By Amy Green
There is little success where there is little laughter.
~Andrew Carnegie
Seriously? I was rejected by a children's magazine? Those kids can hardly even read yet!
There is little success where there is little laughter.
~Andrew Carnegie
Seriously? I was rejected by a children's magazine? Those kids can hardly even read yet!
That was my first thought as I deleted yet another rejection e-mail. I was a college junior studying writing, and our professors encouraged us to submit material to different publications. Sometimes the risk and research paid off... and sometimes it resulted in a few lines of rejection from some big-shot editor who didn't appreciate my literary genius.
I remember flipping through my writing textbook, looking for information on rejection. Mostly what I got was: It's going to happen. Brace yourself! Don't get discouraged. Keep going. All of that is great in theory, but not especially practical.
There had to be a solution out there somewhere. So I had a brainstorming session in my dorm room, trying to come up with ideas for how to conquer rejection.
First, I thought about all the brilliant authors whose famous works were turned down. (I think I saw this on an inspirational poster once.) That didn't help, mostly because I realized that for every bestseller that was rejected, so were a dozen poorly written manuscripts. Rejection is no guarantee of greatness. Or, as Carl Sagan put it: "They laughed at Columbus; they laughed at Fulton; they laughed at the Wright Brothers. But they also laughed at Bozo the Clown."
So I tried to persuade myself that I didn't care if my writing got rejected. You know, the psychological approach. "No problem," I'd say, squaring my shoulders as I came back from the mailbox with a fistful of rejection letters. "This is just making me into a better person." That worked for a while... until I realized that I was lying. Then I went right back to being frustrated.
This led me to the realization that there was a foolproof way of not being bothered by rejection: not caring about the things I wrote. I'd just have to send them out with as much apathy as the mass Christmas cards I mailed to all those distant second cousins who probably didn't even read them. If you've ever invested your time and energy in a writing project, you know how well that worked.
One day, as I was staring at the computer screen, experiencing writer's block on a new project, inspiration hit. I figured out a great way to cope with rejection: I wrote the worst rejection letter I could possibly receive. Then I decided that, until I get this letter from an editor, things could be worse. Here's what I wrote.
Dear Incompetent Individual Who Calls Herself a Writer:
Hello.
Unfortunately, the article you sent us does not meet our publication's current needs. And by "unfortunately," I mean that your article was the most unfortunate piece of writing I have ever read. And by "current," I mean that you should never try to submit anything to our magazine ever again or we will assume it contains anthrax and report you to the authorities.
Besides your clear lack of awareness of anything resembling style, voice, grammar, syntax, or any other vocabulary word related to the craft of writing, I will also assume that you fabricated all of your credentials and writing experience, as no editor in his or her right mind would print anything that you wrote, except possibly as satire.
In addition, we would appreciate it if you did not attempt to contact our publication again, or our sister publications, or any company remotely involved in the writing business within a 50-mile radius of us. Please note that we have caller ID, have flagged your e-mail address as spam, and have installed an electric fence around our premises specifically triggered by your DNA code.
Thank you for submitting to our publication, as I enjoy the sound our paper shredder makes when it tears worthless material like yours to bits.
Sincerely,
Really Mean Editor
It's amazing what a little perspective can do for you. Suddenly, those form letters I got in the mail didn't seem half bad.
At first, I just chuckled to myself and tucked the letter away in an obscure file on my laptop. Then I decided to share it with others. Sure, the letter wasn't much of a groundbreaking solution, and I'd never write a self-help book for writers based on it, but maybe it could do a little good.
I showed the letter to some of my writer friends, and they were able to laugh along with me. "Loved it," one said. "It can be frustrating sometimes when you keep getting rejected, no matter how good you think your stuff is."
To which I said, shocked, "You mean you get rejected, too?" People always say that rejection is common and everyone experiences it, but it sure feels like you're the only one. Get published, and the world hears about it on Facebook. Get rejected, and you cry alone.
As it turns out, satirical rejection letters can open up a topic that most writers like to keep hidden. I think I learned more from people's responses to the fake letter than I did from the process of writing it. Some people went for encouragement: "If I keep submitting bits now and then, I'm bound to have more items published than if I just let them collect digital dust."
Another mentioned my letter in a blog post about seven creative ways to deal with rejection. "I have to admit, getting rejection letters hurts," he said. "So, how do we maintain an outwardly professional demeanor while simultaneously satisfying our need for vindication? Simple: we keep our revenge mostly to ourselves. And we have fun with their rejection."
