Playing the Waiting Game

Probably the most difficult exercise of patience that a writer must experience is waiting for for an editor, agent, graduate school, mentor to tell her if her work is "acceptable." Oh, I know all of the things we tell ourselves -- that publication just wasn't right for me OR I probably wouldn't have liked working with that agent anyway. But you know what, we are just fibbing to ourselves. We tell ourselves those stories in order to comfort ourselves and to keep ourselves from feeling the full effect of rejection. Because trust and believe, when one of the above mentioned individuals tells us that our work is good but not what they are looking for right now, we feel like we just got socked in the belly. Like someone just looked at our pretty little baby and said, "She's alright." Oh, the feeling of being socked in the gut passes -- eventually. But let's not kid ourselves -- one rejection can have the power to render us helpless to the point where the only thing that we are physically, spiritually and/or mentally capable of doing is climb into a warm, comfy bed,watch reruns of Dowton Abbey,and scarf down an entire gallon of Dark Chocolate Häagen-Daz ice cream. I am here to reassure you that it IS okay to do some wallowing when that big let down happens, BUT, we mustn't wallow forever. Like in the immortal words of Scarlett O'Hara, we must remind ourselves that, yes, "tomorrow is another day," and ultimately, no matter how many times THEY say no, we have to continue to do that thing we both love and hate, and that is write.