: Get an Agent: I sold my book on my own, largely because younger me hated the idea of signing over 15% of my profits to someone else forever. But a good agent does a lot more than

@Kevin153

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Get an Agent: I sold my book on my own, largely because younger me hated the idea of signing over 15% of my profits to someone else forever. But a good agent does a lot more than just sell the book. As a writer, you want someone else looking after the business aspects of your book so you can concentrate on writing. That really kicked in for me when I couldn't get the rights to my book back.
Publishing is just the first step: Even if you have a good publisher AND a good agent, you'll need to be ready to work hard to promote your book if you want it to be a success. It doesn't just happen on its own.
One book is not a career: Even a popular, critically acclaimed book is unlikely to earn you enough to live on --even for a year, let alone the rest of your life. You'll either have to convert the success of that book into a secondary career --as a public speaker, or a teacher, or a talking head, etcetera --or you'll need to keep on writing and publishing. You haven't won the lottery. There are famous, well-respected writers --maybe some of the people you admire and envy --who barely make a living. There are others who are doing well, but through doors that opened to them as a respected writer, rather than on raw book sales alone.
Make Peace With Writing For Yourself: Most people write because they want to reach an audience. But an awful lot of what ends up as good writing is exploratory, or drafts, or world-building, or false turns. It isn't skippable, or avoidable --it's necessary work. But no one but you will ever read it. If you can't face that fact, you can't write. If you demand every word be publishable, you'll never write anything.
Be in it for the Long Haul: Writing, especially as a career, is an endurance race, not a sprint.

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