Today.. instead of walking this morning or getting my GLR submissions distributed I spent like 5 hours on my own poetry submissions. Research, editing, writing cover letters, etc. I even created a new chapbook to submit to a contest.

When they say writing is hard work, I’m pretty sure all of this has a lot to do with that. Sure, writing draft after draft is work. But this submission process is exhausting.

I’m happy to report I’ve hit my goal for October. I now have 51+ open submissions in Submittable (and elsewhere).

95% of what I’ve submitted in my life has been this year and so far the results, I believe, are promising. Setting previous years aside, my track record / stats are as follows:

52 open (from single poems to full manuscripts)
7 accepts (10 poems online and 1 in print)
26 subs declined Or “completed”.
And 1 withdrawn.

By my calculations, it appears I have about a 20% accept rate. Which is Pretty promising Right??!

We’ll see how things go with the 50 that are out in the wild right now.

As it happens, during the middle of my mad Sunday dash to let more loose, another rejection showed up in my in-box. I’ve maybe said this before, but at the end of the day it all feels a bit like gambling. Playing the odds as it were.

What gets accepted is just based on one or two or three peoples opinions, objectives, motives, experience, etc. A person can’t predict what the gatekeepers are looking for it what might pique their interest. Even if you are very diligent in your research, the folks at Ploughshares or Prairie Schooner are going to want what they want and like what they like.

So what is a girl to do? I mean, now that I’ve hit my goal for October, perhaps I let that ride for a bit and put my focus elsewhere. There’s only one place I submitted to which I paid extra to for additional feedback. I’m not inclined to do that on a regular basis because it’s not cost effective to get the opinion of one person. It would be much better if I had a regular workshop group. Perhaps that’s something I need to try and find (or start).

In any case, I’ve spent too much time sitting on Submittable today and it’s unlikely I’ll get those new subs distributed.
So I guess I’ll add that to the list of things to take care of Monday. Yeah, my new day job.

Prolly not going to make much more progress on my step goal today either. There’s always tomorrow. 😜

For now I’ll just try to be happy with what I’ve accomplished and enjoy a relaxing Sunday evening. Is that possible? Can I relax and just be happy with reaching a goal without thinking I could do more or setting the bar higher?

Maybe.

Maybe not. Ha!

Cheers to Reaching Goals,
~Miss SugarCookie