Lag Time, Eat My Dust

Awhile ago I wrote about why we shouldn't quit, even when it looks like we're not getting anywhere. Honestly, I wrote it to encourage myself as much as anyone - I'd submitted an article to 17 magazines and hadn't heard back from one. I should've known better, but still I wondered:  was the article that terrible? Had I offended editors in some way?

Then I submitted it to a few more places. And a 2nd article to 38 markets; and then a 3rd piece to 20 markets.

Finally, it appeared in my inbox:

RE:  Submission

One acceptance came. Then a second. And a third. I even received an acceptance for an article I'd sent out 5 months earlier. And that lag time is the unfortunate (and amazing) thing about writing - that you can FEEL like you're just running in place and know in your gut that you're never going to get anywhere - and with one editor's email find out that you're a total dunderhead who's been obsessing for no reason. In fact, I just read about a whole book dedicated to Writer's Doubt.

The trick is, well, to trick ourselves into moving forward, despite "knowing" that we're not getting anywhere. That could mean keeping tabs on the positive progress you've made by marking it on a chart, or meeting with a writing group weekly.  Whatever it takes, to keep moving forward and working towards that goal.

Linklove,
Colleen

Why Quitting Is a Mistake

Last week I submitted an article to 17 regional parenting publications and have heard back from not a one. Other writers have told me this isn't unusual for RPP's, but I've always been contacted within a week in this market.

Successful blogger Mary Jaksch of A-list Blogging and Write to Done would call this pause "lag time," and says that whenever we put ourselves out there, there's some lag time between production and response, between submission and acceptance, between creating a blog and getting readers and comments.

When we're lucky, the lag time is a few days. Other times it could take weeks or more. The error is to mistake this pause as failure. Writers who do this quit blogging on the cusp of (an unseen) success or stop submitting articles just shy of an acceptance.

The empty inbox always threatens to freeze my progress as I obsessively (and unproductively) poke holes in my submitted article. It's easy to get caught up in the TOO's:  of course they don't want it, it's too short/too long/too general/too self-involved.  But it's so much better to focus on the DO's; on what else can be done to make progress.

Now, if a significant amount of time and effort is poured into it and there's still no response, that's a good reason to analyze things and figure out if something needs to be changed.

But until then, it's all about Building Momentum, about - as scientists would say - building pressure. While it appears as if nothing is happening, each submission (or 17 submissions..), blog, written chapter or simple admission of "I'm a writer" adds more and more pressure until progress is inevitable and as visible as any scientific reaction.

Linklove,
Colleen

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Rejection, Shmijection

Have a Case of Rejection Depression?

Surviving Revision #21

Rejection Shmijection

Sign into your email and see it sitting there:

Sender: Editors

Subject: Cahoots Magazine

Tell yourself not to get excited. Decide to open and read every other email first, just to prove how UNexecited you really are. But still, once you finish diligently reading "Are the best jobs posted on the internet?" and "Keyword Basics Part 5," realize you can't fool yourself any longer and feel an excited thump in your chest as you click on that email.

Did they accept the article?

Well, no.

They didn't.

But hey - on the bright side, this is one of the nicest rejection letters you've seen. First of all, they took the time to respond. They've thanked you twice and asked for future submissions. And there at the end, there's a real editor's name:  someone you can contact with future submissions, instead of sending them into a big form-email slush bin.

Tell yourself these are good things. Feel like they aren't. Acknowledge that no matter what you tell yourself, rejection hurts. At this point, know that you can do one of two things:

a)   Suddenly get so busy with everything else in your life that there's "no time" to submit the article - or any others, for that matter - anywhere else.
b)   Find a way to get past the rejection.

Choose B. Remember that tidbit you read the other day:  a baseball player with a .300 batting average—the game's standard of excellence—still fails at bat seven out of ten times. That's a 70% failure rate. Remember that like baseball, writing is a negative game. That means that in order to get one article published, you'll first need to receive many rejections. Think of the authors who learned this first-hand, including Flannery O'Connor, John Cheever, Raymond Carver, and Kurt Vonnegut, Jr. In fact, Raymond Carver stopped sending stories to one magazine because he'd been rejected from it so many times.

Recognize that persistence pays off. Twenty major publishers said that 'Chicken Soup for the Soul' had no commercial appeal, and 'The Godfather' was continuously turned down before it was finally picked up and published. The story on which JD Salinger based 'The Catcher in the Rye' was rejected by the New Yorker because, according to an editor, "we feel that we don't know the central character well enough."

