I’m Tired Of Getting Rejected By Publications

And here’s what I’ve learnt from it. Rejection and revision requests aren’t always bad, in fact, they might be key to success.

I’ve been a writer on Medium for less than a month, yet I’ve received my fair share of rejection and revision requests from publications.

This has always been demoralising. I felt like I was being told I wasn’t good enough, and imposter syndrome started to creep up on me.

However, this wasn’t true.

The Magic of Publications

Before I started writing consistently on Medium in January, I self-published a few articles.

Surprise… they did horribly!

Then, I learnt of publications, and how they could be the secret sauce to gaining some traction on Medium! They can:

• Give me a much larger audience
• Niched audiences (E.g. a publication about health)

I was immediately enticed by the prospects and started joining many different publications. The first ones I joined, and highly recommend were Illumination, Books Are Our Superpower and Long. Sweet. Valuable.

My views and reads started increasing in January, which I’m super happy about!

The First Rejection

I might have an unhealthy obsession with checking my notifications on Medium. So, when I eagerly clicked on it one day, my heart fell when I saw this private note:

Sorry, this doesn’t meet our publication standards. Thank you for your submission.

What?? I just got rejected?

I felt demoralised and dejected. It felt like I wasn’t worthy of being a writer, and my writing just wasn’t good enough.

Anyway, I submitted that story to another publication, where it did get published. Though even now, it is one of my poorer-performing stories.

Another time, I got a revision request:

Hi there. Your subtitle is long. Could you please shorten it? If you have a long title, it’s always better to shorten the subtitle.

My heart sank again. Was my writing truly subpar?

In hindsight, all these thoughts were pretty stupid.

What I’ve Learnt

Rejection and revision requests are some of the best learning opportunities there are.

Growth

Many of the editors looking at my articles have thousands more followers, and years more experience than I do.

I’m getting free advice and guidance from more successful writers. That’s awesome!

When I was told to shorten my subtitle, that was a great piece of advice! I’m grateful they took the time to correct my mistake and guide me back onto the correct path.

I’ve often found major flaws in my writing thanks to the editor's rejection. Things like:

• Poor formatting
• Not enough value for the reader
• Un-engaging title and introduction
• Poor flow of ideas

These tips have helped me improve as a writer, and I ought to be thankful for the rejections, not spiteful or upset.

Don’t Take It Personally

Editors don’t reject articles because they hate you.

They’ve probably never seen your profile, and have long forgotten who you are amongst the hundreds of submissions they get each day.

I used to take it as an insult to my abilities as a writer and get demoralised. Instead, I can take it as an opportunity for growth and improvement.

Grit Is Crucial

Success takes time and hard work. I can’t expect myself to be a great writer right off the bat.

The successful writers we see now, with hundreds of thousands of followers, have written for years. They didn’t get to that level of success overnight.

I can’t let one setback derail me entirely.

Instead, it should fuel me to keep writing and improve. Grit is one of those things that set apart great writers from good ones.

Conclusion

We are all writers in progress, and that’s okay. Giving up is not.

Getting rejected by publications might be one of the best things that has happened to me. I’ve learnt so much, and you can too! Don’t let these minor setbacks demoralise you like they did to me.

All the best on your writing journey!

I hope you found this article insightful. Thanks for reading!

👉Subscribe here 👈, I publish interesting articles every week!