From the depths of our brains, hearts, and souls, we create. So, it is natural for us creatives to be incredibly protective of our work. Once we let go of our piece and allow others to view what we have written or created it’s hard to control what’s going to happen next. We want our writing and art to find a home, but to find that home it has to go through a few, if not many, rejections. We also have to understand that while we are all great writers and creators, the inevitable “Thanks, but no thanks,” email will make its way into our inbox.

Upon reading that rejection, the news can feel very personal and losing sight of reality is a real possibility. The reality being that maybe that specific literary journal had a theme in mind or the other submissions just fit better than yours. Maybe they had a really hard time deciding and that other piece simply had one less punctuation error. The truth is, literary journals are managed by human beings, and oftentimes there are numerous human beings sifting through submissions. Much like a Twitter feed, numerous human beings equate to numerous opinions. Maybe you sent in a piece about a cat and one of the editors just recently lost their cat, so reading and accepting your piece was just too much for them. Usually, when we get that “no” email it takes a few days if not weeks to get back up and send it out again.   

In the upcoming weeks, we will begin a series called “The Published Perspective” in which we will speak with past and present Lindenwood students and pick their brains about publication.

So stay tuned, fellow creatives and keep submitting!