(Part of a series applying the Prayer of St. Ephraim to the writer’s life, and considering where I can improve.)

Grant not unto me a spirit of idleness,
of discouragement,
of lust for power,
and of vain speaking.

But bestow upon me, Thy servant,
the spirit of chastity,
of humility,
of patience,
and of love.

My story The Lion and the Thorn Tree was under submission at Heroic Fantasy Quarterly for six months before they finally got back to me to let me know that the story had been accepted. I say this not to complain about their response times (there are plenty of other markets that are worse), but to illustrate the kind of patience that any writer must have. Publishing moves glacially. Short store markets are on the fast side of the tracks relative to book publishers, many of which have response times exceeding a year. You can avoid some of this slow-down by self-publishing, but even that doesn’t remove the real need for writerly patience, which is waiting for the money to come in.

This is the place where I find myself now. I’ve accustomed myself to the response times of most short story markets, and I’m quite happy with the notion that a story may need to be shopped around for years before it actually finds a publisher. My patience now is tried with knowing how long I have to wait before I’ve “arrived”. At the moment I’ve sold a number of short stories, but never a novel. Am I a professional yet? When do I start winning awards? When do people start recognizing me at cons? When do I get to become geek-famous?

(This is the point where I stop and check myself for humility and the lust for power, as discussed in previous installments.)

Of course, becoming famous, even geek-famous, is not actually my goal. It sure would be nice though. And here, I have to recognize the fact that these things take time. Lots and lots of time. Most of the “overnight” successes in the writing world are from people who have been writing for a decade or more. If I really want success, I have to (1) continually improve my craft, and (2) wait.

Perhaps you can tell that this topic is a bit of a sore point for me. I do not want to be patient. I want to exercise my lust for power (the vice which is paired opposite patience), and seize recognition and fame now. But I can’t—because that power isn’t actually mine, and because it would be bad more me even if I had it. Instead I’ll wait. I’ll keep working, and I’ll wait.

Next time: Love.