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The more I read how the successful authors do it, the more I realize that, like successful people in all walks of life, they all do things in common that contribute enormously to their success. So how can we learn from successful authors to ensure our own success in 2008 and beyond?

We can start by adopting what I call “The 7 Habits of Highly Successful Authors”. Adopt these 7 habits and you just may find that 2008 is the year you break through your own writing barriers!

1. Write about something you care about.

Whether you are writing fiction or non fiction, it is imperative you write about something you care about. The successful authors have some emotional connection to their content or story. If you are writing fiction, then write from a place of emotional familiarity. Your genuine experience will come through in your writing and your readers will connect with that. If you are writing a non fiction piece, choose a topic you are passionate or enthusiastic about. After all, if you are going to invest your precious time in what you are writing, you owe it to yourself to write with passion, feeling and enthusiasm.

2. Take risks

Don’t be afraid to put your head, or your hands, on the chopping block when you write. In the world of fiction, you will have no doubt heard about creating characters that are “larger than life”. That doesn’t mean they are giants, it means they go above and beyond and take risks and make decisions that we would not have the courage to take in our own lives. After all, it’s not about what we would do when we are tethered by the restrictions of polite behavior, it’s what we would do in our wildest imaginations that make our readers sit up and take notice.

For the non fiction writer, it’s time for you to take a stand. Take a view and stick with it, presenting your case with conviction and vigor. No one listens to someone who writes meekly, or with a wishy washy hand. Stick your neck out, and don’t be afraid to get it chopped off. All the greatest journalists are the ones who are not afraid to speak their minds. Get into that habit and you’re well on your way to being that next great journalist.

3. Plan

This is definitely the most ignored but equally the most important phase of the writing process. Planning is essential to the success of any undertaking and writing is no different. J.K. Rowling spent 5 years planning the entire Harry Potter series before she put pen to paper on a single word that appeared in the books. If you are writing a short story, novel or screenplay, planning the story before you begin writing is as essential to your success as ink in your pen or power to your laptop. There are some writers who claim to just start with an image or a sentence and then the whole thing just unfolds before them, but the writers who can do this with any degree of success are few and far between. Take the time to plan out your story, at the very least know where your beginning, middle and end are. The more planning you do, the more enjoyable the writing process and the less rewriting and editing you will have to do. The same goes for non fiction pieces, where it’s always advisable to have an outline in place before you write your article or book.

4. Write every day

Joyce Carol Oates said that she would write, even when her soul felt as thin as a playing card, because somehow the act of writing would set it aright. There are going to be times when you just “don’t feel like it”, but like any other job or activity that is important to you, you must still, somehow, sit down every day and write. It has been said that it is by sitting down every day to write that one becomes a writer. Stephen King writes every day, including Christmas Day. Whether you are working on a book, story, article or nothing, still sit down and write something every single day. Even if you only write one page every day, that’s 365 pages in a year and that’s a whole book, isn’t it? When you are a writer, you cannot not write, and writing is like breathing. You have an urge to put things down in print, so to keep that fresh and alive, you need to turn that tap on every day. It’s more than practice. It’s life.

5. Be prepared to work hard

I read somewhere once that John Grisham worked for 4 hours per day and made $20 million per year. Whether that is true or not (about the hours worked or the money he makes) doesn’t matter. It is far more common to hear tales today of the world’s most popular commercial authors working their proverbial butts off to keep up with deadlines, promotional commitments and the ins and outs of their everyday lives. Janet Evanovich gets up and writes every morning at 5am so she can get a full day’s writing in before she has to answer mail, emails and deal with her other affairs of business, Jodi Picoult has a wonderful stay-at-home husband who allows her the luxury of writing through school pick ups and travelling for long periods to do research for her novels. J.K. Rowling also said she (misguidedly) thought that life as an author would be a Jane Austen-type of affair, sitting in a room overlooking a field and writing in anonymity. Of course her life is a whirlwind of book launches, movie premieres, media commitments, school commitments, and of course she has a family with three children. And while we all no doubt wish we had her “problems” it is very obvious that in the early part of the 21st century, the life of an author, successful or not, is a hard-working life. We are either working hard to get noticed, working hard to stay noticed, or working hard to avoid being noticed. Any way you look at it, if you have an aversion to hard work, you need to look elsewhere. Successful authors work hard. Period.

6. Persistence

It is said that persistence outstrips all other virtues. I have a card propped up on my desk that says, “Success seems to be largely a matter of hanging on after others have let go”. Almost every successful author I have studied has said that their success is due, at least in some part, to pure persistence and determination. If your manuscript or article is rejected, rewrite it and submit it again. Or submit it to someone else. The first Harry Potter novel was rejected by every major publishing house before Bloomsbury picked it up for a song. Even so called “overnight successes” have a story behind them about how many times they were rejected, or how many novels or articles they’ve written that have no value other than as fire kindling. The authors that succeed are the ones who don’t stop until they do. It’s that simple. Never give up. Winners never quit, and quitters never win.

