Ten days ago we made a hard business decision. Then I put in the work to release the PDF versions. Then we got emails from people who were just as sad as I was that the defaced version would not see print. And with each email, even the kind ones, my anxiety grew. It kept me up. It ate at me. We’d promised to deliver a thing and were disappointing people with our choice. A Kickstarter is a trust and we were not living up to it. The sick feeling inside sent me into printers quotes and research mode until I was able to present a plan that might let us print both versions of the book and let backers choose which one they wanted. So that is the new plan. It is the right one. It is going to cost us more money and me a lot of time, but at the end of it I will be able to look at both copies of the book knowing I did everything instead of stopping short of everything.
Now if I can just get my anxiety to wind down, that would be nice. It is roaring at me, telling me that I have already failed, that I’m doomed to fail forever. It howls around me making me want to huddle up an hide until the noise goes away. Only the noise tells me all the terrible things that will happen if I hide. Tomorrow I would like to get up and get back to work. I get to make the book I’ve been working hard at. I get to make companion book for it that I didn’t even realize we needed until twelve days ago. I get to put together a presentation. I want to be able to just do that work in peace and happiness and let failure happen (or not happen) somewhere off in the future instead of becoming a self fulfilling prophecy because stupid anxiety won’t let me concentrate today.
If what you are acheiving is failure, then we need a lot more of it! I gasp at the sheer amount you have managed to do over the years and regard you as a highly effective and efficient person. Tell your black dog you are very highly regarded by your customers who enjoy the fruits of your succesful endeavours! Thank you for all the hard work you put in, it is appreciated.
You are awesome and haven’t failed a bit! The marked up version is great! The “clean” one looks so professional. I can’t help wanting both, choosing will be hard. *hugs* I know me saying you haven’t failed won’t stop the feelings because that’s how anxiety is. But I still wanted you to know. 🙂
See, we Roger’s agree, you and Howard have done an awesome amount of stuff.
Hey Sandra,
I found something on a website that might cheer you up:
http://www.schlockmercenary.com/blog/pre-orders-for-maxim-70-coins/
“Maxim 70: Failure is not an option. It is mandatory. The option is whether or not to let failure be the last thing you do.”
You are doing awesome. I’m sorry that this project is taking so much of your life over. :-\
The marked up PDF looked so awesome that it was hard not to want to in hardcopy. But I do realize that getting something from digital to physical copy is non trivial. Even if there is a large industry practicing that transition.
Maybe when you get the proofs for the marked up copies you could scan a page or two, the most problematic ones perhaps? So that if there is significant visual differences between hardcopy and digital that appropriate expectations can be set.
For me, satisfaction with an item or decision really hinges more how well it matches my mental image of the thing or event. It’s much more important than it’s actual independent characteristics. But I am one of those people who looks at the hotel interior views before making reservations. 🙂
Wishing you well and peace.
Hannah
Or maybe the most problematic of the proofs you’ve already gotten… … Because they might be sitting around already. And because setting the expectations a little lower than you can achieve is a nice buffer.
I’ll bet it would be even more expensive to print a version where the annotations were written in an ink that only shows up under blacklight. On the other hand, it would satisfy the requirement that the maxims draw the eye first, because you wouldn’t actually see the annotations until you literally shine a light on them.