There are so many guides out there that help you not give up
when you’re trying to reach a goal. Article after article and blog after blog
will offer all kinds of encouragement and advice on how to keep your courage up
when the odds seem impossible. By this point in my life, I think I’ve read
pretty much all of them.
The thing is, none of them work. Wanting to become a
professional novelist is one of the stupidest possible things you could
possibly do with your time, at least among the category of things that won’t
potentially get you killed. Especially if you have any kind of anxiety or
self-esteem issues, the idea that you would constantly put your heart and soul
out there to get rejected seems mind-bogglingly insane. It’s like volunteering
to be slapped in the face and pushed down the stairs over and over again, when
literally no one is making you do this.
I’ve tried to ask myself why I do this a thousand times. On
my good days, I have a whole, beautifully impassioned speech about hope, and
passion, and how important it is to tell your story. On my good days, I could
make you cry with how deeply I believe in the power of writing.
On my bad days, I get a single, bald-faced question in reply
– “What the hell else are you going to do?” Because, like with any addiction,
the only way you can be done with a game like this is to be 100 percent, slam
the door done. I will have to accept with every fiber of my being that there is
no possible way I could ever make this work, and I will have to let it go
forever. I’ll have to put away the version of myself that I’ve lived with for
the last three decades, and figure out whether there’s anything else out there
I could possibly want to do with the rest of my life.
Even the thought of it terrifies me.
So I get up again, and I keep fighting. Because even if I
die never having made it, it’s better than living the rest of my life accepting
that I never will.
