A Huge Bump
A new Change Log comic about celebrating small wins.
I’ll be honest. I don’t have a huge following online.
So I 100% identify with Ollie (the small white dog, if you’re new around here) in this comic. Let me pull back the curtain a bit. Here’s a peek at my subscribers for this newsletter:
Why am I showing you this?
It’s not for pity. Admittedly, these numbers aren’t great and of course I’d love for them to be higher. (By the way, if you’re not a subscriber or if you want to help me bump these numbers by sharing this with your friends, I would be extremely grateful!)
I could go one of two ways with these numbers. I could focus on the fact that 61 is a really small number compared to a lot of people’s audience. It would be really easy to feel bad about this and question if the amount of time and creative effort that I put into this is worth it - and believe me, I’ve been down that road.
The second option, though, is to focus on the other number. The nice little green number with the arrow pointing up.
The one that says my audience is growing.
And sure, the pessimist in me will pop up and say “pfft… 3 people? Why would you celebrate that?”
I’ll tell you why.
A few years ago I had a table at the Baltimore Comic Con. Artist Alley tables there aren’t cheap, but they’re not super expensive either. My sales were ok, but I barely made back the cost of the table so I was a bit disappointed.
However… at that convention I gave out a bunch of free sketches and talked to tons of people. One of those people happened to like what I do so much that he hired me to do illustration work for him for several years.
I read all the time from social media business gurus and coaches that the biggest difference between successful people and unsuccessful people is that the successful ones just didn’t quit.
So anyway, that’s why I’m writing this.
As a reminder to anyone who may be reading it - and to myself - that, no matter how small you feel, no matter how the odds might be stacked against you… you never know when you’ll reach that one person or hit on that one idea that could change things.
Keep going. And keep focusing on the arrow that’s pointing up… no matter how small the numbers are.
The only way out is through.
Thanks for reading! If you want to see more of my artwork/sketches/ramblings, follow me on X and here on Substack Notes. And if you really want to support me, I have a store!
Also, if you’re into political cartoons, I have another newsletter called Political Nomad with a new comic every Thursday.
Have a great week!
-Brad