Fear and loathing in the publishing world

I've made the critical mistake as a writer of paying too much attention to what is going on in the publishing world.  Borders has gone down, BN needs a buyer.  Agents are now publishers and everyone and his mother is suddenly an Indie author.  My head is spinning.  Somebody, stop the madness!!!

Actually, that's not the part that has me flustered; it is all the conflicting advice from the "experts" in the field.  There's the indie-only camp that claims that only a blockhead would sign with a major publisher now.  Then there's the traditional/legacy/whatever-you-wanna-call-it camp who thinks self-pubbed folks are setting themselves up for an eventual fall.

Either or both sides may be right, however what truly bothers me is the unspoken undercurrent often  inherent in both arguments.  If you're not doing it like we're doing it, then you are not cool enough, hip enough, worthy enough, whatever enough to endure past this current publishing hiccup. There's absolutely nothing wrong with gathering information, inspiration and advice from all the din in the publishing arena right now, but as always it's best to do your own thing and your own thinking. As clever as I find the meme,  should you really do what JA (as in Konrath) or JK (as in Rowling) or even DS (as in me) does?  Could be, but only if it suits your goals, your plan, your idea of what your writing or your career should be like.  

I have to admit here also that I am  also a recovering tradpubaholic.  I admit I have been known to say "if you ever see me self-publishing anything you can know for sure that the podpeople have gotten me."  Okay, not my best prognostication of what my future in publishing would be. It was also fear speaking, as in I couldn't consider myself truly published unless someone outside of me (agents, editors) found me worthy.

Now, aside from a couple bad covers and other minor indignities, my experience with traditional publishing was a very good one.  This is also not to say that I wouldn't accept another legacy publishing contract if it were offered.  What's changed is my belief that that is the only valid means of being published.  So I will be bringing out some of my backlist and a couple other projects indie.  What can I say? Times and circumstances change and what may be right at one time may not make sense later on.  

So here's the upside of all this publishing hooha--in times of flux it is possible to really carve out something new and exciting in the midst of chaos.  Where there is crisis there is also opportunity.  And with any decision being made, you have the opportunity to move forward in love or in fear.  Do you subject yourself to all the hype on either side, threatening doom or at least a poor result for your writing career if you don't do it their way, or will you follow the call of your own inner drummer leading you your own way?  How do you decide what's right for you?  

As always, I advocate thinking of the most loving thing you can do in a situation and choosing that.  What is the thing you would love most?  Which makes you feel best about yourself and your writing?  Which adds to your feelings of worth, power, contentment, creativity, love, joy?  What does your intuition rather than your logic guide you toward?  What would __ (insert your own initials) do?  Do that.