Ep 100: Submissions - How to Bounce Back After an Editor Turns You Down

In the last episode, I urged you to send out your work even though it means you’re risking rejection—because to get a yes, you must risk a no. I even offered a case for embracing rejection as your goal, especially in the realm of literary journals, because by setting a rejection goal, you’re increasing your odds of an acceptance. A Plan to Process Rejection But you might need a plan for how to process those rejections. You can laugh it off as part of your master goal, but it'll still sting. And it hits hardest when your writing expresses deep struggles or raw pain. Writing like that requires great emotional risk, so to be brave enough to send it off should be applauded. To risk all of that and hear “No, we don’t want this” can leave a writer shaken, even shaky. We are not impervious to the pain of a rejection, nor should we be. We will open that email and feel the wave of nausea. As Isaac Asimov said, “Rejections slips…are lacerations to the soul." You have every reason to react in whatever honest, human way you need to. My hope is you’ll find a way to feel without ending up paralyzed—you’ll figure out how to bounce back after an editor turns you down. To carry on and continue the work of a writer, you will at some point need to step back into some kind of system or plan to move forward again. You Need a Rejection Ritual I recommend a Rejection Ritual to process the emotions. Some writers have found that their response to rejection loosely parallels the stages of grief. This may be a bit over-the-top, but no doubt you’ll struggle. You may even grieve. Don’t be surprised at how hard it hits. You may feel sick to your stomach. You might cry. You may need to throw a tantrum or stare into space. Just don't get stuck there. Design a ritual that makes sense to you, that recognizes the disappointment and pain while encouraging closure. When you complete the ritual, I hope it leads you back to a creative, productive place. Yours can be a five-minute ritual or an all-day ritual. Make sure it's relatively healthy and relatively brief; I don't recommend going out and getting stoned, for example, nor do I advise dragging it out beyond a full work day. 11 Simple Rejection Rituals Consider if one of these simple rejection rituals could fit your personality. Get yourself a nice treat for every rejection. Kim Liao says she saved all her rejection slips in a box and propped a handwritten note from an editor on her window frame as "a talisman of encouragement." Write an angry poem to work through your feelings. It doesn't have to be about writing rejection—it could be about other types of rejection. It can even be metaphorical. If you're feeling more depressed than angry, make it a sad poem. The goal is to get your feelings out. Write an angry poem in someone else’s voice. Choose the voice of an adolescent or young child overreacting to a rejection to tap into thoughts and images you might not find on your own. Print out the rejection emails and impale them onto a spike. Or burn them in a metal bucket in the back yard. Take out your frustration on an inanimate object. Do something safe but a little violent, like hammering a nail into a board for every rejection—that allows you to pound something in frustration without hurting anyone, including yourself. You could hammer those nails and add something beautiful. You could tie or weave ribbons around the nails to remind you that acceptances happen in the midst of rejections. A client went to a craft store and bought a round fish bowl and plastic beads that look like pearls and diamonds. She drops into the bowl a shimmering bead for each rejection so she can see something beautiful is growing throughout the process.