Happy Monday morning! It’s going to be a great writing week!
So there we were sitting in the bleachers for the first home game of the season. The sun arched high, hot on our skin, the fans ignited by the thrill of a new season of football, the smell of the tailgate grills stirring our need for a burger…
And our boys on the field were falling apart. After a fantastic first half, they’d come out and handed the game away to our rather nasty opponents until the moment, with 1:35 left in the game, we fell behind by six points.
I mentioned that we had 1.35 left in the game, right? We got the ball on the 25 yard line and a thread of despair filtered through the crowd.
You know what happened next. Like any great football story, the team rallied. They threw a 25 yard pass. Ran the ball, threw another pass and made a quick dash for the end zone.
We were on our feet for the extra point, already cheering our win.
Easy-peasy.
Except, to our horror, a defender got a hand on it and our dreams died as the ball alley-ooped wide of the goalpost.
We lost in overtime.
Crushing, after our rally. And, our second defeat of the season. The sun suddenly seemed a scorcher, and we become well aware of our sunburns and empty stomachs, defeat bitter in our gut.
It feels a little like that moment when you hear a publisher is bringing your book to committee, trying to decide if they want to buy it only to hear that they passed. Or worse, rejected it with “some revisions” and you work furiously with the wild hope you might get picked up next time.
Only to have them say no.
Or maybe you’ve worked hard on a novel only to have it panned by reviewers even though your beta readers loved it.
Or you’ve written an entire story for the first time in your life—only to have an editor say, “it needs more work.”
Whatchya gonna do?
Do you want it? Enough to let your bruises heal, get your head back in the game and go to work again? Because that’s when you look inside and say…WHY? Why do I want this?
Hopefully its because you know your story matters. Remember, getting published isn’t magic—it’s hard work.
But here are some truths the might help you get back up.
- No one can write the story that you’ve been given. Only you see the unique view, only you can tell from the truths you’ve learned.
- If you don’t get back up and keep fighting, you’ll never discover the truth you’re meant to learn in the journey. And you’ll never realize the feeling of knowing you did something that your heart called you to do.
- And, if your story is destined to be published and you never find the strength to give it to the world, the truths in it will never find a home in a reader’s heart. They will never be changed. Or blessed.
Your story matters. And the journey to writing your story matters.
Get back up. Get your head in the game. Don’t give up.
Because next time, you just might win.
Go write something brilliant!
Susie May
P.S. This week in Novel.Academy, we’re going to be talking about how to take your dreams and put them into a workable plan for true impactvitiy. Join us for Fall enrollment for only $20/mo. ($20/month or $200/year) Check out Novel.Academy and get the tools to write a brilliant novel!