There’s something very powerful about putting your story, fiction or nonfiction, out into the world. It’s a vulnerable place, one that can cause a lot of grief. It’s a place that can dash your hopes and make you doubt your dreams. I’ve been doing some grief coaching training in part for the other work I do as a spiritual storyteller and pastoral counselor; however, the more I look at grief, the more I realize authors deal with it just as much–if not more–and authors need grief coaching too.
Some people think grief coaching is only about a death, and while a lot of grief coaching is focused around that, there are so many other aspects to grief. Life transitions. Disappointments. Having dreams not turn out the way you thought they would. In the case of authors rejection letters (which are sadly inevitable if you submit a story) and low sales (again quite possibly inevitable) are also causes of grief. And yet, the way in which we talk about the publishing business, especially those voices who seem to be amplified, make it seem as if rejection letters or low sales are the author’s fault. Talk about grief amplified. Not only are you having to grieve what happened to you, a perfectly natural response, but now others are telling you that it’s your own fault, that you should have, could have, done something different, which only compounds the grief.
On one hand people are very candid, and often very supportive, about the disappointments that happen in our community. I also think that like a lot of unpleasant things, people don’t want to talk about them. It’s as if they can make them not happen by refusing the admit that they exist. We see this when people deal with end of life situations, the constant belief that somehow, someway this will be different, and the person will not die. Which is something that we’d like to hope for, even as we know that each of us will succumb in the end. It’s an almost unrealistic hope, because everything that’s alive in the way that we understand it dies eventually. Plants. Animals. Even a star dies, and you have to wonder if the other stars grieve for it, or if they accept the changing flow of gasses as a transition, and depending on the point of view, a beautiful one at that.
One of the ways in which I feel the author community would be healthier is that if people actually talked more about the grief we endure as authors. There’s grief, for example, when a social media platform dies or transforms itself so that the connections we once found meaningful no longer exist or cannot be recreated. There’s grief in rejection letters, in low sales, and even, sometimes, in those well-meaning but sometimes a bit harsh editorial comments.
I encourage you to think about how grief has shown up in your author life. And if you like, reach out. I’m here. And this is the sacred work that I do. I hold space for authors as they soothe and strengthen their creative nervous system.