Managing Time

Not sure what is going on here . . .

I’ve not had a sense of urgency with my writing for a few months. Perhaps, getting and losing an agent did something to my psyche. I’ve had several agents, now gone. Is it this feeling that I’m a loser?

I really cannot point to a sales record and say I’m a good bet to anyone. But, always, in the past, I could safely attest, I’ll keep writing and producing and certainly something will stick. It has been my philosophy that the only thing that helps the current pain of not selling is to write the next book. I’ve been in a constant state of “writing the next book” for a while now.

At the end of 2022 I did an assessment—what we all do, a looking back. On the homefront I’d managed to finally get my own place. This is after YEARS of communal living in small places. The fact that I now live in a Tiny House seems inevitable—but it wasn’t easy. And never once did it seem inevitable, a slam dunk, or even possible. The very idea that I’m sitting here in a corner of my Tiny House writing this sentence is surreal. Maybe this is how real life works: it keeps bubbling along until something breaks loose and rises to the top.

If so, I hope the same happens for my writing.

So far, agents (and I get this) want to see that I can sell as well as write.

In 2022 I managed to get an agent, work up a book proposal, have a small bit of work featured in a NY Times article on women writing during the pandemic, I had numerous pieces accepted and published, and slapped together a first draft of a sequel to the non-selling memoir that no one wanted. Oh, and I wrote 4 short stories—mostly needing additional work. All this while peddling a MG novel that was workshopped in Story Studio’s prestigious Novel in a Year class.

Again, no one cares.

I’m not having a pity party, just being clear-eyed. Also I’m not alone, so many of us are left with these feelings—What if? We have talent; it’s just that we need the impossible to happen next.

Looking forward to 2023—

*manage time

*write even more

*keep submitting

*don’t stop

*thinking about tomorrow