We live in a fast food world. By being able to get nearly everything we want, from food to money to marriage, without ever leaving our cars, we have been programmed to expect instant gratification. Be honest, how many times have your feathers been ruffled by a wait? We are used to things happening fast, and when they don’t we get upset.
This is a no-good situation for a writer. See, publishing is S.L.O.W. It takes time to write a book, it takes time to revise a book. Once a book is ready, it takes time to query agents and get their responses. It takes time to hear back from publishers once your agent starts submitting your work. And once a book is sold, it takes a lot of time to get it on the shelves.
Things don’t move quickly, and even this is a perfect example. What happens when a writer doesn’t move from step A to B to C to D to E in a nice sequential order? What happens when one moves from A to B to C (C, in this sequence is finding an agent, just so we are still on the same page), only to experience failure?
Writers need to be persistent little buggers. This is a business that is largely subjective and setbacks and failures along the way are par for the course. I fear that too many people have so subscribed to the fast-food ideal of life–expecting everything to come quickly–and will give up when the path is no longer easy.
Friends: we cannot do this! Remember that not everything in life comes as quickly and easily as pushing a meal through a window. We need to take the time to nurture our craft, to write the best books we can, and to fight to see them on the shelves. If a book fails? We need to spend time working on the next one. And the next, and the next.
This business takes time and persistence. Don’t let yourself get discouraged and give up because things aren’t moving as quickly or as smoothly as you hoped. Keep working, keep pushing, and eventually you will make it!
4 Comments
of a song! I’m a little glacier, short and slow. Here is my furrow, here is my snow. In 10 million years my track will grow. Then my valley’s a lovely show. Hmmmmm. Something seems fishy about this song.
HA! That made me laugh so, so hard. Mostly because:
1. My dad used to like to sing, “I’m a little teapot, short and stout. Here is my handle, here is my….what the %&@*! I’m a sugar bowl!!”
2. Once I heard my dad singing that song, so I sneaked down the hall to see what was up and caught him singing it to the cat, making the cat do the motions.
Thanks for the laugh, friend!
Completely unrelated to your post (I just didn’t want to send you a one line e-mail again, and lets face it, I wanted to tack my site onto my name
Complete geek, I know) – what happened to your little favicon?
That’s a really good question that I don’t know the answer to. I will have to try to figure out what happened!