The Ten Stages of (Publication) Rejection

Rejection Stage 1:

I'm okay, everything is fine, I'll find rep somewhere else

Rejection Stage 2:

                                                        But why didn't they like it

Rejection Stage 3:

                                                           They don't understand it!

                                                   They're so unfair, I worked so hard!

Rejection Stage 4:

                   I'm trash. I'm shit, I'm a terrible writer, I'm not even human why should I try anymore

Rejection Stage 5:

I WILL CUT AND BURN YOU UNTIL YOU SHINE BRIGHT LIKE A DOITSU GOD DAMN IT

Rejection Stage 6:

                                                                               y this

Rejection Stage 7:

                                                                              Sleep

Rejection Stage 8:

                                      Did I write this poorly, or was it just not up to their tastes?


Rejection Stage 9:

             Cheetos and Ginger Ale and Comfort Writing ab something else to rinse the taste away

Rejection Stage 10:

                                                             Reluctant acceptance.  

                                                  Time to move on and try again.

4 Lies You Tell Yourself During NaNoWriMo

     With NaNoWriMo just eight days away, I decided to kick off my writing blog's re-activation with a post about the self-same!  Buckle your seatbelts kids, 'cause today I take off the training wheels and give you a taste of what it's like to be a big boy!  These are 4 lies you tell yourself during NaNoWriMo, and the reasons why they're full of shit.

1.  I'll Do It Later

     Mmmmmm no you won't.

     Listen, I know; I've been there myself.  You insist, "I'll do it later, I promise, I swear," and then it never gets done and you fall asleep and wake up the next morning and groan because oh great, now you've got twice as much to write today as you did yesterday!

     Do it now, while you're thinking about it.  You'll thank yourself later.

2.  I Don't Have Time Today

     Honey, it's November, ain't nobody got time for anything.  It's midterm season, it's holiday season, it's family drama season, everything goes crazy in November and you will never have time.

     So you have to make it.  Stick a knife into your day and carve out the time if you have to, even if it's just five minutes here and fifteen minutes there.  Use your lunch break to get some writing done, you can type or scribble or dictate between bites!  Install Dragon on your phone and talk it through your scenes while you're driving home from work, or walking to school, or tip-tap some paragraphs on your ipad while you ride the bus or train or magical flying kangaroo to whatever the hell it is your afternoon is full of.

     Even if you have to wake up at four in the morning to get those 1,667 words out, you do it.  Because the truth is, you're never going to have time, and life is always going to get in the way.  If you want to win this thing, you need to make your own time, and guard it with your life, the way a dragon hoards gold.  You are a word-dragon, and your story must be told.  ROAR.

3.  It Doesn't Matter/It's Not Important

     Maybe it doesn't matter to your neighbor, or your friends, or even your parents or your wife or your kids or your dog.  Maybe it doesn't matter to anyone else in the entire world, but it matters to you, doesn't it?  It certainly mattered enough for you to make the commitment.

     And you're the only one it has to be important to.  Newsflash:  No one's WIP is ever important to anyone except the person writing it until it's been published.  And once it's published it could be the most important gd book in the entire goddamn world, or at least a super important book to one person, which is just as good.  In fact, your book could be the catalyst that changes someone's entire life, and you just don't know it yet because we're three-dimensional beings passing through the fourth dimension as if it were a linear plane.

     But before that book is published, it needs to be written.  It can't be important if it never exists in the first place.  Except for inside you--you believe it's important, don't you?

     Then write it, damn it.

4.  I'm Too Tired/Hungry/Thirsty, etc

     Me too!  I mean fuck, why am I always tired, amirite?  Is it all my medications?  Or the drugs?  Or the alien probe lodged deep into my hypothalamus?  Who knows!

     But dude, my dude my friend my sweet Florida bucket of orange juice, you need to keep going.  Get those words out, comrade.  Pound them out of the keyboard like you never pounded a keyboard before--and I know about the summer of aught nine, so I have some high expectations from you.

     Seriously though.  I know you're tired, and you need your sleep, you're hungry and you need food, you're thirsty and you need thirty barrels of Irish coffee STAT or you won't be able to stand another second of staring at this too-bright screen and oh god now you've got a migraine and you absolutely cannot work in these conditions, can you?

     Only you can.  Get your food and drink and guzzle and chow down between word sprints--maybe you reward yourself with a bite every fifty words or something.  You can multitask.  As for sleepiness, you can write while you're tired.  It may not be the best thing that ever flew from out your fingers, but sure as heck by gosh by golly, words will appear!  And then you can edit them in January, after you've hit 50k.

