I’m leaving tomorrow on a business trip.

I’ve spent the past several weeks organising it – talking to sales people, arranging hotels, receiving press packets. I’ve been gathering article ideas, working on queries and all the while I’ve been thinking over and over, “This is what I want to do.”

When I first began writing I wasn’t sure what kind of writing I wanted to do. I was completely baffled by what I’d write, who I’d write for and how it all worked. All I knew is that I wanted to write.

I started to write human interest pieces because I had done that on a personal website for years with much success. When I submitted those articles to an editor, she rejected them but was interested in my website and asked if she could publish some entries. She did and I received such an amazing response from readers of the magazine that she published my entries again.

I became an Inspirational Writer.

The title always bothered me as it’s been my goal even before writing to be an inspiration by doing and not just by talking about something. I wanted to show people that it can be done because I did it and not just because I could write a good article on it. However, without direction and confidence, I continued to write inspirational essays.

It worked for me for awhile but I knew I wanted to do more. As I learned more about who I was and how I wrote, I realised that I needed to move into another direction, and travel writing seemed like a good place to do.

Getting into travel writing was hard because it was so different than what I was writing – it was a challenge that scared me at first but then slowly excited me.

The transition took awhile but as I gained confidence in my skills and abilities, I opened up my travel website, queried magazines like crazy and slowly started to become successful at it. By making the idea of travel writing real, I convinced myself that it wasn’t just something I wanted to do, but was doing.

And I have to say, I’m loving it.

Travel writing combines my passion for travel and story telling with my love of “making deals” as it were. Contacting hotel people and tour operators gives me that outside connection, the buzz of putting something together and the ability to share my inside knowledge (I worked in tourism for 6 years before getting into corporate America).

It’s taken me a lot of trial and error over a long period to find my niche in the writing world, but I’ve found it. And finding it has helped re-energise my passion and interest in writing.

I’m no longer drifting in the writing world – I’ve found my home.

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