When we last met we were talking about the book and publishing and what all that means to me, as you know if you read Friday’s post. But on Friday I didn’t get to the part in the session in which I was telling Igor my personal myth and how this myth seems to run in my mind like a kind of fatal error that I don’t know the html code to reprogram.
“So here is my myth,” I said it like some grand pronouncement. I left space after I said it with full awareness that what I had just said had been an incomplete sentence. Yet I knew that there needed to be space between the introduction and the actual content and that if I rushed it and didn’t leave my listener hanging for a bit that the importance of what was to follow might be missed. I know enough about comic timing to wait for the laugh, only I suppose this myth isn’t really very funny.
“It goes like this: I am loaded with potential. I am the one in the class who was told she would publish in the New Yorker. I was told by professors that I was the one they were sure would “make-it” and I was told by my infertility doctors that I had fantastic eggs and had an excellent response to the stimulating drugs and that our embryos were all grade-A and that they were very hopeful and then nothing happened—no baby. I am the girl who has loads of potential and no fulfillment. I am all promise and no completion. That is my myth.”
“And what I worry that the same is true with my writing. I have lots of potential and yet I will never publish a book.” I said that much more ebulliently than was fitting for what I had just said. Therapists are always on the look out for times when clients say things that should be loaded with emotion and are said flatly or for times when there is a dissonance between message and meaning. This was one of those times.
I went on, “This thought is always there in the background whenever I think about my writing and the better things are going the more that the myth seems to pop up like an unwelcome weasel. It is there in the back of my mind, running like the text scrawl on the bottom of the screen on CNN, even as everything is going great and the big picture looks really-really good—the myth is there reminding me that all this potential and promise is nothing but a set up for a cosmic joke. Only I am not at all sure who has set up the joke and who is finding my failure to fulfill my potential as so fantastically funny.”
“So what if you gave up?” Igor asked.
“Huh?”
“What if you told yourself whatever I create goes into the void? What if you embraced that? What if you told yourself that your myth was true and you embraced it”
Igor might as well have asked me to jump from the ledge of his fourth-floor window, “Are you kidding me? It would kill me. Are you saying to live without the goal of publishing? I couldn’t.” I got antsy and sweaty and I took off my cardigan. I was reacting like an addict who had just been asked to get off of his/her drug of choice.
“No, seriously. I couldn’t. If I gave up hope on giving up on publishing it would kill me.”
I could see in Igor’s face that he didn’t believe it would and so I reminded him of times in our work together when I had lost hope and how depressed I had been and how much despair I felt—and how horrible those times have been.
“Yes, I know that it feels that way. But every time you have let go of the goal something has happened.”
I didn’t have the presence of mind to ask him for examples. I want examples. I want them written down and alphabetized and notarized. I want a document that proves that what he is saying is true. As for today I am still completely unsold on his suggestion. In the session I ignored his assertion and moved on to what I have already given up on. “I gave up on having kids. Isn’t that enough? Should I give up on hoping to publish too? No, I couldn’t. Really, it would kill me not to have a goal.”
“Would it really kill you? How would your life be if you gave up on the goal of publishing this book? How would it be different?”
My thoughts raced and I wasn’t able to answer his question directly, I only knew that I felt like he was asking me to give up my life preserver and that my life-instinct was feeling particularly strong and that I had no intention of giving up on hoping to publish. Only he wasn’t really asking me to give up on that hope—he was asking me to embrace the myth that I was already holding onto and to see what would happen if I did.
A few months ago after a particularly bad bout of self-doubt, He-weasel and I were at my favorite Peruvian restaurant. As I devoured spicy muscles and bits of octopus with hedonistic gusto, I told He-weasel something straight out of a Disney comedy. I wished out loud to have my desire to be a writer taken from me. It is a wish I had made many times before about having a baby. If I couldn’t have a baby I wanted to no longer have the desire to have one—it seemed only fair. In the Disney movie version of my life in which I would have been played by Lindsay Lohan( pre-jail), I would have instantly lost my desire to write and then I would have learned how valuable it was to write and by the end of the third act I would be desperately trying to get the wish to write back by the end of the film I would have learned my lesson and I would have gotten my writing mojo back and I would have gotten a book deal. Only this wasn’t the Disney version of my life.
