Wash your hands

Many beginner writers send out a ms. and then wait, wait, worry, wonder, wait. Forget about it! All that stress should have been done before hand, polishing and making your ms. the very best it can be. Once you've mailed it out, it is out of your hands and best put out of your mind.

Now then, about the eighth or tenth rejection, you may want to look it over again. If anyone has been kind enough to offer you suggestions to improve it, take it to heart, mull it over, make changes. Yes, the wait and worry and wonder will still exist, but the best piece of writerly advice is get busy working on something else.

Heard about the rule of 13? Some writers swear if you keep thirteen mss. floating around at editors, publishers, etc. that eventually one will pick up on one. It took me a while to write enough to keep thirteen going all the time and sometimes it is more like ten, but I strive to keep plenty of material out there.

Meanwhile, even as I write, I still look forward to the mailperson each day and feel a twinge of disappointment when there is no news. But hey! that's what being a writer is all about.