Get Rejected
Without Doubting Yourself
Dear Death,
As an ambitious creative person I’m currently oscillating between hope and doubt. I want to achieve my dreams of being an established writer, while appreciating the small wins such as getting a few subscribers on YouTube.
At the same time, my critical voice constantly takes over saying I’m not good enough or I shouldn’t even try.
Yes, I do fear before I die I won’t be able to achieve my dream. At the same time it’s difficult to remain present sometimes. How do I resolve this conflict?
Sincerely,
Ambitious Self-Critic
Dear Ambitions Self-Critic,
A little over 200 years ago, another writer who struggled with establishment success in his lifetime wrote the following lines in his now celebrated poem Auguries of Innocence,
If the Sun & Moon should doubt,
They’d immediately go out.
The public didn’t appreciate William Blake’s writing until after he died. During his lifetime his vision was often considered strange by the more popular Romantic poets of the day. But he kept creating. He knew that though the world might doubt him, if he doubted himself then he’d never make another thing.
In the short term, commercial success makes for a poor art critic. Emily Dickinson never found a publisher in her lifetime. Moby Dick by Herman Melville was a commercial failure. Franz Kafka’s most famous works never even got published until after he died. One hundred years ago in the 1920s authors like Zane Grey, Sinclair Lewis and James Oliver Curwood wrote the biggest bestsellers. Few read or bother to remember these names today.
There is a question you must answer: Are you chasing commercial success or your own peculiar artistic vision? Of course every writer would love to have both but if you had to choose, what matters most to you?
If you want establishment success most of all, there is no shame in that. The current publishing industry has trends you can follow, models you can emulate and connections you can make. Give the agents and the publishers exactly what they want. They will tell you what they are looking for at conferences, on social media and on their websites. Write for the market if market success is your goal. You can find ways to make it fun within the current market restraints of what sells.
If instead a peculiar artistic vision drives you, then above all things be true to that vision. In this world you are allowed to make whatever you want. You don’t have to compromise. Life is short and if you don’t make that story in the exact way you envision it, no one ever will. Your art deserves a chance at existence.
If your chief goal is to make art, you are going to have to accept that the agents and publishers may or may not ever know what to do with you. Art often bucks commercial trends. But you still get to create according to your own genius.
Whichever ambition you follow, you are going to need a few tools to deal with rejection. There is no writer or artist of any note on either track that hasn’t passed through the gauntlet of rejection letters, derision, apathy, indifference and readers and critics who don’t like their work.
Luckily, you’ve come to the right place. Thinking about your death can be a huge help in caring less when other people reject or ignore your work. Remind yourself that you will die but today you can write.
Here is an exercise you can try to get clear about what you want your story as an author to be. When you get a rejection, write a letter to the future you that is on your deathbed. Tell your future-self what you choose to do in this moment in face of that rejection. Do you choose to keep going and try again? Or do you give up? Imagine that future self at the very end of life reading this letter and make them proud of what you choose to do now.
Rejections happen for a thousand reasons. Sometimes it is because your art doesn’t match what someone thinks they can sell. Sometimes, they are just too distracted to see your potential. Some people get rejected because their work needs more work.
Whatever the reason, it is the people who keep going who get to make cool things and sometimes get celebrated for that work. It’s the people who doubt and give up to save themselves the sting of another rejection that come to make little. If you do choose to retire this ambition, don’t do it because of fear of another “no.” Do it because you are inspired to spend your time in ways that excite you even more.
Good luck with your writing and your ambitions,
Death
The Croak Section:
Ask Death a Question! It’s fun. He’ll tell you you are going to die in the most helpful way possible. And this column needs more people brave enough to send in their questions to askdeath@wecroak.com
If you have ambitions, consider hiring me as your coach. I’ve helped entrepreneurs build their dream business, leaders of non-profits turn around their year and executives find work-life balance. Find out more at www.tidepathcoach.com
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-Hansa