He-weasel responded to me in a way that made me want to pick up the empty mussel shells that sat on my plate and throw them at him. “You can’t. You can’t give up. You are a writer. It is who you are. No matter if you publish or not, you are a writer. If your laptop was taken away you would write on paper. If your paper was taken away you would write on the wall. If there was no wall you would write on your body…writing is what you do. You can’t not write.” In that moment I felt like a somewhat modified Salieri. I didn’t want to be a writer if I wasn’t a writer with a published book. Instead of throwing mussels at him I went home and wrote about being mad at him and how he didn’t understand and how awful it was that he used a double negative. But even as I vented to my journal about how he didn’t understood me, I knew he was right.
I am not far enough along with all of this to know what it means. And as of yet I am not able to take Igor’s advice. I can tell you that I have been thinking a lot about hope. I have been thinking about how Igor says that holding hope for clients in psychotherapy can be sadistic. I have been thinking about what my boy-friend, James Hillman*, says about hope, “Hope is an evil. It was the one evil left in the box when Pandora snapped the lid back shut. Hope is about the unknown future. It’s like the promise of salvation in the afterlife…I just think we should pay attention to what is here right now. It’s this hope thing that has gotten the planet into such a mess. If we paid attention to what was true right now, instead of what we hoped would be true in the future, the world would look very different.” I am not sure how this relates to everything I have said before, maybe you do and if you do I invite you to tell me. The only phrase that comes to mind is a Latin one, sorry if that sounds fancy-pants, but it was the phrase that my psyche gave me and my psyche does have a tendency towards fancy-pants, it is Amor Fati which means “love your fate”. I wish my psyche would think of something else, something more constructive. And if my psyche doesn’t have anything nice to say I wish it would just shut up. If it doesn’t I will reward it for its bright ideas by watching “The Real Housewives of Washington D.C.”, that’ll teach it to bust out Latin on me.
* Just in case you are new to the blog, I have non-dangerous and completely harmless delusions that James Hillman is my intellectual-boyfriend( i.e. the boyfriend of my mind). Hillman doesn’t know anything about this and it is probably best that we keep it this way.
Oh man, that “much rumored potential” I’ve written about in the past. It’s like a weighty, smelly albatross. The worst kind of psychic accessory.
Now you? I have confidence in you. You will be published. And that’s not hope. It’s my unmitigated belief.
I wish I could throw off that albatross like last seasons accessory. Every time I try to get rid of it—it finds its way around my neck again.
Thank you for belief in me. I have the same belief in you.
I am not sure what Igor was trying to say. Maybe he was saying Amor Fati? But this post reminded me of the Book “The Power of Now”. Have you read that? I didn’t like it at all the first time I read it. Then I read it again and gleaned something from it.
It seems to me that being published is the main purpose of your work. So maybe he was saying let go and see what happens. I don’t know? I am glad you write though!
I tried to read a chapter of my friend’s copy of the “Power of Now” and I couldn’t get through it. It gave me a headache.;-) I am much less about now and more about past and future. I know this “now” is a lesson I have to learn.
Thanks for the nice thing you said about me writing. It means a lot.
I think you’ll be published too, I hate when people say frilly positive wishful thinking statements like that to me but you have a unique voice, you are funny, you write about a milieu that fascinates many people and you’re a babe ( I just know, dont’ ask!) that is a recipe for authorial success.
Personal myths, phew I’ve never herad of that, mine is that I never make a go of anything and that I’ve never found myself, I’m one of life’s good for nothing much drifters.
Thank you, lovely you. It REALLY is incredible to hear that from you( who I don’t know in *real* life(whatever that means) and who I haven’t paid;-).