Ironically, in my quest to learn how to deal with rejection, I learned a lot about acceptance. As writers, we need each other. We know about the struggles that go along with the writing life that outsiders just don't understand. And if talking about it together can help us laugh a little, well, maybe there's an upside to rejection after all.
I remember flipping through my writing textbook, looking for information on rejection. Mostly what I got was: It's going to happen. Brace yourself! Don't get discouraged. Keep going. All of that is great in theory, but not especially practical.
There had to be a solution out there somewhere. So I had a brainstorming session in my dorm room, trying to come up with ideas for how to conquer rejection.
First, I thought about all the brilliant authors whose famous works were turned down. (I think I saw this on an inspirational poster once.) That didn't help, mostly because I realized that for every bestseller that was rejected, so were a dozen poorly written manuscripts. Rejection is no guarantee of greatness. Or, as Carl Sagan put it: "They laughed at Columbus; they laughed at Fulton; they laughed at the Wright Brothers. But they also laughed at Bozo the Clown."
So I tried to persuade myself that I didn't care if my writing got rejected. You know, the psychological approach. "No problem," I'd say, squaring my shoulders as I came back from the mailbox with a fistful of rejection letters. "This is just making me into a better person." That worked for a while... until I realized that I was lying. Then I went right back to being frustrated.
This led me to the realization that there was a foolproof way of not being bothered by rejection: not caring about the things I wrote. I'd just have to send them out with as much apathy as the mass Christmas cards I mailed to all those distant second cousins who probably didn't even read them. If you've ever invested your time and energy in a writing project, you know how well that worked.
One day, as I was staring at the computer screen, experiencing writer's block on a new project, inspiration hit. I figured out a great way to cope with rejection: I wrote the worst rejection letter I could possibly receive. Then I decided that, until I get this letter from an editor, things could be worse. Here's what I wrote.
Dear Incompetent Individual Who Calls Herself a Writer:
Hello.
Unfortunately, the article you sent us does not meet our publication's current needs. And by "unfortunately," I mean that your article was the most unfortunate piece of writing I have ever read. And by "current," I mean that you should never try to submit anything to our magazine ever again or we will assume it contains anthrax and report you to the authorities.
Besides your clear lack of awareness of anything resembling style, voice, grammar, syntax, or any other vocabulary word related to the craft of writing, I will also assume that you fabricated all of your credentials and writing experience, as no editor in his or her right mind would print anything that you wrote, except possibly as satire.
In addition, we would appreciate it if you did not attempt to contact our publication again, or our sister publications, or any company remotely involved in the writing business within a 50-mile radius of us. Please note that we have caller ID, have flagged your e-mail address as spam, and have installed an electric fence around our premises specifically triggered by your DNA code.
Thank you for submitting to our publication, as I enjoy the sound our paper shredder makes when it tears worthless material like yours to bits.
Sincerely,
Really Mean Editor
It's amazing what a little perspective can do for you. Suddenly, those form letters I got in the mail didn't seem half bad.
At first, I just chuckled to myself and tucked the letter away in an obscure file on my laptop. Then I decided to share it with others. Sure, the letter wasn't much of a groundbreaking solution, and I'd never write a self-help book for writers based on it, but maybe it could do a little good.
I showed the letter to some of my writer friends, and they were able to laugh along with me. "Loved it," one said. "It can be frustrating sometimes when you keep getting rejected, no matter how good you think your stuff is."
To which I said, shocked, "You mean you get rejected, too?" People always say that rejection is common and everyone experiences it, but it sure feels like you're the only one. Get published, and the world hears about it on Facebook. Get rejected, and you cry alone.
As it turns out, satirical rejection letters can open up a topic that most writers like to keep hidden. I think I learned more from people's responses to the fake letter than I did from the process of writing it. Some people went for encouragement: "If I keep submitting bits now and then, I'm bound to have more items published than if I just let them collect digital dust."
Another mentioned my letter in a blog post about seven creative ways to deal with rejection. "I have to admit, getting rejection letters hurts," he said. "So, how do we maintain an outwardly professional demeanor while simultaneously satisfying our need for vindication? Simple: we keep our revenge mostly to ourselves. And we have fun with their rejection."
Ironically, in my quest to learn how to deal with rejection, I learned a lot about acceptance. As writers, we need each other. We know about the struggles that go along with the writing life that outsiders just don't understand. And if talking about it together can help us laugh a little, well, maybe there's an upside to rejection after all.
http://www.chickensoup.com
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