Three Things I Learned Publishing My First Book

Notes on asking for help, beginning again, and honoring momentum over milestone

Dear friends,

When Narrative Healing was published a little over two years ago, I stepped into the experience with the confidence of a cat. I was self-possessed, convinced I understood how things would unfold, and confident I could land on my feet no matter what happened.

In my head, I knew publishing.

I had spent decades working alongside authors as their books entered the world, including nearly a decade at Vintage and Anchor Books at Penguin Random House, and later as a consultant and coach. I had shepherded hundreds of launches, guiding books toward readers.

I thought that I understood what would be required. In many ways, that assumption was my first obstacle.

It’s one thing to believe in someone else’s voice. It’s another to stand beside your own. When you publicly share your work, something inside you shifts. This experience isn’t intellectual at all; it demands radical vulnerability.

Also, sharing work successfully is often at odds with what we’ve been taught about achievement. It isn’t powered by independence or self-sufficiency. It’s deeply intertwined with asking for help.

Looking back on my publishing experience, three lessons stay with me. I didn’t fully understand them at the time, but they continue to shape how I support writers and approach my own creative life.

Lesson One: Invite People In

Looking back, I wish I had invited people in earlier.

The truth is, I did more alone than I needed to; not out of martyrdom, but out of habit. I had spent years learning how to be capable and self-reliant. In my childhood home, I often heard: If you want something done, do it yourself. I wore that belief like a badge of honor.

But the vulnerable effort of sharing creative work asks something different of us. Books don’t move through the world by willpower alone. They travel through human connection. They travel through conversations, recommendations, reflections, and shared enthusiasm. They grow through community.

And although I understood this intellectually, I hadn’t yet learned how to embody it. The consequences became clear a few weeks ago when a trusted friend who knows publishing well told me, “About 99.9 percent of the people who would benefit from your book don’t know it exists.”

He suggested a relaunch.“Start with the basics,” he said. “Do a little Amazon review outreach.”

I stopped in my tracks because I knew he was right. I felt a flush of shame realizing I hadn’t even asked my closest friends to review it. My reluctance had worn two costumes, one telling me not to burden them, the other thinking they should have known anyway.

“It’s not too late, Lisa,” he said gently.

He helped me reframe asking for help as inviting people to help readers who might benefit from the book find it. I began to see it wasn’t a burden. It was an opportunity to help readers find my book and to allow others to support me.

I was humbled by how willing people were. Within two weeks, twenty reviews appeared, and more are coming.

Inviting people in doesn’t just generate reviews; it opens pathways. Conversations lead to gatherings. Readings become workshops. Recommendations become classrooms, circles, and communities where the work continues to live and evolve.

Lesson: Asking for help isn’t an imposition; it’s an invitation for connection.

Lesson Two: I wish I had treated launch as momentum, not a milestone

What I didn’t understand when my book was published is that I was treating launch as a verdict, when in reality, it was simply the beginning of momentum.

Some of the pressure I felt came from earlier emotional patterning. I grew up in a culture of high achievement where worth was tied to outcome. Like many of us, and maybe especially those of us socialized as girls, I internalized the belief that if something wasn’t perfect, it wasn’t worth doing.

As a child, I remember deciding that if my drawing wouldn’t hang in a museum, I might as well stop making art. And I did stop. That logic followed me. quietly and without invitation, into publishing my first book.

As I moved toward launch, I was swayed by that same voice. I convinced myself that if my book wasn’t featured on the cover of The New York Times Book Review, I might as well give up. If I didn’t receive this or that A-list blurb or invitation, I had failed. If I didn’t sell a significant number of bulk copies in the first six months, the book was a flop — ad infinitum.

Even writing this out exhausts me.

The truth is, I was fortunate to receive meaningful early attention and support. But I became so focused on what wasn’t working, on what I didn’t receive, I couldn’t see the encouragement right in front of me.

I’ve come to understand that this is what happens when we’re burnt out and stressed. Our nervous system steps in to protect us, scanning for danger, narrowing our perception, wiring us to focus on threat or absence rather than presence.

In that state, it’s basically impossible to register positive and friendly news. Here’s what I know now: publishing a book is a marathon, not a race. The work evolves. And part of the practice is learning to relax enough along the way to take in the good while it’s happening.

For most books (unless they are tied to a specific news event), publication day is not the finish line; it’s the starting line. Sales and attention accrue over time. Readers arrive gradually. Conversations deepen.

Lesson: There is time—the launch is the beginning, not the end.

Lesson Three: Stay in relationship with the work

Years ago, a writer I was working with invited me to join her at a workshop for survivors of gun violence. I didn’t analyze the opportunity or weigh its strategic value. It wasn’t part of my launch plan. I said yes because I cared about her, and because the work felt meaningful.

At the time, it seemed like a simple act of support, showing up, listening, and contributing where I could. I couldn’t have known that experience would eventually lead to developing a trauma-informed writing program for Everytown for Gun Safety, for both survivors and staff.

That experience taught me something I didn’t yet have language for: when you stay present with the work, and with the people who could benefit from it, possibilities emerge that far exceed what you could plan or pursue on your own.

I learned that launching a book rarely unfolds through strategy alone. Whatever I imagined for my book was smaller than what became possible once I stopped forcing a narrative and stayed engaged with what was unfolding in relationship with people who cared about the work and about me.

Lesson: Launch is not only about the book. It is about the work and the relationship you build with the people it reaches.

If you’ve shared creative work of your own, I would love to hear what you’ve learned. These exchanges keep the work alive.

With appreciation for walking alongside this work,
Lisa