I made my own covers

This sounds bragging but read on. Some well-known, successful, important, handsome, famous, self-confident, super rich (add your own adjectives) persons have publicly claimed that it is impossible to make your own book covers, do your own editing and layout, and still be successful. Well, I did all that, and still made more than a million dollars. I was not perfect but nobody criticized me. I should add that English is not my mother tongue, I did my own drawings, too (they are naïve but original and charming), I made my own press releases and got about 500 write-ups, some several pages long, I wrote in three languages, and success found me.

How is that even possible? I mention some ways in my new book, Sell Your Words. Here are some points in retrospect:

• Be different. It takes courage but media loves people with courage and will reward them with publicity. It makes a good story.
• Price your books to give them good value and great content. Can’t go wrong with that. I priced mine at five bucks postpaid to get started and it was magic.
• Turn your publicity around and around while it’s fresh with publicity value. It won’t last forever. New ideas and new books will come and replace yours.
• Be ready to write new books before your current one has run out of steam, so just keep on going.
• Learn your computer really well so you don’t depend on others or have to pay others.
• Ideas are everywhere and many are worthwhile. Grab those ideas from thin air as soon as they appear.
• Respect self-publishing as amazingly cost-effective. You need hardly anything to do it. You do need an idea and passion and time, and if you have all three, you are all set to go. Write even in a corner of your own closet, time is free.
• It intimidates some but being rich doesn’t mean everything. You can hire help when you have millions of dollars to draw from. What about your personal self-esteem or education or lessons learned through difficulties? What would you be without all your money?
• OK, I take it back. Money is useful, it impresses others and helps but it’s best if you earned it by your own wits and courage. Have wisdom and decide what’s important and possible even without money.
• Success that comes through your own courage and honesty is a valuable commodity and nobody can take it away from you. It builds you a platform for new things in your future.
• Say thank you to anyone who helps you on your journey. It’s more important than you realize.
• Help others. Be genuine, listen to others and help, not necessarily with money but with understanding and advice to give what the others need. When you help others, it somehow comes back to you. It’s one of those unexplainable little miracles in life. Don’t wait for it as it might take a few days or weeks and might not announce itself when it comes. Just do it and it brings good things along. When you look back, you will see it later.
• Have a bit of humility and modesty so you don’t sound to others too full of yourself. Helping others doesn’t take anything away from you. True help comes from the sincere love of humankind. This may sound preaching but try it and you will feel good about yourself.
• Analyze negative reviews. They might be right, or jealous, or narrow-minded. Sometimes there might be at least some truth. Maybe the person behind it needed to vent her feelings and has maybe different taste. Don't let it defeat you. Maybe something good will come out of it.
• Accept and celebrate your success, be aware, be grateful. It is truly fun to keep on struggling and accomplishing something unique. Life is short and unpredictable. Treasure it in many ways from smelling the roses on your path, looking at the nature through seasons, thinking what you might do to help others, walking in the rain when you still can walk.
• If you love to write, keep writing, keep reading. If you have left behind one useful book when your time is over, you have blessed others for a while, and might be blessing others much longer than you’d know. Think of it as an invisible mentor.
• Make your book a good book, useful, funny, practical, interesting, invaluable, silly, worthwhile, shocking, intelligent, helpful, motivating, maybe worth it for destroying a tree, or maybe make it digital and let the tree live longer, or plant a new tree. It’s said that in their lifetime one should do three things: plant a tree, have a child, write a book. And you are allowed to do each in multiples, and so much else.