mbarker: (Me typing?)
[personal profile] mbarker
Original Posting 2022/01/14
Writer's Digest, January 1994, had an article on pages 42 and 43 by Loriann Hoff Oberlin with the title Learn from My Mistakes. Loriann lays out six mistakes that she feels she has made, along with suggestions about why they are mistakes and what you can do about them. Let's take a look at the mistakes, and what she says about them. You might want to think about your own responses to each of them.

1. Not following up. Actually, she starts with a short anecdote about submitting a manuscript to a new magazine, and not hearing anything. Until she happened to be reading an issue of the magazine and realized her article had been published! The trick here is don't just assume that the parts you can't see are running smoothly, be proactive. Make a phone call, send a follow-up email, check what's going on.

2. Personalizing rejection. "Whether it's an abrupt response to a phone call, a form rejection slip jammed into an SASE, or a kiss off letter from a new editor, rejection is never easy." Ouch! When you get rejections, Loriann recommends admitting your anger to yourself and a friend, but don't argue with the editors. You're going to get rejections, and you may never understand why. One suggestion is to look for publications that pay on acceptance. Your article may not be published, but at least you got paid.

3. Shooting for the stars. You can certainly submit to big-name magazines and publications, but that also means the competition is harder. "Set realistic goals and view your writing as a career."

4. Lacking confidence. "You want me to do what?" You may be surprised at opportunities that come up, but go ahead and take a shot at them. You can boost your confidence level with workshops, classes, and conferences. Join some organizations, experiment with different genres, try out some different projects.

5. Drifting with the clouds. "Success can be an evanescent joy.… The moral is to be confident, but be realistic and never complacent." Just because you're starting to succeed, don't let up. Keep working on it.

6. Failing to read and write every day. Deadlines everywhere, work that needs to be done, I'll just put off reading and writing? "If you fail to read and write every day, you're cheating your creativity. Be kind to yourself. Take time to recharge your batteries, gather new ideas, and try different approaches." Books, the library, all kinds of places can provide ideas and information. You need to feed your creativity. You also need to play with your writing, experiment and grow.

Some of this seems to be tied to the old freelance magazine market, but I think it's worth thinking about anyway. Even with do-it-yourself publication on Amazon or other social media sites, part of the process is handled by other people. You need to make sure they are doing their job. Rejections – what about one star reviews on Amazon! Ouch. Trying to do too much too soon, or not feeling ready to take the next step? We all get caught between those two extremes. And having success blind us to the need to keep working… Oh yeah. Or what about feeding your creativity on an ongoing basis?

What are your mistakes? Have you stopped to think about what went wrong, and how can I avoid it in the future? What can I do to make sure that the next time I don't trip over that same stumbling block?
Some things to think about. And of course, write about! 
mbarker: (Default)
[personal profile] mbarker
Original Posting Aug. 31, 2017

Over here, Matthey E. May talks about a common problem. Say you're sitting in a brainstorming session, and you have an idea, but... you squelch it, because, well, what if they don't like it? Fear of rejection, right? And there's even a mechanism explained for this! But what can you do?

https://medium.com/@MatthewEMay/3-simple-steps-to-silencing-your-inner-critic-74c9ff7de646

May recommends three steps.

1. Recognize the assumption that something bad will happen! You assume they won't like it, right? Or you assume that the story you're writing won't be good, right?

2. Think about reasons that will not happen! Go ahead, dream a little. Why won't they reject your idea? Why won't this story be bad?

3. Now, think about reasons why even if that bad consequence comes up, good things could result. Suppose they reject your idea, but it prompts someone else to come out with a better idea? Or suppose your story isn't the best in the world, but... it suggests another story that really is good?

So, three steps. Recognize the stumbling block, the cry of the inner critic. Figure out why you don't need to be afraid of that, why it isn't going to be true. And then, look at what happens even if you do stumble, even if that inner critic is right.

Don't just tell the inner critic to take a seat -- give them some good reasons to shut up.