7. Let it go

And finally when you have written your article, book or screenplay and have submitted it for publication or approval, let it go. If you’ve done the best you can with it, let it go and trust that it will make its way to where it needs to be. And start something else straight away. Regardless of whether what you have submitted is accepted or rejected, you are a writer and a writer writes. Once you finish one manuscript start immediately on another. If the one you’ve sent is picked up, they’ll be happy that you’ve got something new already, and if not you’re well on your way to finishing your next manuscript.

So those are the 7 Habits of Highly Successful Authors. Adopt these habits yourself, and before you know it, you too will join their ranks!

In fiction, the writer’s job is to entertain, to draw an emotional response from the reader. The reader is often looking for suspense, action, and to go on a journey they have not been on before, one they will not easily forget. Readers want to get drawn into and experience the story for themselves. They want characters they can relate to and form a personal connection with. But most importantly, they want a good book. One that leaves them anxiously awaiting each turn of the page.

Here are three crucial elements of a good fiction book:

Well-developed characters: The characters in the book must be well developed and believable. The characters should remind you of your teacher, your lawyer, your doctor, or maybe even your best friend. Even though they are fictional, they come alive for us in the story.

Action: A good fiction book needs to be filled with action. The good guys are after the bad guys, the doctor needs to find a cure. From the beginning to the end, the reader can’t bear to stop reading because the action just keeps coming.

Great Plot: The writer keeps the reader guessing right to the end by using surprising, realistic plot twists. Just when we think we know “who did it” &ndash bam &ndash a new twist creeps up and a story involves more. As we near the end we wonder if there is time to solve it. Will it have a happy ending? Most readers long for a good ending to their story as they grow fond of the characters in the book and want to see the best happen to them.

For those looking for a good fiction book to read, one that stands out is the fiction thriller, Sledgehammer, by Paulo J. Reyes, M.D. This book has a well-developed story that takes place in an ER in Los Angeles. The author, an ER Doctor himself, depicts the ER setting perfectly as patients appear and seek treatment and case after case of medical drama unfolds. The story takes you hour by hour through life in this ER until the unthinkable happens and one of the patients appears with smallpox symptoms. What happens next is fiction at its finest and leaves you eagerly asking, “Could it happen today?”

Writers write about what they know. They can bring the sounds, colors, and images of their world to life in their story. Fiction is where writers get the opportunity to bring you into that world and keep you there until, “the end.”

Most people think writing a novel is just writing. I have lost count of the number of people who say “I want to write a novel” and think that they will just sit down, put pen to paper or fingers to keyboard, and the whole thing will just unfold before them. I’ve read a few novels, they think, why can’t I write one?

If only it were that easy!

The process of writing any story is exactly that, a process. And whether you are tackling a novel, a short story, an essay or a non-fiction book, you need to begin by planning your story.

This is the most ignored stage in the writing process, and yet it is by far the most important. JK Rowling spent five years planning the Harry Potter novels. And that certainly paid off, didn’t it?

The key to writing any story well, is to find the story that only you can write. This story carries your own emotional truth, and as you progress through the story writing process, your character will take you on the journey of emotional growth just as they will your readers once it’s published.

The Deeper Character Journey

The deeper character journey is the most important aspect of any story. It is what your readers will remember and it is what makes the process of writing a story so worthwhile for the writer. Every time you take your character on a journey, you go on that journey yourself.

So how do we find that deeper character journey? Where do we begin?

We begin with this simple exercise:

Without thinking too much about it, finish this sentence:

• I am interested in writing a story where the main character discovers the importance of ………………

Write for 5 minutes, preferably in long hand, allowing whatever comes up to just flow onto the page.

When you have finished you will find that you have written a lot of different values into your answer. Values are universal qualities of human experience, either positive or negative. Take a few moments to divide these values into their positive and negative groups. You’ll find that a few similar ones in each group will stand out, so isolate these and then decide on the most important ones from each group.

Once you have done this you can now write your deeper character journey in one simple sentence.

• I am interested in writing a story about a character who goes from being….. to being…..

What is your character’s weakness?

Every character has a weakness &ndash something they need to learn to have a better life. Your character’s weakness should now be pretty clear to you, as it is strongly connected to what they need to learn the importance of from the above exercise. With your character’s weakness in place, you can now begin to put them and their weakness under pressure and suddenly your story is off and running.

Predicament

Stephen King says he starts a story with a character in a predicament and watches them to see how they get out of it. So at the start of your story your main character must be in some sort of predicament or stuck in some way. The predicament your main character is in should be a symptom of their weakness. They are aware of their predicament, but they are not aware of their weakness.

For example, a character who needs to learn the importance of patience, is stuck underground on a broken down train. He becomes more and more exasperated and angry as the minutes tick by as he needs to be at an important meeting. As he’s underground his mobile phone has no signal, and he also can’t just jump off the train, as the doors are electronically sealed, and besides he’s underground so he can’t just wander off up the tracks in the dark.

So we know our character’s predicament will expose his weakness, which is impatience. The question for you to answer is, what does he do? How does he respond? What choice does he make? And he will make that choice based on his personal values.

