Writing Worry #25: No yard stick for success

When I was a college student, I excelled at tests. The thrill of getting a good grade was a confirmation of my hard work. Then graduate school came with yearly meetings with my advisory committee and the rare course that gave out standard grades. It was tough at first to know whether I was on the right track in my research because there were no tests, no grades. There was no one there to assure me that all my hard work was paying off. Five years later, I had a degree and a couple of peer-reviewed publications under my belt.

As hard as it was to deal with insecurity of not knowing if my research was headed in the right direction, it is even worse when it comes to writing. Other than a big-five publishing contract or a New York Times bestseller, how do you measure success?

When I first started pursuing fiction publication, my goal was to publish without having to pay for it. I had a friend who had vanity published. However, I was determined that if my writing wasn't good enough to get someone else to pay for publishing it then I shouldn't get my hopes up. It took me two years to find a publisher for Between Love and Lust.

I set my sights on a print publication contract. Unfortunately, I couldn't sell my dark fantasy novel to even e-publishers. I'm in the process of finding a publisher for my LGBT YA urban fantasy. Attempts to find an agent were only me with form rejection letters.

While I am disappointed neither of my last two novels sold, I understand why each of them isn't a good sell for print publishing. 

This year I have been writing and submitted short stories while I procrastinate on editing my erotic thriller novel. It was partly to set and achieve a writing goal and partly to reassure myself that my writing was up to publication standards.

After selling more than half of my new short stories, I am still left with some uncertainty. While I can produce fiction that others want to publish, I still don't know if I can produce a novel that is not only good enough but interesting enough to find a print publisher.

Each step of success seems to bring the realization that I could set my sights on another goal. A big five publishing contract or a New York bestseller are probably never going to be within reach, there are plenty of other writing goals to strive for.