Well, I know that you have made a go of your blog. Your blog is FANTASTIC. As I said on your blog, I always learn something from you.
Perhaps “the myth” is the impetus for your writing, the provocation, an ally disguised as cynic.
Perhaps you can try to be who you are without the distraction of trying to discover who you are.
Write without regard for consequence. See if you are not pleased with the outcome.
I think you know you have it in you.
VERY interesting idea, the myth as cynic and impetus. That is QUITE brilliant. You are a smarty!
Honey, you and I share the same personal myth. Though I guess a lot of people at our age are worried about fulfilling their potential. It seems to be now or never to me.
It is a bitch of a myth. When I look at you I see how much you achieved. And I have achieved a lot, but I only see what I haven’t achieved.
I am new to your blog and I already love you. Your myth is my myth and I am struggling with the exact same issue of “What if I give up this dream after already given up so many others (including biological baby)?” But in this struggle I keep coming across amazing women, like you, and for that I am forever thankful. At least I know I am in good company on this journey!
Thank you so much!! I am so glad to have found your blog and thrilled you found mine. Having to give up the baby dream is an incredibly hard one. The impact of infertility and losing the baby dream impacts our lives in so many ways—how it impacts hope and dreams is one that I hadn’t given a lot of thought to before.
If it’s just about publishing a book, you can just publish one yourself. Does that count or is it all about the validation of others?
Just checking.
I have way too big of a legitimacy issue for self-publishing. My dream is to have a book published. We’ll see if I can manage it.;-)
OK, here’s why I’m backing Igor up on this one:
I have always had a strong desire to control and shape my life path. ALWAYS. And I forced myself to do things that seemed right and felt wrong because they were part of “the plan” and stops along “the path.” It wasn’t until I gave up doing that and trusted the Universe to guide me that I started to feel happy and fulfilled. I am not a go-with-the-flow person … but, as it turns out, my life becomes shit if I don’t go with the flow.
I think Igor wants you to place less importance on getting published. I’m not sure about abandoning hope … maybe more of a lessening significance. If you decide that getting your book published is the only thing that will complete you, you’re setting yourself up for a massive fall if things don’t work out. If you decide that getting your book published would be truly amazing, but continue to enrich your life in other ways and pursue other goals, your chances of continued contentment improve. Even if you start writing another book, or taking a writing class, or doing something else to further your writing goals and skills it will take some focus of getting the book published.
I hope I’m not sounding massively condescending. This is something it took me AGES to comprehend myself, so I might be over-explaining.
I have long been a planner and I have let go of that a lot. I no longer micromanage and think how I know I am going to make something happen. The best laid plans often lead to nothing. That said, I just can’t give up the dream of publishing. But you, Igor and this post has given me a lot of food for thought. And the truth is that even if I knew that I was never going to get a book published that I couldn’t quit writing.
Thank you so much, Sal, for sharing your experience. It means a lot and does not at all sound condescending.
Hmmmm…we’re with Wendy on a number of us encountering this syndrome. And we totally endorse Jeff’s “Write without regard for consequence.” But the Hillman notion of hope as evil isn’t something we can wrap our little pea-brain around, not at all. For many it is all there is, and that has to be enough.
Sending you wishes for a wonderful week Miss LBR,
tp
I think that what my boyfriend is saying is that the bad thing about hope is that it takes away from what is and that if we don’t deal with is and find a way to enjoy it or change it that hope can offer false hope. If I say “I hope x” then I might not do anything to make x happen. Hope is not action. Hope is not acceptance. Hope can be wishing and while wishing can be nice it isn’t often what makes things happen. If we hope the world is going to change and don’t do anything to make that change happen—I think that is what Hillman thinks is “evil”.
Hillman is saying that hope creates expectation, which can only lead to disappointment. He is advising us to “live without the future and stay in the present”. It’s an ideal and not easy to achieve.