Write!
tink


mbarker: (Me typing?)
[personal profile] mbarker
Original Posting Aug. 23, 2017

Writer's Digest, February 2001, pages 28, 29, and 35, have an article by Joan Mazza with the title Finding Your Heart. The idea is that some of the stock rejections – not enough weight, too slight, lacks power – really mean that it's lacking emotional honesty, strong feelings. "Editors want a manuscript to arrive at a depth of emotional honesty that most beginning writers avoid. Beginners back away from strong feelings of all kinds. They are reluctant to have their characters suffer."

Avoiding pain-and-suffering is completely understandable. It's normal. But… "Facing and exposing these emotional upsets is what is meant by the old writerly adage open a vein." You need strong emotions, powerful feelings, all of that. "Tiptoeing away from the emotional punch of a story makes it bland and superficial."

One reason may be simply maintaining our own self-image. We don't want other people to think we're that kind of a person! "Worrying about what others might think will give you writer's block every time.… The distressing and difficult aspects of being human are exactly the parts of the story that people want to hear."

We read to explore experiences we might never have, to see the entire spectrum of emotions, to live other lives from the inside.

Joan points out that you start whispering, people around you stop talking so that they can hear. "In a way, a whisper is like a narrative hook: it gets the reader's attention." But… If you've promised strong emotions and then you don't deliver, your audience evaporates. Frankly, you have to lay bare the innermost emotions. "A willingness to be publicly honest and vulnerable is also what makes readers love authors enough to call themselves fans."

Take a look at what really is emotionally charged for you. What are the memories that you don't talk about, or the ones that you twist when you let someone know about them? What are your fears and worries? Illness, death, abandonment, failure, ridicule? Make up a short list of the things that really make you jump. Then… Start writing about them. Look at your nightmares, your daydreams, your memories.

"Enter the cavern of your most distressing sentiments on memories, then put them on the page. Your writing will be more compelling, as well as more marketable."

There's a tiny little sidebar in the middle of the second page. "Finding your emotional truth. Ask yourself these questions:
– What terrifies me?
– What disgusts me?
– What news stories make me wince or change the channel?
– What is my biggest secret(s)?
– What would I never do?

In your answers to these questions, you will find the seeds of your most powerful writing in all genres.

If this pushes any of your buttons, good! Go write."

Oho! So, emotional depth. And Joan suggests quite a few questions and probes to help us get started. But... let's see. Practice? Okay, take something you've written recently, and think about the emotions in it. Did you pull back at some point? Did you avoid really putting your character through the wringer, because you didn't want to have to suffer through that experience yourself? Are there emotional depths that you can dredge a little deeper, things that make your nightmares and memories twinge? Go ahead, add that emotional edge and see what the story does with it.

Write?
tink


[identity profile] mbarker.livejournal.com
Original posting 9 December 2009

Writers' Digest, October 2004, pages 26 to 33, has a collection of short "nuggets of wisdom" related to getting published. Maria Schneider is the author of the compilation. Take a deep breath, and here we go:
"Always pitch a particular idea an editor can say yes to. Even if you get a rejection, the editor may decide you're right for a different idea she's been kicking around." David A. Fryxell
The interesting thing here is that David is saying go ahead and try those ideas out -- you're building a relationship, not a one time attempt. So give the editor ideas that you think they will like, but don't worry too much about a rejection that says not quite right for us at this time, but liked the writing (or whatever). Next time, maybe they'll recognize the name, and maybe they'll come back with something else that they would like you to do.

I think this gets back to the notion of building a portfolio -- having multiple stories and even multiple novels that you are feeding into the system. Of course, there's the "this writer is hot so publish anything" syndrome that seems to hit some of them, where they are apparently cleaning out their backlog of stories that aren't quite as good as they should be. If you happen to get hot, think about whether you really want to toss the publishers stuff that your readers will not really like -- sure, it's quick money, but you want to maintain a relationship with your readers too. Anyway...

Get those ideas out there, keep them out there, keep playing...
write?

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