When to give up

I recently gave a speech in my Toastmasters club called “How to write a novel in 20 years.” I talked about how a short story I wrote in 2001 eventually turned into my first completed novel, how the story benefitted from the rewrites that came years later because I was older and knew better, and the reality of being part-time ambitious. I have stopped writing this novel, but I haven’t let it go. It’s written, it now needs to be read by people who are not me.

(Toastmasters, if you are not familiar, is an international network of clubs that focuses primarily on public speaking skills, and in addition to helping me overcome anxiety about public speaking, it has been a great way for me to come up with story ideas by way of speechwriting. You can visit my club online).

It was cathartic to lay out my failures in the speech. I have a 100% rejection rate after decades of submitting to literary journals. I’ve only been published locally, which I’m proud of, but I want to go wider. Also, I don’t prioritize writing, especially since my personal time often begins after 9:30 pm. There is no burst of energy after a long day of full-time employment, parenting, and housework to get through the admin work of finding new ways to be told “no” when all I want to do is write and have someone read it.

I am 42. It’s not unusual for someone my age to get their big break. I know that every rejection cosmically increases my chance of finding that one person who says yes. I know that there is opportunity everywhere. I can find success in writing somewhere completely different from where I am looking for it. And, yes, I know about self-publishing. I might not have another 20 years for my next novel. I want to see this one through the traditional way while it exists.

Right now, I have paused my literary agent search to work on new essays and short fiction so that I can submit it to journals so that I can become a published writer so that I can go back to all those literary agents from before and say that I now have credentials other than the product I want them to help me sell.

I thought I would have a book published by the time I was 23. I had no idea then how much non-writing work there is to being a writer. It’s like when you apply for a job by submitting your resume and then still have to sign up for a web portal to then manually enter every item on your resume that you have just submitted. Plus write a novel.

Maybe I’m a bad writer. I don’t think I am. I think the book is pretty good. I would read it and tell friends I liked it. Four stars on Goodreads, for sure.

I have always wanted to be a writer. I am a writer. I still enjoy writing. What keeps me going is that I have a yet. I haven’t had my book published, yet. I haven’t thought of my next short story yet. I haven’t found motivation to get up at 5 am to write for two hours before the kids get up yet (I will never do this one).

After I gave my speech I wondered if I would know when I should give up. People don’t think of me as a successful writer or a failed writer. I am other things than what I haven’t done (yet). Will it feel good to simply stop trying at being a published writer? Will giving up feel like its own accomplishment? Will a day off from work be more relaxing knowing that the menial tasks of trying to grasp at that next writing connection are definitely not on the to-do list?

Yes, probably, it will feel good to give up. Though, I don’t think of giving up because writing is part of me. It’s a thing I do, not to become, similar to exercising. I’m an active person. I walk, exercise at home, and go for jogs every weekend, even though I end up walking most of the time. When I want to push myself, I sign up for a race. Then I train harder. And I used to get up at 5:30 am to run, when I just had one kid.

Same with writing. I work harder when I have a goal beyond “let’s knock some rejections out.” Even when I’m not working on the novel, the writer in me is constantly exercising. I can just get a paragraph down, or draft something that might never be anything, but use those muscles all the same. Even making someone laugh with a new joke I came up with feels like a little acceptance letter (or what I assume it feels like to get one).

I’m a fast walker. I hope I briskly walk until the day I die (up to but not including cause of death). I would like to get published before I die, but I know at least that I will be writing thoughts in my “is this something?” notebook for the rest of my existence, and maybe one day it will be something to someone else. These things can happen, yet.