But it’s been difficult to say, “I’m ready to try again,” because I realize now how much I still have to learn. Comments from classmates and the instructor of an online writing class I recently took helped me realize it was time to start applying what I’ve been learning, and I began submitting articles and short stories while I work on a novel.

To my surprise, the feedback and requests for rewrites that I’ve received in response to my submissions have pointed me to the areas I need to work on. This, too, is part of the learning process.

Continuing education is as essential to writers as it is to any other profession. What we need to learn is to focus our learning on our weakest area before we move on to other articles and books. Otherwise, we’ll go through life learning a lot but never writing the stories we meant to write.

You just gave me permission to let go of all that and write again. I do believe there is worthy advice in the piles of writing-and-publishing how-tos I’ve been inundated with, but I think you’re right in that I just need to keep writing and keep reading novels, and then polish up what I’ve already written and go from there.

Bless you!!!
Stacy A

I also love reading about people who have taken ego trips (they end up in the most fascinating and entertaining situations). I actually find their stories inspirational. Oh, yes, and I love bookmarks, too. So much nicer than a receipt from the grocery store, or a piece of tissue from the pocket of your robe. I need a lot of bookmarks, myself, because I have so many wonderful stacks of books I am currently reading.

I only wish some young whippersnapper would invent an electronic version that was as much fun to look at and collect as the traditional ones used to be. Some creative little visual thing you could click on or off at whatever place you stopped reading in your Kindle. With the same quality as some of the ones I spent an hour perusing, last week, at a fantastic online museum. Then again, I suppose only those of us “of a certain age” have enough time to do exactly what we want to every day. Which is another thing the whippersnappers seem to get upset about. But you know something? I wouldn’t go back to that age, again, even if you paid me. I love it over here on this side.

Anyone out there who decides to start an online ego club, I’ll be the first to sign up.

My response to Mr. DeWitt’s writer friend would be, “Guess what, partner, if you don’t publish them yourself, your stories will never see the light of day.” The publishing world is changing so fast and mainstream publishers are so unsure of the future that they are less likely than ever to publish an unknown author unless they are absolutely sure that they have a major hit on their hands. Indie publishing isn’t an ego trip, it is reality … that is, if you want anyone to read your stories.