Well thank you. I have always wanted to write a book. But now that I’m trying to write the actual proposal, and a sample chapter, I find myself thinking, “Hey, this is hard!” I think my goal, instead of getting a book published, is simply to have TRIED. I would like to at least finish the proposal and submit it. That is a completely different goal than having a book published. But I wouldn’t have known that’s how I felt until I went ahead and gave it a shot. Then think how nice it will be once the proposal IS written. I can just live day to day. Write for the sake of writing only. Make omelettes. Mow the lawn. Sounds wonderful, no?
Writing a proposal is hard. Congrats to you for undertaking the proposal. It is a big accomplishment to have one done. I felt proud of completing mine. I write, i think, for several reasons. I write because I have to. I write because I enjoy having written. I write because I want to have a book available at Barnes and Noble. All of these reasons drive me.
Oh and the lawn mowing sounds HORRIBLE!;-)
Good morning LBR…My brief advice is not to give up hope because your hope is not unfounded. Were you unable to compose a paragraph or deliver eloquently and were you uninterested, then I would immediately advise you to drop that pen and paper! I was told frequently that I was the cause of my own failures and to some extent I am sure I was. I have now simplified things for myself…if I really want something and believe that I am qualified, I give it my best shot, my really best shot. I really do believe that most things are doable.
Also, I don’t think that your wish can be taken away from you…creative energies have to be channeled into directions that advance your potential…this is all a result of your creativity so in a way i may not be agreeing with Igor either. Perhaps he is just telling you to not obsess, to pursue in a detached manner.
Love to you always….xoxo
I like the way you think. And, I agree, I don’t think my wish can be taken from me. But I think that he isn’t really asking me to give up my goal. I do think that the is giving me a paradoxical idea as a way to challenge the myth. Time will tell.
Love back to you.xo
I get it, the publication blues. Many times I have told myself, “After the first book…” such and such will happen, it will be easier to get other books published, I’ll go on a reading tour of bakeries and will be given desserts by crowds/tens of fans…
It’s like after that first book being published, a lot of the responsibility for my writing is off of me (even though I know this is not true at all).
I hear a faint strain of people-pleasing in your wish to fulfill your potential (we always know our own kind). It’s scary to think about letting other people down…I share in this, too, and think publication is validation (to others, as in, thanks for supporting me, I knew it wasn’t crazy, see, it paid off).
Innnnnnteresting.
Finished your BF’s The Soul’s Code last night. Mmmhmm.
I think that much of my longing for publishing comes from the longing for validation( as I said in my last post). Even though I have accomplished other significant things in my life–a book feels like a birth and I so want to birth something. I don’t have the people-pleasing( not now anyways). I have had it in other areas of my life but for some reason it doesn’t show up in my writing life).
Isn’t my BF wonderful?:-)
This idea sounds just as appealing via the written word. It reminded me of Nirvana-the absence of desire. Sounds so easy in theory but in practical application, well, now, that’s another story, isn’t it??
xo
I too, like Lisa, have unmitigated belief in you.
I envy you that it sounds appealing. I hope you are able to enjoy writing just for the writing and shelf the idea of publishing—it would have to be liberating.
Thanks, Steph. I appreciate your belief in me.xo
Actually I liked Igor’s advice. I’m taking it on board plus James the boyfriend’s top tips. Also the fancy pants latin did it too. Gosh I feel as if I’ve just had the best ever advice ever!
So happy to help!!! Uh, when you implement it could you come back and tell me how you did it. I am still feeling mighty confused.;-)
xo
I go back and forth on this idea of letting go of trying to shape outcomes, because it seems that the letting go often does lead to the desired outcome hence letting go can be seen as just another way of trying to shape outcomes. I like LPC’s idea of trying and I also like something I learned from my former husband about a way to approach difficult learning — specifically mathematics. His idea was to assume failure and approach the task from that standpoint. Maybe I can’t learn this theorem. But can I learn anything at all? One tiny thing just messing around and doodling? It works. I think because it takes anxiety out of the picture and allows the mind to focus. So much of the anxiety we feel about any sort of outcome is really desire for legitimization — symbols of it, e.g., degrees, publishing, fame whatever. What if I am illegitimate, a total failure. Can I just mess around and have fun doing something I love? Yes. I wish you happiness working at your beautiful craft LBR.
