“When I say someone with courage, I mean you. You wouldn’t be looking at these pages if you weren’t interested in writing. Not just writing, but writing you intend to hand to someone else to read. Trust me, the mere thought gives all of us the same combination of ‘wouldn’t it be wonderful’ anticipation and ‘oh, my, I couldn’t, ever!’ dread. Those feelings never go away. As for the dread? Your courage will see you through.”
What is courage? The simplest of definitions actually suffice here: “...the ability and willingness to confront fear, pain, danger, uncertainty, or intimidation.”
At first read, you might be tempted (as I was) to think that
Julie Czerneda could NEVER feel nervous about sending her work to her
publisher. “She don’t need no stinkin’ courage!” might run through your head as
it ran through mine.
But another form of dread comes out of the near-certainty
that an editor is going to send your story back with a standard rejection. A
lot of things in publishing have changed since I started submitting stories in
the 1970s as a kid, but rejections haven’t changed much. They just happen faster
now. I think the dread has its roots in fact that every story is a small part
of me that I’ve fashioned into a message I want to send to the rest of the
world. If I’m any kind of good author, I’ve exposed a bit of my heart to
another person – a scary proposition even when you’re in love with someone! –
and they have to take the story on its own merits. I’m not there to comment on
or coddle the piece.
I can see how that wouldn’t change no matter how many
manuscripts I’ve sent out or how many award-winning novels I have on the
shelves. (In case you were wondering – the answer is NONE!) It’s a new story
every time; a new part of my heart exposed; and so the dread can’t diminish
much.
That kind of dread is hard to avoid. But there's another kind of dread to struggle against and that is
the kind that freezes me. Maybe I start a story then stop, dreading the
investment of time and effort that might produce something not even worth the
paper it’s printed on or the broadband it occupies. Maybe I finish the story
and then bury it in a file, dreading the rejection I might get (and don’t get
me wrong, the chances are good that it will be rejected – my own record stands
at 80 acceptances for 875 submissions since 1990…an acceptance rate of just
over 10%). Maybe I send it and spend the next few minutes, hours, days, weeks,
or months dreading its return. Or I send it and get it back and now dread
sending it out again for more of the same. Or it’s published and I dread the
response of readers. Or readers love it and I dread critical reviews. Or the
reviews are great and I dread the nominations list. Or I make it on the
nominations list and I dread the vote. Or I win the vote and, prize in hand,
dread that I have nothing left to say and my career is over...
Whatever the source of our dread at whatever stage of
writing we’re at, the only way any of us can overcome that dread is to be brave and keep
writing things and sending them out to editors.
Julie Czerneda has obviously taken her own advice, so I feel confident that I can take it as well: “Your courage will see you through.”
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