Values in Conflict

Conflict lies at the heart of all powerful stories. It is a well worn adage in story writing that nothing moves forward in a story except through conflict.

But a good story also isn’t just a sequence of random conflicts, things that happen with no apparent pattern or meaning. It is a series of events, putting your character(s) under more and more pressure, forcing them to respond. This then shows us their true character.

Values underlie our choices, our decisions, and in storytelling they drive the story through the characters being forced to make difficult decisions where their values are challenged. A value is a belief system based on what is important to the individual. A value represents something in your character’s life that they are willing to fight for. So if you have a married woman who is attracted to another man, her choice of whether to go with the other man or stay with her husband will be based on the values of romance versus fidelity or loyalty.

Once you have nailed the values underlying your character’s choices, you will have connected strongly with your character’s deeper journey. This in turn connects you to your readers, who will recognise similar conflicts in their own lives.

And you also have the essence of the story that only you can write.

When you are a writer, you cannot separate your writing from your life. Writers cannot not write, so writing for you is like breathing. It is so natural you don’t even think about it. I think it’s a shame that so many writers treat their writing as anything from “special time” to the last thing on their to-do list. Writing is life. And so the principles of life, or the truth about life, are also the principles of, or the truth about, the writing life.

I recently re-read a favorite spiritual book, and in it I found a quote from the author’s high school drama teacher. This drama teacher must have been a wise man because he always taught his drama students the following:

The Truth About Life

1. Leave your personal problems at the stage door.

2. Treat the material with honesty, dignity and without embellishment.

3. Show up fully no matter how many people are in the audience.

I was suddenly struck with a simple thought: The Truth About Life is exactly the same as The Truth About The Writing Life, and so many of us forget these simple truths, as often in our everyday lives as we do in our writing lives.

So as a reminder, for all the writers out there, here is my version of The Truth About (The Writing) Life

1. Leave your personal problems at the stage door.

When you are writing, IT’S NOT ABOUT YOU! What? Not about me? Well then who is it about?? It’s about your view of the world, your take on things, how the world appears through your own unique lens, and yes, you need to write from your own emotional experience, or at the very least you need to write about something you care about. But that’s where it ends. While you are writing from a place within yourself, or you’re channeling something from the depths of your unconscious, you are still doing it with one very important proviso. You are disengaging your ego, and writing from some deep inner truth, or emotional place. Get out of your ego and into the soul or spirit of your characters. You are a writer. You are there to serve the story. It’s not there to serve you.

A great idea is to have an imaginary hat stand, coat rack or even a cardboard box outside the door of the room where you write. Every time you enter the room to do some writing, mentally drop all your baggage, problems, ego issues and any other personal issues into the box or hang them on the racks and walk into the room unencumbered. Then, while you are writing, imagine that someone or something comes and whisks all your baggage, problems and issues away, so that when you’re finished, the doorstep is empty.

2. Treat the material with honesty, dignity and without embellishment.

I firmly believe that when you are writing, you are co-creating with a force larger than yourself. Whether you call that force God, the Universe, the collective unconscious, the spirit of your dearly departed grandmother, Allah or simply your Higher Self, when you truly enter the creative imagination you are only one element in many that go into making up the totality of your story. So when the material comes through (when you write it) you do need to treat it with honesty, dignity and without embellishment. Let it flow through you honestly. Don’t try and change it as it flows. Just let it flow, get it down on the page, and if there are changes that need to be made, address them in the rewriting and editing processes. Dignify the material with your time and your skills, and for goodness sake, don’t embellish. There is nothing worse than a wonderful story and good writing being asphyxiated by attempts at literary high-mindedness. If the character gets hit in the head, tell us he gets hit in the head. Don’t tell us that a large object projected itself into his cranium. Be blunt and use simple language. You will find the greatest writers do that. At the risk of sounding like another American self-help guru, you’re best served to “tell it like it is”. Thanks Dr Phil!

Go back over some of your own writing and see where you may have been guilty of embellishment. The beauty and complexities of great novels come from the story, the narrative, the rich drawing of characters and their relationships to each other, not from using lots of big words.

3. Show up fully no matter how many people are in the audience.

Write for the sheer joy of it, the pleasure, the beauty, peace and satisfaction it stirs in you. Write because you have to, because you can’t not write. Write because there’s a story that’s bursting to get out of you. Don’t write to please editors, publishers, readers, your mother, teacher or partner. Write for the sense of abundance it brings into your life. Turn up at the blank page or screen and write just for the heck of it. It doesn’t matter whether you’re the only one who’ll read your words or whether you have a print run of 1,000,000 books ready to roll when you finish your manuscript. What matters is that you show up fully at the page, every day. Because writing in and of itself, is all that matters, isn’t it?

So next time you’re sitting at your page thinking “what am I doing here?” have a look at these 3 simple Truths About (The Writing) Life and remember how simple it really is. You write because you can’t not write. So leave your personal problems at the door, treat the material with honesty, dignity and without embellishment and show up fully at the page, no matter how many people are in the audience.

And watch your writing improve.