finished a revision of my second novel—a psychological conspiracy thriller about a musician struggling with memories that may be from a past life, while being hunted by a powerful organization that wants to weaponize immortality.

• I’m also working on my third novel, a psychological horror novel about hell. I’m particularly excited about this one (but it’ll be a while before you hear much more about it, so stay tuned).

What I’ve learned from this

I want to have all the answers. I want to know whether I’ll one day be a full-time author, or whether this will always be something I do on the side.

But I’m learning to enjoy the journey.

I’m grateful for every day I get to sit at the computer with my coffee, spend a few hours in another world, and wrestle with questions in the way that only a story allows me to.

And I love putting my work out there, knowing that I’m not alone on this journey. I’m thankful that we get to ask the hard questions together and enjoy some stories while we’re at it.

– J. W. Pierce

P.S. What’s your greatest fear?