Other books that went through multiple rejections before they were picked up by a publisher are: A Wrinkle in Time, Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance, and All Things Bright and Beautiful.

When none of this cheers you up, find ways to make light of the rejection and not give it more weight than it deserves. Remember that a writer friend of yours has chosen to decoupage a coffee table with her rejection letters. Realize that doing something like that would make receiving rejection letters oddly satisfying, as in:

Nooo! They don't want my article.

But Ooo, now I can finish covering that fourth table leg!

Find a silly use for your own rejection letters. Find it today.

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Have a Case of Rejection Depression?

Publication is Like Dating

Have a Case of Rejection Depression?

After submitting a piece to 31 publications and not hearing back, the last thing I wanted to do was look up more markets and resubmit. So I decided to take a short break. Say, a week. I revisited supercouponing. I discovered Mad Men on Netflix. I discovered three seasons of it. And one week turned into two, then three.

Yep. I’ve had a relapse.

And that is why it’s so important to nurture the good habits that keep our dejected, rejected selveswriting. Here are a few things that have worked for me and other freelancers I know:

Stuff Envelopes:  Ease Your Way Back In

Maybe an editor’s rejection makes resubmitting feel like a monumental task, or the big fat zero under your blog “comments” box discourages you from writing the next post. These things ARE disheartening, and instead of trying to ignore the feelings and “man up” (resulting in three seasons of Mad Men), why not be kind and ease our way back in?

At the insurance agency where I used to work, my boss called this “stuffing envelopes”. He said the pile of work on his desk was so overwhelming that he was always tempted to procrastinate. So he let himself off the hook by starting each morning with simple tasks, like stuffing envelopes and making simple calls. By the time he was done, he was “warmed up” and ready to tackle bigger projects. At the end of each day, he prepared for the next morning by putting the easiest work on the top of his “to do” pile.

We, too, can ease ourselves back into work after rejection. One freelancer I know prepares for rejection depression ahead of time by looking up five markets for each of her pieces – before she sends them anywhere and while she’s still excited about its potential. That way, if it gets rejected by the first market, she’s not faced with doubts AND the task of trying to find somewhere else the piece will fit. She just consults her excel sheet, pulls out the email and sends it off again.

Another great trick is the task manager “reminder,” which I use to keep track of my submissions. As soon as I submit a piece, I put a six month follow-up into the manager. If I haven’t heard back from the first publication by the time it pops up, I can’t “forget” to resubmit it. And the darn thing keeps popping up until I send out the piece and re-pend the follow-up. Kind of like the alarm clock’s snooze button. Annoying  – but it gets the job done.

Ease your way back into the writing process by brainstorming ideas for your next blog post or submission ahead of time.  I often work on several blog posts or articles at once, so that I’m not faced with a blank page when an article or post flops. Sometimes writing something fun that’s not work-related is enough to get back in the groove.

The Rule of 13:  Focus on What You CAN Do

My first writing mentor told me about the Rule of 13:  once you’ve got 13 articles submitted, you’ll get an acceptance. That means that every rejection brings you closer to #13. I’m sure you’ve heard the stories about writers covering desks and bookshelves with rejection letters. In my Netflixless moments, I see my own letters as proof of progress:  each one brings me one step closer to an acceptance.

By looking at publication as a numbers game instead of a measure of your talent or an editor’s taste, you can take back control from the editors. Your fate is in your hands. While you cannot make an editor like your piece, you can send it to enough editors so that ONE is likely to want it. And you can submit enough pieces that some of your work will attract bites. Think:  to be published, you only need to get enough work out there, to enough people.

Date Around

So you submit work to your dream publication/publisher/blog – and then wait. You wait for six weeks, or six months, however long they say it’ll take to get back. And while you’re waiting, you’re dreaming up different scenarios for how the acceptance call or email is going to go. You imagine high school classmates reading your work and being sufficiently impressed. You imagine surprising your family with a glossy new copy of YOUR ARTICLE off the newsstands. What you DON’T do, is write or submit. And that’s the problem with infatuation.

Instead, try dating around. Spread out your work and excitement to many different places, and you may be surprised at how Unimportant a response from any specific one becomes. Also:  try submitting to long shots and good bets simultaneously. Even if you don’t get a “yes” from the long shot, it’ll still feel pretty great to get a “yes” – and may be just enough motivation to keep the rejection depression away for a bit longer.

linklove,
Playing the Field

Related Posts:
Rejection Shmijection
Publication is Like Dating