Writer's Quality: Patience

My post today is to serve as a bit of inspiration and advice that every writer must deal with. Patience is a quality that doesn't come naturally to me. I can remember last summer when I first began sending out queries. I would wait and wait and then wait some more for responses from editors that seemed to never come. Then I finally started getting a reply here and there, mostly rejections. Then one day I checked my email and there was a message from Transitions Abroad stating that they were interested in an article that I submitted. I was overjoyed!! It took several months to get that ONE positive response. At times I thought I was going to go crazy. But I am still here and still in my right mind and still writing.

Patience isn't an easy thing to learn. In fact, as a writer (and as a human being) your patience will be tested daily. After you've sent the query and waited (patiently) for a response you'll still be waiting several months or more for your article to actually appear in print. Then you will have to wait again for the publication to cut your check. So it's not a fast, easy, comfortable process.

So my advice is to not sit in front of an empty email box waiting for an editor to acknowledge your talent. Though it's tempting to loose your patience on the road to publication, it's a good thing to keep your cool. Once you send out a query, let it go and begin working on the next one.