When I first began seeking advice about writing as a career, the first recurring theme I noticed in workshops, books, and magazines was clear:
Your work will be rejected.
That may be the only widespread rumor about writing that is true. The universality of the experience leads to the first way to rationalize your inevitable rejections.
- Take a look at successful writers who have been rejected (and some of them, quite cruelly). You can find these lists with a simple search. Hemingway, Stephen King, Louisa May Alcott, JK Rowling… if you keep looking, you’ll find every author you know. Why? Because everyone’s work is rejected.
- Make a list of successful books or movies that would never have been published or filmed if it were up to you. How many times have you found yourself asking “seriously?” as you read the latest bestseller? That was some writer’s beloved masterpiece and at least one agent or publisher agreed with that writer. Being rejected does not mean that your work is bad or unworthy of promotion in the world. It means someone read a bit of it and thought “seriously?”, the way you often do when reading. It’s all subjective.
- You don’t want to be accepted by the wrong people. Really, you don’t. Rejection can be a blessing. If it’s not meant to be, let it go. This is the most difficult during an agent search when you’ve read what the agent wants, you’ve seen who the agent represents, and you’re perfectly suited in every way. The form letter rejection makes you wonder if she even read your query. Think of it as fate or divine providence if you must. It was a bad match, or else you would be working together today.
- If you still feel that the rejection personal, there’s an easy way to see proof that it’s not! Subscribe to Duotrope. It’s worth the small fee. Not only will you have access to publishers and agents for any genre or style, but a clickable link is also provided on each market’s information page (along with the percentage of acceptances, rejections, and the average time of evaluation). The link is “View report of recent responses from this market”. You’ll see something like this:
I chose Apex Magazine because I was recently rejected there. (Look! I’m number 8 on the list!) I see that I’m in good company. Apex Magazine knows what it wants, and none of us wrote it. Most publishers of short fiction, short nonfiction, and poetry I have found include a phrase of encouragement with their rejections and wish you luck elsewhere. After you’ve read a few, it doesn’t hurt anymore.
5. Multiple rejections of the same work? Move on to another project. Maybe there is something to the criticism, and maybe there’s not. Send it out again while writing something new. Think of it as a temporary separation. After a break, perhaps you’ll take some criticism to heart and do some rewrites. Perhaps you’ll stick to your guns and continue sending it as it is. Perhaps you’ll retire the piece. The point is, with time, you’ll make a decision based on what you feel and not someone else’s judgment.
If none of those work, you can always get drunk, gain twenty pounds, stay in bed for a week, or reject the rejecters. I only have a few acceptances under my belt and I can attest to rejection becoming easier with experience.
Bottom line, at least for me, is that I enjoy the process of creation that writing is. The process, not the end result, has to be the reason I continue writing.
