How Vocal+ And The Online Publishing Community Continues To Give New Life To The Dream Of Being A Writer By Making It Easy To Share Stories With The World.

Common denominators exist in all things and writing is no exception to the rule. Whatever it is that you're writing you're sitting there at your computer, typewriter, or a table with a pen and paper, because you possess a love of telling stories. Has your soul poured out of you, landing on paper in the form of a beautifully worded, magically written piece of poetry that your readers can feel your pain or joy as they read your stanzas? Are you working on a biography or history piece about your favorite person, thing, or event? Perhaps you are working on the next great screenplay that'll make millions of dollars at the theaters, or is it the next New York Times Bestseller? Either way, you are there because there are stories that need to be told, and you feel compelled to use your words.

Whether you are a free writer or an organized writer, it doesn't matter as long as the result is the same--that you're proud of what you've written. Perhaps you have to start with an outline because the words and ideas in your head are jumbled, obscured, and unclear. Maybe you sit down at your computer, your ideas all thought out, your information bookmarked, and your end all planned in your imagination. It just pours out of you, traveling from your brain, through the heart you put into your work, and out the tips of your fingers as they strike the keys or hold a pen. Once you are familiar with your process then you can produce a story to share with others. From thoughts to research, research to planning, planning to outline, the organized writer gets the same result as the writer who sits down and works on things as they go through the story.

Wattpad, Medium, WordPress, Vocal, and others have all got one common denominator. They attract writers from all walks of life and all different levels of skill. Vocal +, this article is written on, has connected people from the U.K. to Midwest Illinois, Ireland to India, Canada to Ohio, and the list goes on. If you're a content creator on Vocal, then many of the works you'll read are being written by writers from thousands of miles away, throughout different countries. This is the most interesting part of connecting with other members of the online writing community. You may be messaging someone at the end of your day, after midnight or later, and they're looking at a clock that says 1:00 p.m.

Writing on Vocal + has been a real learning experience. After years of toiling away with different stories that never made it past my hard drive or out of different notebooks, it presented a place to share stories with people around the world and touted the possibility of making a decent income in the process. Vocal, a subsidiary of Creatd, actually is fairly good at recruiting people through their membership drives. Right now, Vocal + memberships are being given away for the first two months, no doubt in the hopes you'll write, enjoy the experience, and think that its' worth sticking it out past that first sixty days. Chances are, that a good portion of those that seize on the opportunity will join the over 28,000 paying members sharing their stories with the world. That first two months free means you can try to make some cash by telling your tales and save the $19.98 you would have spent. Money in your pocket, that's always a good thing.

The Summer Fiction Series Challenge, or SFS: Challenge, is at the halfway point. There are still twelve prizes left with a total of $26,000.00 on the line. I've entered them all and am satisfied that I've put some great work into the entries. While some people may enter them numerous times, others skip them, and I've entered as inspiration strikes. The prompts were all fun to play with, mull ideas around, and create entertaining and fun possibilities to be shared with the internet.

Vocal, through its' partners, has managed to award thousands to brilliant writers that have truly inspired others along the way. Through social media groups, writers can promote their work and attempt to get as many reads as possible. If you're social media savvy, able to figure out the best places to showcase your stories, and willing to invest the time and effort into your success on the platform, then you can make anywhere from your platform fees a month up to $6,000.00. Of course, the $6,000.00 dollar mark is going to require truly great stories that are unique enough to attract readers, and a million reads. It sounds incredible, but that's content creating.

Cordelia And The Magical, Mysterious, Links is one of the most fun ideas I have come up with during my time on Vocal+ and is my way of giving a little back to the tremendously supportive community I have found as a member. The idea of a nearly 50-year-old man being visited by a fairy may seem silly at first, but the magic of a fairy is an interesting vessel to adventures that a normal human may not be able to enjoy. As the fairy princess, the cute and diminutive Cordelia, guides the main character through the start of their adventures together, our main character grasps with accepting the impossible, that what he's seeing is real.

The most fun part of writing this story was finding links to use. Remember the links from the title? Those are planted throughout the stories and link to works by other writers, while I plan to explore the link between the world of man and the world of magic. As I've found different stories that amazed, intrigued, or just entertained me, I inserted links into the stories for readers to find. Maybe you'll click on one and find you're one of my favorites. My first edition of Cordelia and The Magical, Mysterious, Links has over a hundred reads in just two weeks. It qualified for a fiction challenge and could make it into the top ten of my stories.

