#UpbeatAuthors: Knowing When to Quit

Perseverance is a good thing. But sometimes it’s better to know when to quit.

I used to drink coffee. But every year on a religious fast day, I went through caffeine withdrawal. About ten years ago, I realized if my body was going through withdrawal, then I was addicted. I’d quit smoking a few years earlier. If I could quit one addiction, I could quit another. So I did.

Other things not worth hanging in there for:

  • bad/abusive relationships
  • a hated, dreaded job
  • an eating plan that leaves you hungry
  • a beer chugging contest
  • a TV show that makes you uneasy
  • a bad movie in a theater
  • the same first three chapters of a writer’s WIP that keep getting entered in contests–and nothing more is ever written on the story.

 

 

 

Dishwashing Mantra

I could swear I blogged about this topic before, but I can’t find it, so I’m going to blog about it now.

I was raised in a home with no dishwashing machine. My mother had two dishwashers: me and my younger sister. (Why did my younger brother not have to wash dishes or set the table? My sister and I had to mow the lawn…)

The way we were taught to wash the dishes was: glasses and silverware first. “Glasses” included tea mugs.  The theory was that those items went into our mouths, so it was best to wash them first, while the water was still clean and hot, in the hopes of sanitizing them.

Next came everything else except the “tin dishes”, which is what my parents called the pots and pans. Except for the frying pans (usually cast iron), tin dishes were washed last.

To this day, that is how I hand wash dishes.

 

#UpbeatAuthors: Outlasting Your Enemies

There have been times in my life when perseverance involved keeping my head down, doing what I needed to do,  and reminding myself I could outlast my enemies.  Enemies are legion: bad bosses; nasty co-workers; crushing debt; non-life-threatening illness; rent increases; traffic jams; raising teenagers.

I just remind myself that this, too, shall pass. Then I hang in there.

 

 

But He Has a Wife/Secretary

I used to read time management books. I also read a couple of “how to increase your creativity” books. Every one of them had a fatal flaw: they were written for men who had wives/secretaries/administrative assistants. Even books written by women seem to assume there is…staff. Someone else to deal with the stuff you’re too important to do.

What about when you are the wife, the admin, the bottom of the hill the crap rolls down?  No one has ever written a book for us.

Gloria Steinem once said:  “I have yet to hear a man ask for advice on how to combine marriage and a career.” More recently, author Colleen Walsh stated her version of this quote.

 

#UpbeatAuthors: The Road to Publication

The month’s #UpbeatAuthors topic is perseverance. When I think of perseverance, I think about how long it took me to write a book a publisher felt was worthy of publication. I think about other authors, who never gave up, whether it was to sign contracts with traditional publishers, small-press independent publishers, or who decided (sometimes after decades of rejections) to self-publish.

Members of my RWA chapter have come and gone. Several of us stuck around until the industry changed. The others must have been hobbyists, because they surrendered.

A few of my friends haven’t had contracts renewed. Or their lines have closed. Instead of giving up, they’ve sought new ways of getting their work to their readers. Or they’ve decided now is the time for me to reinvent my product the way I want it done. And they are succeeding.

Because they hung in there.