     You can write tired, you can write hungry, thirsty, achey, breaky, keyboard-hatey, whatever your current mood and physical condition.  It doesn't have to be gold, it just has to be words.

     "I'm too ___" leads to "I'll do it later," and then we're back at square one and nothing gets done!  Just do what you have to do.  Keep writing, and don't stop; chances are good that no one's keeping track except for you, but you don't want to let yourself down, do you?

     Don't sabotage yourself, pally.  When the bomb drops, you don't want to be the only person you can blame--that one's a bitter pill to swallow, and very large, too.  Don't make me shove it down your throat!

     Just get the words out.  You can do it; I believe in you, and you should believe in you, too.

Avoiding Writer's Burnout

1.  Write 2k Everyday--No matter what yesterday's wordcount was

     Maybe 2k is too much for you, maybe your wordcount is more like 1k a day, or maybe you even do more than 2k in the average day.  Whatever the case, you set your goal, and that's your goal.  So hit it.  And if you miss it?

     Oh well!

     Don't try to "make up" for your previous days (unless you know you have the stamina or you're on a tight schedule of course).  Just try to hit today's wordcount, and worry about yesterday's wordcount after you're finished.

     It can be overwhelming, especially if you skip a day--or worse, several!  Sometimes you just need to take care of the now before you take care of the past.


2.  Take care of yourself

     Drink lots of water, eat healthy foods, get exercise, take asprin when you need it, take your meds if you have/need them, take naps, get lots of sleep.  Your brain, believe it or not, is a part of your body, and if your body isn't heathy, neither is your mind.  The better you feel in body, the better able to concentrate on your story you'll be.

     And if you let your health decay and get yourself sick, you'll lose valuable writing time, as well as getting behind in your other daily duties.  You should also ...


3.  Hang out with friends

     Take breaks.  Hang out with people.  Socialize.  You'll feel better afterward, I promise.  Well, unless you have anxiety.  Then it's a fifty-fifty.  Still, you should try it!  Find writer friends if you can so you can BS about how hard writing is and nobody understands and find commiseration in your conversations.

     Human contact goes a long way toward keeping you happy and healthy; if nothing else, it will give you more material to work with.


4.  Unfollow toxic people on twitter

     I try not to unfollow people if I don't have to--it's like distancing yourself from a friend, and I've always had trouble extricating myself from toxic people and environments.  Unfortunately, I use Twitter as a source of inspiration from time to time--or at least a distraction.  Whatever you want to call it.

     And when I go on Twitter to take a quick break, post about my writing progress, encourage others, etc., I sometimes get caught up in the political bullshit going on in the world, and the asshole things other people are saying, and I get so upset sometimes I can no longer write--all I can do is bury myself in pillows and blankets and listen to loud music to keep from screaming.

     The more toxic the poster, the less able I am to return to my work.  So a few weeks ago I made the decision to unfollow some people who were making my Twitter feed downright unappetizing to attend to, and I haven't regretted it since.  I still get distracted, of course, but not the sick, "I'm-going-to-kill-someone" distracted.  Not as frequently, anyway.

     And whether or not you use social media for inspiration or distraction or discussion or none of the above, if you find that certain parties are always posting content or making comments that upset you, unfollow them.  Just do it, get them off your dash; you are in no way obligated to keep following anyone, and life's too short to be handing all that power over to the assholes.  You'll be much happier, and much more productive, with that negativity cut out of your life.

5.  Listen to music, read books, get excited

     Take time to do things that relax you.  Listen to music while you write, or take walks, or just close your eyes and let it sink in.  Read a good book just because you can and you know you want to, get excited about someone else's world and characters, draw fanart, write fanfiction, draw art of your own story, write fanfiction for your own work because it amuses you.  Call these "writing hours" or "research hours" if you have to.

     The big secret to not burning yourself out, is simply to not burn yourself out.  Rest.  Take a nap.  Set it aside and come back to it.  And if you're more frustrated than you are excited?  Maybe it's time you took a step back, maybe worked on another project.

     As a writer, it's important to push yourself and investigate uncomfortable truths, but if you push yourself too hard too fast, you'll catch fire, and might lose your taste for the work.  You'll certainly find yourself needing a break, and it's better to take the small breaks as needed than to end up needing breaks that last for months.

     Take care of yourself, writers, and the writing will take care of itself.

(Okay not really, you still have to actually do the writing part)

(But it did sound like a cool closing statement, amirite?)