Your former husband’s way of approaching something is an interesting one. I think Igor might like his idea.
Thank you for your kind wishes for me and I thank you for sharing some of how you approach a goal. Very interesting.
Miss J cannot even read this today. to close to home… She does not seem to be able to address her book edits despite having PAID someone to read & edit her book…
I hear you. But I have to tell you, you are a BRILLIANT writer. You are. I hope that sometime soon you get back to your book as I can’t wait to read it.
Isn’t this the month of Be Here Now (for both of us)?? I don’t want to compare our situations, Lord knows that is never appropriate, but I sense that Igor is trying to tell you that your writing is an act of faith, much like my sewing.
Of course, they occupy very different personal domains, but isn’t it the hugest fucking pain in the ass to sidestep our fears, the things that sabotage our pure experience?
As far as I am concerned, you are a writer. I don’t need to buy your book to validate it. I only wish that you could enjoy my confidence in you.
I think you are absolutely right.I really related to your post about sewing. It is, as you so rightly said, a huge fucking pain in the ass. Being here now is all well and good but there is a future and I want to know all this work is leading somewhere. I don’t want to throw away a 100 yards of fabric.;-)
I do enjoy your confidence in me. I enjoy it very much. I would ALSO like to publish a book.
Hopes, myths, dreams. What a subject. We could spend hours on this one!
I’ve abandoned so many hopes, myths and dreams, that I can’t count them all. Their empty shells are always edged out by a new hope, myth, or dream.
What are you going to do?
Actually we have…and yet there is more to be said. Isn’t there? I am going to keep writing and keep hoping to publish. I can’t quit either of those things. But what I guess I can do is challenge the myth as there is plenty of evidence that things do workout for me and that I have lived up to my potential in certain areas of my life. The myth lies and I have to challenge it. Maybe by saying, “okay, myth…you are right”,maybe that is a challenge to it.
I’ve managed to achieve a few things so far in this life, but I still feel the influence of that myth you describe — unfulfilled potential. And there’s obviously always that big gap between what we can intellecutalize and what our inner whatever FEELS! But I do find it useful to at least acknowledge intellectually what I’ve achieved thus far AND to give myself the same permissions and messages that I’d give to others — process over product, etc., etc., That’s what you’re beginning to do, isn’t it, as you outline thoughtfully what Igor is asking you to consider? Worth the work, I say. Worth the work . . .
I keep a journal of my accomplishments( and I list all manner of things) as a way to remind myself that I have done stuff;-). Hmmm…maybe I should write about that. Thanks for inspiring me( as you often do).
I do think it is worth the work and deconstructing these myths is hard work—but definitely worth it.
The thing that strikes me the most is that when you went to you psychoanalytic training program you said that while you wanted to get in, it didn’t really matter if you did. How is having a book published different for you? Also, I don’t know what avenues you are pursuing, but would you consider self-publishing or publishing electronically for e-readers? And know with a certainty that I think you are fabulous writer and your blog is at the top of my list of favorites–I will definitely be purchasing your book
I think that being a therapist came really easy to me. I have never had doubts, fears or any sense other than that I could easily become a therapist. I actually decided on becoming a therapist through my writing( I always wrote and my themes have always been psychological). I love being a therapist but I would say that I am a writer the way I would say I am right-handed—it is intrinsically who I am. I would say that being a therapist is my job and that I do it as well as I do because I have a talent for symbolism and a real passion for people’s stories. I just have no attachment to succeeding as a therapist where I do have an attachment to being a writer. I think the writing feels more personal, in a way, and more me. Therapy is something I do and I love it. LOVE it. But, I guess that is part of the difference between the two. Hope this helps clarify.
