Have Faith

Publishing is a lot like jumping from an airplane. Except less fun.

Sorry I haven't been updating lately. I've been a busy little... (bird? Bee? Lawnmower? I don't know) so I haven't had the time. Plus, I don't really know what to talk about half the time. Sometimes I imagine I'm talking to empty space, because I can't imagine anyone wanting to listen to the advice of an unpublished author on how to get published. Go me.

Anyway, like I was saying. Planes. Publishing. Plumiting towards the ground. Right.

Today I recived a partial request for TED. Now, naturally, iw as very excited when I recieved the request. But as I checked through my chapters to comb for any last minute mistakes, the doubts started fluttering in. "There's no way this is good enough. This is all wrong. This writing is horrible. These opening pages don't draw the reader in enough. I could swear this was good last week!"

But what could I do? Rewrite the entire beginning of my book? That would just leave me a mess before I had to send it off. There were some changes I could make, but this was what I had to offer, sink or swim.

So I sent it. Sometimes it's hard to see the merit in your own work when you've spent so long looking at the mistakes. But all you can do is take a deep breath and send it out there. There was something about that book that made YOU write it, and make YOU love it. So all you can do is leap from the plane and hope your parachute open. Or, at least hope someone else likes your work as much as you do.

And if it's a rejection, so? It's not like you've fallen any farther than you were before you sent it out. But you had a chance to get further. If you feel fear when you send yourself out there-- that's a good thing. If you're living your life without fear, you've stopped trying new things, you've stopped making yourself vulnerable. And when you stop making yourself vulnerable, you limit your ability to grow.

So be afraid. You have every right to be. But eventually, you'll stop being afraid of it. And then you can expand your horizons even further, and keep on growing.

Peace.

-Katie