The Exception to the Rule

Publishing is hard. It’s a long, windy, seemingly never ending road. You have to finish a book. You have to revise said book. You have to query agents. You have hope an agent will say yes. Then you and your agent have to submit your manuscript to various publishing companies. You have to hope again for that glorious yes, I want it. Then you might get a book deal. Then once that’s done, you have repeat all the steps after getting an agent. 

I know it’s hard. I know it’s going to take time. I know that authors that I look up to, spent a lot of time and money to get to where they are. Some of them even took ten years to get their first book published. I know it won’t just work out for me. I have a long road in front of me and I’m taking steps towards that end goal everyday. 

Still I can’t help but hope that maybe I will be the exception to the rule. I know it sounds foolish and crazy, but there are some authors that seemed to have all the luck in the world. They get their first book they ever wrote published. The publishing company puts a lot of their advertising efforts behind it. It just seems like those authors have it all. 

Don’t get me wrong. I’m not discounting those authors at all. There’s a lot we don’t see behind the scenes. I don’t know how much time the author put into writing their book. I’m sure it’s a lot of time. I don’t know what was going on in their life at the time. I’m sure they were juggling more than just writing a book. 

But I do know that some authors—the very rare one is the exception to the rule. And I sometimes dream my path will be like that. Who doesn’t like the easier path? Who doesn’t like to believe that their top choice agent is going to love you book? Who doesn’t want to believe that their ideal publishing company is going to come knocking on your door? 

Who doesn’t want to hope? 

I think that’s why publishing and writing scares me. Because I do have these hopes and I know in the back of my mind, it won’t end up that way. The path to publishing is long and I’m not going to be that author who gets the secret password to get into the party. I’m not the best writer and I don’t have the most unique ideas. There’s really no reason I should be the rare author. 

I know that. Logically I know that, but I can’t help but hope. Just maybe. Just maybe I’ll be the exception to the rule. 

Anyone else feel this way? Is there anyway to gently remind yourself the norm isn’t this way without completely dashing your hopes and dreams?