Enjoying the Journey (repost)

Since my family has decided that the new year is the perfect time to break down and get sick, I'm reposting one of my favorite posts from last year.  I hope you still enjoy it.

I’ve been scratching my head for over a week as I tried to come up with a topic for today’s post. On top of that I’ve been rushing to finish my latest WIP so I can get to another that’s been pulling at me.  In fact, I’m writing this at almost midnight because the inspiration didn’t come until I watched GLEE. ( Yes, I’m a Gleek and I’m proud of it. :) )  Anyway, to make a long story short, in last night’s episode, the lesson was to enjoy the journey.  It didn’t matter if they won or lost their competition—though a lot was riding on their winning their regional competition.  All that mattered was the fact they were doing something they enjoyed.

It got me thinking.  Here I was stressing over the fact I haven’t gotten a publishing offer yet, when I should have been happy with how far I’d come.

I think that the lesson the kids learned not only applies to the show, but in real life too.  And especially for us writers.  Almost every writer’s goal is to be published.  More than likely we want to make the best seller’s list.  We focus so much on what’s at the end of that road, we never stop and smell the proverbial roses.

We rush to get through our WIPs and then hope our beta readers and critique partners will get our MSs back to us quickly so we can edit as quick as we can to send off to agents and editors. 

We critique other writers’s work and read already published books, digesting and dissecting them bit-by-bit to see what we can do to improve our own writing, but we never just enjoy them anymore. 

But why did we start writing?  For most of us it wasn’t because we wanted fame and fortune.  Maybe it was there in the back of our mind, but it wasn’t the sole reason and it wasn’t the biggest. 

It was because we enjoyed it.

We wrote to relieve stress or boredom.  To breath life into the characters we saw in our heads, and having people read and enjoy it was just icing on the cake. 

So no matter where you are along the publishing voyage, whether you’re writing your first word or your millionth, relax.  Slow down.  Take a deep breath.  It’s not a race to get to the next step.  Or the next.  Or the one after that. 

It’s simply a matter of enjoying the journey.  

The Climb by Miley Cyrus courtesy of Hollywood Records and youtube.com.  As always we ask that you respect the artists and download their music on approved sites.