Twitter for the Distractible and Retiring

By Kirsten Voris

Disclaimer: This is not a Twitter primer. It’s a look at how one writer began to get over herself and hammered the first nail into her media platform.

I have two domain names and no website. A poorly curated LinkedIn. Otherwise, I have shunned social media. When I hear the word platform I close up like a Venus flytrap at mealtime. I hate the idea of spending time on it. My words, I decided, will sell themselves. Magically.

Then, in August, I attended a Memoir Proposal Workshop at the Hippocamp Creative Nonfiction Conference. I have no proposal-ready memoir, but I like to over-prepare. As it turns out, I needed to be on-hand to receive a message from the cosmos via Brevity’s Social Media Editor, Allison K Williams.

NEWSFLASH: I don’t need Instagram and Facebook and Twitter to have a platform. It’s more effective to do one well.

Only one!

My all-or-nothing thinking was still coming to grips when Allison described her Twitter tending.

Once a day, during the morning bathroom visit. Then, fini.

Limits! Here was an example of someone who could set them. Could I?

My butt-in-chair writing lifestyle is fragile. I rely on the Pomodoro technique. My writing partner. I need scaffolding. Accountability. Do I want to add platform grooming to the list of things I am compelled to do to sell the writing I have only just begun producing?

Or was it another task I’d abuse to avoid my date with @tomatotimer?

Seated among the motivated and the proposal-ready, I gave in to the ambient vibe. Writing memoir? Platforms are just part of the deal.

I chose Twitter.

Because: character limit. And I could manage it during my morning toilette.

But I needed more limits.

Limit One: There is a Time for Tweeting and a Time for Writing and it’s Not the Same Time.
Recently, I went on silent retreat. No phone no computer no talking. For three days, I did one thing at a time. When I came home and began unpacking, sorting, emailing, eating—simultaneously—it felt icky. Multi-tasking confuses me.

Limit Two: Hit Send and Let It Go.
As of this writing, I have tweeted 9 times. With each tweet, I fret: I’m unoriginal, un-writerly, dull. Oh, and self-absorbed. But tweeting is like writing an essay. At some point, I have to decide I’m done.

Limit Three: Keep it Writing Related
Twitter is a distraction minefield. My no-go list: Cats. Celebrities. Celebrity cats. Old boyfriends. People who suddenly stopped talking to me. Politics. I make an exception for Turkish politics written in Turkish by former neighbor @aykan_sever. Otherwise, Twitter is for my writing life, not @RealGrumpyCat.

Limit Four: No Late-Night Tweeting
The night I set up Twitter I could not sleep. I kept thinking about the profile I’d posted. In haste. Really? Why those seven words? It was well past midnight when I got up and dosed myself with homeopathic nerve tonic. Eventually, I slept. But I didn’t get on my phone. The phone amplifies ruminating. It’s a bright light. If I don’t sleep I can’t write.

Limit Five: Tweet to Give Love Not to Get It
Writers and editors have read my essays. Journals have published and rejected them. What have I done for these folks lately?

I’m part of a community. Tweeting, retweeting, liking and commenting on blog posts, essays and insights that inspire me is a way to support the community. Plus, I feel good when I do it. Plus it’s better than imagining everyone in Platform Land is ignoring me out of spite because my credits are 3 essays and an (unpublishable) 600-page manuscript.

Having established limits, I come to the heart of the problem. I still don’t want to draw attention to myself. Without a platform, I have heard, I’m as good as invisible.

Yes. I think. Right on.

However, few will see my work. And I claim to want that kind of attention.

I write because can’t think of a more gratifying way to spend my precious life energy. I dread writing and feel amazing when I’ve written. By joining Twitter I put myself on notice. I take my writing seriously. Twitter is part of my job, which is writing. This is my mantra.

But I need more than a mantra. Twitter requires stickers. I paste them in my journal, a visual reminder of each fearsome task I complete.

I have a vast sticker stockpile. I love to sticker shop. And take coffee breaks and watch cat videos. During writing time. Even without social media, I am distractible. So why not tweet? And commit to tweeting well? In support of my job. Which is writing.

I gave myself a frog sticker for writing this blog post. I will earn a dragon for sending it out. I celebrate patient improvement. I can learn to shill. Who better to shill for me, than me?
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Kirsten Voris tweets @bubbleate and gardens in Tucson, Arizona. You can find her #CNF @SuperstitionRev, @theknicknackery, @hippocampusmag and in two forthcoming anthologies. She is currently reworking the biography of a stage mentalist and planting her winter garden #amwriting #gardening.