Why Writing a Novel is Like Running 50 Miles--Part 2

The easy feeling is over. You look up and notice that everyone is starting to pass you.

In writing, this can happen before you’re published, but it happens after you’re published, too.

Look, that person got an agent and a big deal with the first novel she wrote.

That guy got a deal when he was still in college.

I’m the only person in my writing group who hasn’t sold a book, and we all started ten years ago.

And just when you think that you’re at your worst, walking slowly and not sure if you are getting anywhere, it starts to hail.

This is my third book and I still haven’t broken out big yet.

My friends are all winning awards and all I get are sales numbers.

My friends are all selling big, but all I get is awards.

My agent has fired me because he hates my new book. My life as a writer is over.

A big name author has taken the time to review my book on-line—badly.

It happens to everyone. It may seem like it is only happening to you, but that’s the lie. Everyone has good times and bad times.

On an ultra run, there are times when you will be feeling great and times when you will feel like crap. Just get through the crappy times.

There’s no magic, no secret. You just feel like crap and then you don’t feel like crap anymore. But you will again.

Just like people who think there is some special handshake that will get them published, there is no special magic that keeps you getting published, or makes you a best seller or an award winner.

You just write the books (make the donuts). You sit down and some days your books won’t work. You may figure out how to fix them. You may not. You may erase a week’s work. You may stop writing for a month. Or a year.

And then you write again, head down, no reason to believe it’s going to be good this time except that you’re tough and you know that there used to be something in all of this that you really liked, and you’re determined to find it again.