Look Ahead, Not Back

What do you do the day after you receive a rejection after submitting a query or a manuscript or short piece? We know what you probably did on the day that slap in the face arrived. You most likely deflated like a pin-pricked balloon or maybe you ranted while storming around your house. You might even have cried, especially if it was not a first-time rejection for that submission. 

It's quite alright to react in a way that helps you absorb the hurt. The disappointment and disgust--oh yes, we often feel disgusted when a rejection arrives--show that you're normal. No one in their right mind would accept a rejection with glee. 

Our poster for today has good advice. Those broken pieces of yesterday need to stay there. Don't carry them with you into today. The new day is a new beginning. Start by checking your list of places you had planned to submit to. What? You don't have a list? That means you need to take time to find multiple places where you can submit your work next. 

No one ever said the first editor you approach is going to swoop up your submission, clutch it to his/her breast and exclaim "Eureka!" Every writer knows stories of famed authors who had to submit over and over again before their work was accepted and published. Sure, we know those stories but do we apply that procedure to ourselves? Not always. Why?

It could be that it's a lot of work to turn to the submission Ferris wheel. It's also a surefire method to set yourself up for disappointment. There is no guarantee that the second time you submit your piece it will be taken. Or the third, or fourth or...  

In the writing world, very little is set in concrete. Our work is steeped in maybes. Maybe it will, maybe it won't. 

How passionate are you about getting your work published? Answer that question honestly. Then, ask yourself if you are willing to persevere until you find a degree of success. 

I think one of the hardest things we writers must do is to be honest with ourselves. When we soul search, we need to answer as objectively as possible. Easy to say, harder to do. 

Start each new day with the attitude that it is a new day and you're not going to sweep up the discards of yesterday and put them in your pocket to needle you. Look ahead with hope instead of backward with regret.