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"Winning is not an event. Winning is a process."
Wish I could tell you who said that. It was some guy on a Travel Channel special about Las Vegas, and he was talking about making money in casinos. But even though I'm not a professional gambler (or trying to be), those words really stuck with me for the next few days. I'd been thinking that getting an agent and a book deal as the only way to 'win' at this writing thing. And in retrospect I've realized that isn't true. I'm not where I want to be quite yet, but there are some things that I should give myself credit for.
Since July 2010, I've progressed from a 100,000 word MONSTER BEAST with a ton of potential but in need of some serious work, to a lean, mean, 65,000 word manuscript that I'm really, really proud of. I've gone from believing that since my best friends and family loved my book, it was ready, to understanding that feedback from neutral critique partners is VITAL. I've learned to take agent rejection feedback as the intensely valuable assistance that it really is, instead of brushing it off as 'They just don't get me.' (Oh, I was so clueless and arrogant last July) And my responses have improved considerably. My current query has had a request rate I'm really pleased with, and though I haven't signed with an agent yet, several have shared things they like about my story and asked to read more. So now I'm just waiting and hoping that one of them *loves* the final product enough to offer representation. I hope it'll happen soon. But even if right now isn't my moment, I know I've a come a loooooong way from where I started. And to me, that's winning.