As I said above, I have a need( i.e. a father complex and HUGE issues around legitimacy) to be published through traditional channels. I don’t imagine I would ever be open to any self-publishing( other than the blog).
Thank you, dear Zen, for your INCREDIBLE compliment and for your book order!! ANd thanks for getting me to think.:-)
Aw, you’re welcome!
Could you be having qualms about meeting publishers about ‘Thursdays With Igor’ or am I being too simplistic? In my opinion whatever our art form of preference we approach a work with passion and excitement; when an idea has been nurtured and developed from the realm of mere possibility into actuality it’s natural enough to have some doubts about its value. Has one done justice to the inspiration, the Muse?
The shelves of libraries and book stores are filled with much dross that publishers thought would bring a hefty financial return. Whether one is published or not has nothing to do with the essential quality of a book and I don’t think you should ever doubt your ability or your brilliance as a writer.
You’re no Salieri.
I guess my anxiety comes from knowing that my manuscript sits on a brilliant agent’s desk and I am waiting to hear from her and so all the fears, doubts and past failures come to the surface.
It does help to read books that are not so great. I am encouraged when I come across the dross. I think to myself, “if some agent and publisher took this book on then there is definitely someone who will take me.” It helps.
Thanks!
i think i love what your he-weasel said. he sees the very thing you want to prove. he says you’ve already achieved it. you ARE a writer. to you, you aren’t, until you get the official stamp. are we what we are without that stamp?
I love what my He-weasel said too. He is right. I am a writer. I just want to be a published author. But, no, the official stamp won’t make me more of a writer than I already am. I know it is true and yet I want is anyways.
i like one of the commenter’s advice- such a wisdom almost verbatim from rilke: ‘write without regard to consequence’ — the means being an/the end in itself…
While that is good advice…really good. I think that part of my issue is that we do live in a world in which we determine what is valued by if something is free or not. I have had supervisors tell me that clients don’t value therapy as much if they aren’t paying for it. And I have seen that bear out in work with clients. I guess getting paid for my work makes me feel valued at another level. I do write without regard to consequences…it is after I write that my mind turns to the marketplace. Sorry to blab on.;-)
Always happy to see you here.:-)
OMG we share that myth. But I haven’t lived up to any potential and I am beginning to accept that I never shall; or that my potential is not what I thought it was. I don’t think that is true of you as you have already accomplished a great deal.
As to being a writer versus being published, well perhaps Igor is right. You are a writer you know. You write. You have an audience that loves your writing and looks forward to your words. You write and your words bring meaning to people. Not everyone who has published a book can say that.
I think we have all accomplished more than we give ourself credit for. Don’t you think? I am going to write another post about this topic.
Thank you so much for your encouragement and belief in me. I do know I am a writer. I know that. That I have no doubt about. And I am sooooooo grateful to have an audience. I know that many books have less of an audience than I do. I am proud of that. Even if I never publish a book I have achieved more as a writer than my father ever did and I am proud of that too.
>“What if you told yourself whatever I create goes into the void? What if you embraced that? What if you told yourself that your myth was true and you embraced it.”
Hey, I will pay Igor to say this to ME; it sounds so freeing!
Having apparently peaked at 4, when I was labeled a leader, I am able to go all Clintonian on at least some of your pain.
If you can’t detach etc etc as all the smart folks upthread encourage, then I guess you would be well-served to have a Personal Myth 1.1 where you are the scrappy underdog who overcame many a barrier to fulfill her potential. [!!!111!!!]
When success hits, you’d be the new poster child for DPFR (Delayed Potential, Finally Realized). And think how well *that* would play in Peoria….
Why don’t you come with me to my session on Thursday? He will happily say it to you. He seemed to relish saying it to me.
