Don't let fear destroy success: part 1

The writer dilemma- Part One

Kia once told me told that in order to achieve success, one must embrace failure.

She explains that throughout the course of her young writing years (It was only recently that she started taking her writing seriously) that she too had, had to cope with the dreaded rejection letters.

Most of them are now locked away in her sacred dream box for the day when she actually makes it, so she can post the response ‘You were wrong and I was right’ to all those who rejected her!

“I wrote over a dozen short stories in the midst of a very painful break up and was able to get them all published within the space of a year or even less,” she tells me.

“In that same year, I wrote my novel too- the pain from the break up was intense and writing was the only way I knew how to deal with it. That’s how I express myself. Funnily enough, I personally find it very hard to talk about how I feel and so writing enables me to express myself freely and without constraint,” she explains. 

“Every now and again though, I do write strange things on Facebook and then get people asking me whether I live on another planet...!”

Who doesn’t, I think to myself.

She smiles, “The point it, I always find I am my most creative through failure. It is necessary in order to develop your craft and to become bigger and better. There is no escaping failure and the pain you experience can be great motivator for all if only we embrace it and use it to drive success,” 

“I have had lots of no’s when I sent off the first batch of my short stories. I mean, I even had someone wrote ‘No thanks, please don’t send back’ on my manuscript,”

She shakes her head in amazement. “Can you imagine? This is my dream and someone has scribbled that on the front of it? I had to compose myself, I had to tell myself that this agency just doesn’t get it but, someone else will...someone out there in this big, gigantic world must get it!”

She continues, “And you know what? Someone did get me, but it was only because I kept going. That’s all it takes... the ability to rise above the fear of failing and just do...that’s all that is required from you and you never know what could happen.”

“So... are you really going to send a response to those rejection slips you received?” I asked in disbelief.

She laughed with a now very obvious cheeky grin on her face, “Yes, I am. Together with a copy of my new glossy book! But in all honesty, Rochelle you must believe that when one door closes another really can open for you. If one person doesn’t like you, I guarantee there is someone out there that will love you. The point is to never take failure personally,”

“You know that saying, feel the fear but do it anyway? I live by that statement.”

This makes me think about failure from a young writer's perspective. There are so many unpublished, young writers out there and there is this major feeling going around that most can’t make it really big as a writer.  The ones that do are lucky geniuses. 

Is this really true? What is the difference between those that makes it and those people that don’t? In any case, I believe that in any writing career, failure is necessary is reshaping a young writer’s style and never lets them get lazy in their craft.