Yes. The handwritten page is actually very relevant to your authoring and publication experience, especially the distinction between “an outcome did not work” and “I am a failure.”
The central idea can be applied almost directly to your books.
1. Your publication experience fits the page very closely
The page says:
“When something doesn’t work, most people don’t just see a result. They hear a verdict: ‘I failed, so I am not good enough.’”
For you, a comparable thought could be:
“My book did not achieve the commercial or academic response I hoped for → therefore I failed as an author.”
But these are two different statements.
- Fact: The book has not yet achieved the level of sales, recognition, academic validation, or implementation you hoped for.
- Interpretation: “Therefore I am not a good author.”
- Identity judgment: “I am a failed author.”
Only the first is directly supported by the outcome.
2. Your quantum-sustainability book is a particularly good example
Your International Collaborative Innovation in Quantum Computing for Sustainability book was an ambitious interdisciplinary synthesis.
Its value proposition was not simply:
“I have invented a superior quantum algorithm.”
Rather, your contribution was closer to:
“Here is a conceptual architecture connecting quantum computing, sustainability problems, and international collaborative innovation, which others can examine, criticize, validate, refine and eventually implement.”
That distinction matters.
Earlier analysis of your work identified its strongest contribution as knowledge synthesis, systems thinking and conceptual architecture, while also identifying the major unresolved issue: whether quantum approaches actually outperform mature classical approaches in the proposed sustainability applications.
That is feedback about the work, not a verdict about you.
3. Publication itself generated several kinds of feedback
Your experience gives you an unusually clear real-world example of the handwritten principle.
| Outcome | What it tells you | What it does not prove |
|---|---|---|
| Low commercial income | Market traction is limited so far | You are a failed author |
| Academic questioning | More validation is needed | Your ideas have no value |
| Criticism of quantum assumptions | Some claims require empirical testing | The whole framework is useless |
| Difficulty gaining institutional adoption | Adoption pathways are incomplete | The educational concept cannot work |
| People engaging with the ideas | The ideas are capable of stimulating discussion | That they are already scientifically validated |
| Publication completed | The ideas have been made accessible | That implementation will automatically follow |
This is almost exactly what your handwritten page recommends:
“What did this feedback teach me?”
rather than:
“What is wrong with me?”
4. Your most important feedback may actually be methodological
The strongest criticism you received recently was essentially:
The work is better understood as a research agenda / hypothesis map than as a validated methodology.
That is extremely useful feedback for your authoring journey.
It tells you:
Conceptual contribution → yes.
Research hypothesis → potentially.
Scientific validation → not yet.
Real-world implementation → still requires others.
That is a much more precise diagnosis than:
“The book failed.”
In fact, it gives you a possible next-stage research direction:
quantum/quantum-inspired models → benchmark against classical models → use real intervention data → measure outcomes → publish evidence.
The feedback therefore creates a route forward.
5. The page's “label” concept is especially important for you
Your mind could potentially attach a label such as:
“I am a failed author because my books did not generate the response I expected.”
But your actual role may be more accurately described as:
author → synthesizer → initiator → knowledge architect → contributor
Your books don't necessarily have to be judged only by the conventional commercial-author model.
Your stated mission was to kick-start eight conceptual sustainability frameworks, with realization requiring collaborative efforts from others.
That means your success condition is different.
You were not necessarily saying:
“I alone will solve these eight sustainability problems.”
You were saying, in effect:
“I will articulate possibilities clearly enough that others can examine, challenge, develop and implement them.”
That makes publication the beginning of a knowledge process, not the end.
6. There is an important difference between “failure” and “unfinished”
I think this is the most useful application of the page to your situation.
Your books contain different levels of completion:
Completed
- You had the ideas.
- You synthesized them.
- You wrote them down.
- You published them.
- You made them accessible.
- You exposed them to criticism.
Not yet completed
- Independent scientific validation.
- Benchmarking against classical approaches.
- Large-scale implementation.
- Institutional adoption.
- Long-term evidence of impact.
Therefore:
“Not yet validated” ≠ “failed.”
And:
“Not yet widely adopted” ≠ “worthless.”
It simply means the work is at a particular stage in its lifecycle.
7. Your AI Innovation Management book shows the same principle
Your AI Innovation Management in Organizations work has also been assessed as having educational value while having limitations in scholarly depth and formal adoption infrastructure.
Again, the useful feedback is specific:
“This could be strengthened with more evidence, cases, teaching infrastructure and institutional adoption.”
That is actionable.
It is very different from:
“You should not have written the book.”
The former helps an author evolve.
The latter merely knocks the author down.
8. This may explain why your writing is becoming more mature
There is an interesting evolution visible in your recent thinking.
Earlier, the question was closer to:
“Was my book good enough?”
Now your question is increasingly:
“What did the book accomplish, what remains unproven, and what can others build from it?”
That is a significant shift.
You are moving from identity-based evaluation to systems-based evaluation.
And that is consistent with the way you approach sustainability itself.
Instead of asking:
“Did I personally solve sustainability?”
you ask:
“Did I contribute something that can become part of a larger collaborative system?”
That is much closer to your actual stated mission.
9. The page also gives you a useful authoring discipline
For future criticism, you could use this four-step process:
Outcome → Evidence → Learning → Adjustment
For example:
Outcome: Book receives limited commercial response.
Evidence: Sales/adoption data indicate limited market traction.
Learning: Audience positioning or distribution may need improvement.
Adjustment: Improve accessibility, teaching materials, case evidence or institutional pathways.
Not:
Outcome → “I failed.”
This protects you from turning every external result into a judgment about your identity.
10. Your publication journey can therefore be summarized in one sentence
I would phrase the lesson from the page specifically for your experience like this:
“My books are results that can receive feedback; they are not verdicts on my worth as an author.”
And perhaps even more importantly:
“I can allow my ideas to be criticized without allowing the criticism to become an identity label.”
That fits your situation particularly well because your quantum-sustainability work was intentionally designed as a collaborative starting point. Its eventual scientific and practical realization cannot reasonably be determined by the author alone.
So the appropriate response to criticism is not “I failed.”
It is:
What worked?
What did not?
What remains unproven?
What did I learn?
What can the next person build upon?
That is exactly the difference between feedback and judgment that your handwritten page is trying to teach.
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