WE CREATE ROADBLOCKS IN OUR MINDS, AND UNLESS WE USE THE MIND TO DISASSEMBLE THESE BLOCKS WE WILL CONTINUE TO STRUGGLE.

There is not one way to say this, and many writers will attempt to dissect and analyze The Writer’s Journey for us all. My approach, then, will be unique to me, because my experience is unique. Because of me. But I am not alone in saying this: “The Writer’s Journey is difficult.”

My first attempt at The Writer’s Journey led me straight into rejection. It was like I hurled my over-confident self right smack into a brick wall over and over in the hope that the brick wall would move and open up closed doors for me. It didn’t.

This desire to succeed and prove myself was so great that I couldn’t see what I was doing wrong. I thought the wall was wrong to be there. And it took a long time for me to see that I was going to have to take down the wall brick by stupid brick.

Literally, and figuratively, The Writer’s Journey for me has been about disassembling expectations and stepping into a new alignment with the meaning of success. Because I had had a fair amount of success in school and was certainly a creative person, and I knew this, I had a fair amount of certainty that the wall would crumble. For me. I didn’t understand this kind of hard work. And it took me a long time to accept that writing is hard work.

All things being said, I wanted instant success. Right? Each of us has probably experienced this same story, repeatedly. It doesn’t work like this for the majority of us as many Writers’ Journeys are fraught with complications such as not feeling good enough to be here, or continually feeling upended by rejection. We must work to overcome these feelings before we can see that there is success right in front of our noses.

I took another route to work around the feeling of rejection that I want to share.

This became, not how I was going to tear down the wall by myself (remember the wall represents “that which stands in our way”), but how I was going to begin to understand my emotional self to understand how I had built that wall by myself. I was responsible for the wall. No one else created this wall. I created an obstacle because I saw rejection as a problem. It took me a long time to find rejection as only something in my mind. It only existed because I labeled it rejection.

Still with me?

It took years of rejection for me to accept the wall existed because I saw “that which stood in my way” as a construct. I saw rejection as a marker. I saw it as a plush pillow to lie my head upon and cry.

Let’s unearth the emotional journey, because we all have one, whether we’re writers, artists, or creators of any kind.

The emotional response to rejection becomes the wall. It is not the editors, the publishers, or the agents who say “no.”

This makes The Writer’s Journey about conquering emotion. It is not about fighting anyone else. It is not about laying blame. It is not about hurling insults at the world because the world isn’t bending to our latest whim. Therefore, becoming a master at emotional self-restraint is the key to creative success.

People will share their absolutes with you and these absolutes will be encouraging. I wanted to speak to this notion that the wall is our own construct, one we design in our mind that we build and that we when we’re ready can take it down with the help of a strong self.

I think self-esteem has to come from our truth and not from our desire to prove ourselves. We can’t playact our way to writer’s success. We have to be successful in our minds at every step of the way.

My idea of success is having one person drop me a line that says something to the effect of “you’re helping me.” I was desperate for the audience, but an audience of one is just as proven as an audience of one hundred. Or one thousand. I accept this now.

I write often about this need to succeed. To climb. To gain. We’re programmed to march onward and make inroads in our careers, but we tend to march forward without appreciating the steps. This journey is still difficult at times because I tend to still see it as difficult but to get to this place of acceptance that the journey is “a journey,” well, this is my goal.

The Writer's Journey still has its bumpy moments. But because I have a better emotional shock absorber and can appreciate and accept the nitty gritty work, and the fact that I create this idea of rejection as rejection in my mind, instead of seeing it as part of the maturation process, I can honestly say I’m having more fun. And more success!

The mind creates.