Staying on Vocal + at the end of the day is a personal decision, a personal choice, and one that should come easier than it seems. While I have experienced a certain amount of success on the platform, I've experienced my share of failures. My first and greatest success on Vocal+ was shortly after the spring recruitment drive pulled me in and I became a paying member. Success, as good as it felt, might have been fleeting for the moment. The story that was what set my reads on fire was called Remember These Tips Before Calling Work To Play Hookie. It was written on April 8th, published on April 9th, and had over 1300 reads by April 10th. I swear to you, my readers, that it is a true story. To date, it's been read/viewed over 3400 times.

Trying to recreate the success of my cautionary story about how to not get caught by the boss if you call work saying your sick because you want to go have fun, I thought about other things that I had seen, done, or studied in my free time. What did I have any expertise at? Where do my passions lay and how do I tap into them? What was the reason for my success and how can I recreate that effect? It hit me like a meteor striking the planet. It was the fact that I had chosen a group to post the story to, and chosen it well. I tapped into my professional experiences, posted a story about how not to get caught skipping work, into groups around the most burned-out and underappreciated workers there are. The next story that saw a fair amount of success was the same way, a story about the effects of night shift work on our health and well-being, told by a lifetime night shifter and promoted to professional pages that have night shift workers. What's your expertise or specialty? Tap into that--trust me!

Nobody is going to have a long and successful career or journey as a writer without a fair amount of frustration, struggle, and angst. It's important to remember that, as sit might mean the difference between going crazy about what you love, and just seeming crazy.

As the summer months came and people were released from the long-term lockdowns of Covid-19, I felt fair amounts of frustration growing inside me as I struggled to maintain momentum and my successful read count. The most important thing I learned, was as much as it might feel tempting to quiet, call it done, and walk away, restricting myself from what makes me happy wouldn't be healthy. Having goals, plotting stories, and sharing them with the world lead me to the goals of writing better stories, being more creative, and opening up my soul more than before Vocal. We're all kind of isolated this past year and without Vocal and my new friends, what would my year have been like? As the variants continue to spread, what might the future look like?

You're human. You will struggle to find your "groove" and your "niche" as a writer, or any kind of artist. Forgive yourself. Reach out to the Facebook groups, they'll literally be your best source of support. You'll make new friends and you'll experience new ideas just by reading the messages on the groups like Vocal Media Creators Hub, The Vocal Creators Lounge, and Vocal Creators Support Group.

When you've had a bad run, or a bad day or two, put it aside and go do something else for a while.

Take some time off, take a holiday, and then come back when you're ready.

Tom Bradbury-Vocal Media creator

It's smart advice for anyone. Even the most fun hobbies that people enjoy can become cumbersome and troubling to our daily lives. If we aren't happy, especially in our chosen endeavors, then we should step aside for a while and come back when we have a new perspective. If you love what you're doing, you'll always find your way back to it, even if it takes time.

My last downward turn was just a few weeks ago. I swore I was done. "I give up" and "This just isn't working" came out of my mouth. I had one foot out the door and was ready to accept that I couldn't write, no matter how much I knew that I was wrong. My lack of attracting readers for a few weeks had me feeling like a failure, dejected, and frustrated. Then, I found myself convinced by some truly supportive people in the community, that I needed to chill out and remember, this is supposed to be fun.

As it turns out, I was letting writing become too much like work, and that is just another four-letter word. So, whatever happens, don't forget that there are other things in the world to focus on. Pick up a book and read, read some stories on vocal, go for a walk, a swim, a drive, or a hike. Get those fishing poles out, get your ass to the gym, or watch a movie and just relax. Eventually, your muse will strike and you'll be called to your keyboard or your favorite pen and a notebook.

If you found any of this helpful or enjoyed reading my story then I hope you'll consider letting me know by clicking on the heart icon below. The reach of stories published independently is up to the readers so if you found this helpful or enjoyable consider sharing it with those you know that might benefit from reading my work. Also, if you're not a plus member, Vocal is giving two-month memberships to new subscribers as an introduction to the platform.