• Home
• About bethestory.com
• Subscribe
• Terms of Service

Battling the Post-Revision Blues

Photo © 2006 Sheldon Wood CC BY-NC-SA 2.0

I’ve experienced the same thing, as a musician, whenever I give a big musical performance. As you prepare for the big event, you practice, you plan, you’re running on adrenaline. The big night comes. You perform beautifully. The burn of the spotlights, the adulation of the crowd, the feeling of accomplishment. You’re floating on air.

The next day, you crash, hard.

I always plan to take the next day off after a big performance. My father, too, when he was pastoring a church, Monday was his day off, because he had prepared all week for Sunday, and after it was over, he needed to decompress. And I experience the same thing after finishing a big writing project.

Once the manuscript is revised and put to bed, I start coming down off that adrenaline high. Up until that point, I’d been barreling through, planning, creating, writing, then revising, amazed at how good it feels, to read my own story, to have it excite me, the fulfillment, the psychological reward. And then, sadness.

After the revision is complete, I crash, hard. I need to put the manuscript up on the shelf for a little, because I’m too close to it. More than that, though, I start to see all the mistakes in it. I notice all the things I did wrong, or that I could have done better. Yes, it’s the best thing I’ve ever written—not just the one I’ve fallen in love with the most, but the one that encompasses all of the skill and acumen I’ve collected, more so than anything I’d ever written before. I have no reason to feel ashamed and every reason to feel proud. But even though it’s good writing, and fun to read, and even though there are plenty of less enjoyable works in the world that have been published to rave reviews, I wonder if it’s good enough. And then I wonder whether I’m good enough. I wonder whether people will hate it, or me, for whatever piddling reason. I begin to doubt that they’ll even take the effort to read it, because it’s not worth reading. I doubt my abilities as a writer. Am I any good? What kind of a stupid hack am I, anyhow? It doesn’t matter how much success I’ve gotten in the past, how many complements I’ve gotten, how many readers I have, how many fans or friends. And allowed to proceed unchecked, the feeling can debilitate.

This is the post-revision blues.

Fortunately, there are ways to deal with them in a healthy manner. (Many of these are adapted from the book How to Lift Depression …fast.)

• Relax. What you’re experiencing is a form of grief, caused by changing circumstances. It’s natural to feel down at this point in the cycle, but it’s still just a feeling. Don’t let it cloud your judgment. Calm your emotions—breathe out slowly, read a book, listen to calming music, exercise, take a nap—and you’ll be able to think more clearly. Then you’ll be able to make more effective choices as to how to proceed. (However, be careful about watching TV. Because of the nature of television, it can overstimulate your mind and wear you out, making it more difficult for you to calm yourself.)

• Work on the next phase of the project, or on the next project. If you need to mail the manuscript out to publishers or to your agent, do so. If you need to have readers reading it, send them a copy. If you need to start planning your next novel, start working on it.

• Realize that the feeling is separate from you as a person. It’s just something you’re going through, but it’s not part of who you are. When you feel sad, register the feeling, because it’s normal, but don’t allow that feeling to define you or project onto your future.

• Combat self-loathing by reminding yourself of all the people in the past who have read your work and came to you, overjoyed, and gushed at how much they enjoyed it and how good a writer they thought you were. Remind yourself of all the work you’ve put into learning how to write, all the creativity you’ve displayed, and all of the skills you’ve developed as a writer.

• Stop worrying about it. You finished it; it’s done; there’s nothing you can do about it now. No sense dwelling on what you can’t change. Move on.

• Whatever you think you’ve done wrong on this project, modify your writing process to keep it from happening again. Change negative thoughts into a positive, constructive future.

• Don’t dwell on how much “better” you think such-and-such another writer is. Yeah, maybe she sells more books than you, for now. But that doesn’t define who you are. You’re doing your best and developing your skills and talents, and that’s sufficient for now. Never let thoughts of inferiority drag you down, and if you find yourself thinking them, just say, “Stop!” (To yourself, in your head, at least if there are others around.)

• … which reminds me… Laugh! Read Dave Barry. Or Kevin Cummings. Or whoever your favorite humorist is. Or read Janet Evanovich. Or your favorite funny blog. Or tell yourself a funny joke. It’s not just an old wives tale: laughter really is the best medicine.

• Put boundaries around your feelings of worry and self-loathing. Allow yourself a half-hour to be a failure, but know that after that half-hour expires, you’re going to move on. Even with your feelings of natural sadness, you can allow yourself a day each week to grieve. But when those feelings occur to you other times during the week, put them off until the appointed time.

• Uncouple destructive patterns. Sometimes, you feel worried or sad, because something reminds you subconsciously of a situation that distressed you in your past. Maybe someone criticized your last book, maybe unfairly. Maybe you haven’t been able to sell your manuscripts. You’re assuming unconsciously that the outcome will be the same now as it was then. But it’s silly to assume that everything will stay just as it was before, because the only constant in this world is change, and what you’re experiencing now is a new situation with new possibilities. Try to list all the ways in which this situation is different than what’s happened in the past. (Really, literally, give it a shot.) You won’t be able to, and even your subconscious will have to admit that things really are different now.

• Imagine a better future. A great way to combat worry is simply to invoke anti-worry. That is, instead of worrying about how bad things could be, imagine how good they could become. Do your best then to bring about those good results. I’m not saying that you should have a pie-in-the-sky outlook; but when you’re being dragged down by unrealistic negativism and worry, you have to go out of your way to remind yourself of the positive prospects in your life. For example, if you’re worried about what bloggers will say about your book, you may end up behaving antagonistically to them. But if you imagine the bloggers who will fawn over your latest book, then it makes it possible to engage with them as friends.