I don’t think I can detach. I am going to have to take to your idea of a Personal Myth version 1.1. And maybe I can talk to the people at the DSMV and see if they can add DPFR to the new volume. Perhaps my second book can be about how I overcome my long term battle with DPFR.;-)
Another post with so much food for thought!
I share your mith, career-wise, and Pedro suggested the same thing as Igor! He said: what if it never happens? and I guess what he meant was: what would you do then?. Thinking about that outcome made me realize that it wouldn’t be so terrible and I would probably find something else to put my energy in and it was liberating. I am now, as you know, trying to concretely picture a life without that dream. I am not saying I will stop pursuing it, but after 15 years I am really tired and need to look for options elsewhere. The funny thing is that it’s not heartbreaking anymore, now it’s actually interesting and thrilling. I guess for so long I didn’t even consider the possibility of doing something else because I believed in my own American dream: if I studied and worked hard enough I would achieve. Well, maybe I will, maybe I won’t, but I am determined to be happy whatever the outcome!
Going back to Igor, how do you relate this post to your previous one? wouldn’t letting go of the dream of publishing or not placing such an importance in it have an effect on your father complex? I mean, if you no longer care about the approval of an external masculine figure…wouldn’t that be like saying to your father: “whatever you think of me, I really don’t care because I no longer need your acceptance, I am happy with who I am”?
I tend to not see Igor’s suggestion as a literal one. I think he is giving me a paradoxical intervention. He, I think, is trying to get me to challenge the fallacy of the myth rather than actually giving up on the dream. In fact, I think he truly believes that publishing would have an impact on the desire for generativity that I long for.
I am not even close and don’t think I ever really could give up on the desire to publish a book. While the desire brings up my myth it also motivates me and gives my life purpose. It is the myth that is the problem and not necessarily the goal. And I am still gripped by the longing for the objective masculine for approval and truth be told I don’t think that is all bad. It has motivated me to excel and to achieve and I am grateful for what that hard work has taught me. So as miserable as my father complex has been at times it has definitely given me gifts.
Firstly, I am so pleased to have found you. Your writing is so insightful, engaging, intelligent and so brave. What makes you think you won’t get published? I understand you already really answered that in this and many previous posts, but really – I (for what that is worth) believe you will. I think you must believe (in some small and tucked away corner) that you will, or at least that you deserve to – the quality of your work and the great deal of effort you have put in to get this far is amazing. It must be so scary now it is all in someone else’s hands. Would you keep going until you are published? I’m sure you will. Is this the difference between “belief” and “hope”? You have demonstrated your “belief” by getting this far. I guess hope is relying on outcomes out of our own hands. Please, have “belief” that you can cope with those outcomes. Once you are published how important will it be to be well received? Will that replace this dilemma and also count towards legitimacy?
Thank you.
Dear Frances: How on earth did I miss your comment for so very long. I am terribly sorry. WHat an incredible comment you left me.
I will keep going until someone agrees to publish me. I do have some belief that I have what it takes to publish and then there is another part of me that believes that I never get what I want.
For now what matters to me is to be published but once that happens I am sure I will move into wanting to be well-received. That’s human nature, I suppose.
Thank you, Frances. And again, I am so sorry I missed your very kind comment.
All the best,
Belette
This post reminds me how, about a week ago, I listed all my fears in my journal. Then realized everything on the list I have experienced or am experiencing right now…
Interesting. What do you make of it?
I beg to differ, but you are a published author through this hugely popular and poignant blog. I know it’s not the same thing as a published novel, but it’s pretty darn close. Not many bloggers can claim the following you have.
I admire your candor about everything – many of us feel the same way and are afraid to admit it to ourselves, let alone anyone else.
Lu: So lovely to meet you. And I sincerely appreciate your generous point of view and your very kind comment. I feel very lucky to have such wonderful readers. I am very lucky.
The nice thing about admitting difficult things here on the blog is that I always end up feeling less alone. That makes the risk worth it.
Again, thank you so much for your comment.