Fear Of Publishing

Time and again I often am asked how I do what I do to make a living. How I find work, how I get pieces published and how did I know that I could make a living this way. First of all, I just have to say, this has always just been me. But that will be for a future post.

What I find people are really wanting to know after deeper conversation is how to start? How to get published when the person in question has never been published before? I find that there are a lot of people out there wanting to get their writing published. Unfortunately, not all of them should be. Even more unfortunate is that a portion in that group still will be. But for those select few that have the talent and take the time to develop their craft, they SHOULD be published but something just keeps holding them back.

Typically, it is basically the fear of being published and out there that hinder a writer. Yes, we blame it on the not knowing where to start but with all of the how to's out there now a days, that really is the lame excuse. What these up and coming writers don't know is that getting published is all about opinion. If you are one of those people with a talent to tell a story better than the rest of the population or if you have the God given talent of writing poetry (hats off to you because that is just beyond me), then the publishing process really comes down to developing a way to deal with rejection letters. As an editor and someone who has worked as an editor in publishing, I can tell you that I have often heard from other editors on the team, "I am picking this manuscript just because I like their story line." See how incredibly simple that is?

Writing is all about talent and then developing a your own little way of dealing with a person not liking it for some banal reason or another. Or maybe it wouldn't fit in this or that issue due to the off theme. Maybe the piece topic was already thought of and assigned to a different writer not five minutes before the editor received your email. There are all sorts of reasons that could come up that have nothing to do with the worth of the writer and everything to do with the periodical's preferences.

That dreaded rejection letter often has nothing to say that is bad or wrong with the piece but writers take them so seriously and to heart. As demonstrated above, the typical rejection of a piece was not about the writer's skill or talent or even on how well the piece was written. Acceptance of a piece is all about opinion. As artists, writers take their work seriously because true art comes from the soul. Each artist shares a little piece of the real them when they send out their work for publication. But a rejection letter is not the rejection of the writer or their soul offering. A rejection letter is the invisible pass or fail test to the shooting in the dark, guessing game they call publishing.

When I pitch, or when other published writers that I know pitch, I figure on a one in 20 ratio on rate of acceptance. Give or take. Plus, I now write something, look at it once or twice to give it a run through and then hit send. Developing the "letting go" attitude towards my work was the most challenging but I no longer worry over a piece and go to start my day with "How many rejections can I get today?!" I figure once I receive that 20th reject the next one's gold, right?

Did this help? Still have more questions? Write a comment below or send me an email. I am happy to answer any questions that you may have to get over your fear of getting published. 

The Scribbler