It’s episode 500! Time flies indeed. The first episode of The Creative Penn Podcast was released on 15 March 2009. I had a couple of non-fiction books out, the international Kindle had not even launched, and there was no empowered indie author movement as we know it today. I was living in Ipswich, just outside Brisbane, Australia and I worked as an IT consultant implementing SAP Financials at a large mining company. How things have changed!  I'm now a full-time author and podcaster with over 30 books, fiction and non-fiction. I live in Bath, UK and I'm part of a growing independent author scene. We have more opportunities than ever before and it truly is the best time to be an author! In this episode, I’m going to share some of the biggest lessons I’ve learned over the last 11 years and include clips from podcast episodes that helped me and can help you on your own author journey — some are craft and some are business. This episode covers: * Write what you love * It’s OK to suck in your first draft. Editing is the process that will turn your book into a finished product. * We are independent authors. We create and license intellectual property assets. * All long-term book marketing comes down to one thing * Turning pro and long term thinking. The mindset of the professional author. * Next steps: What's changing for The Creative Penn? Today’s show is sponsored by my wonderful patrons who support the podcast with a few dollars a month through patreon.com/thecreativepenn. Patrons get an extra Q&A show every month — bonus audio! — and also 10% off my courses. Thank you, Patrons! Thanks to my long-term listeners of the podcast and also to the long-term sponsors of the show, Kobo Writing Life, Draft2Digital, Ingram Spark, and more recent sponsors FindawayVoices and ProWritingAid. (1) Write what you love In episode 16, June 2009, I interviewed Tom Evans, back then known as The Bookwright, about writer’s block. Up until that interview, I had only written non-fiction, and I was afraid of writing fiction. I didn’t think I had a block but I clearly did and I realized it as part of this discussion. The ‘block’ was based on my education and background — my parents were teachers, and I did a Masters at the University of Oxford in Theology, so I was steeped in the literary tradition. I thought I had to write something literary whereas my guilty pleasure and my escape from the day job was binge-reading thrillers and watching action movies. Once I realized that I could just write what I loved to read instead of something others thought ‘worthy,’ I was off and writing. I started writing Pentecost (re-edited and re-titled as Stone of Fire in 2012) and I now have 18 novels — and counting! I didn’t have such a good mic set-up back then so it’s a bit breathy, but I think you’ll find it interesting.