An astronaut's guide to getting published

This week I've been reading Commander Chris Hadfield's book An Astronaut's Guide to Life on Earth.  Part-memoir, part-personal development text, the book is inspirational.  

The thing that struck me was how many parallels there were to the process of getting a mainstream publishing contract.  He recounts the memory of watching the 1969 Moon landing as a nine year old, and resolving to be an astronaut right then.  And he records that, at the time, that was impossible.  Canada didn't send astronauts to space back then.

He says he'd never have felt that he'd been a failure if he didn't get to space.  His attitude was that he should keep doing things that moved him in the right direction.  And that he should be sure those things interested him so that, whatever happened, he was happy.

I think we writers have to do the same.  We have to be focused on the dream of publication, knowing that it might never happen.  And we have to keep learning things that make us happy along the way.  We have to be in love with the process of writing.

Chris talks about his application to the Canadian Space Agency to be an astronaut.  "What followed was the least comfortable five-month period of my life" he says.  "...there was no feedback, no way to tell if I was succeeding or not."  As someone who is currently waiting for an agent to read the full manuscript of my novel and get back to me, I can attest that this process feels just the same.

"I tried to lead my normal life but could not forget for a moment what was hanging in the balance."  What a perfect description of my struggle at present.  I try to concentrate on writing the next book, knowing that another of my creations is undergoing life or death professional scrutiny.

Chris has a good piece of advice about attitude.  "Ultimately, I don't determine whether I arrive at the desired professional destination.  Too many variables are out of my control.  There's only one thing I can control - my attitude during my journey."   "Be ready.  Work.  Hard.  Enjoy it," he advises.  "I got real pleasure from small victories."

This is the way we too can survive our journey to publication.  Small victories may be all we have for a long time.  We need to find our satisfaction in the everyday process of writing.