The Power of Confidence

Background Story

We have this amazing new thing in Scotland: the Scottish Open University Press, or SUP for short. I know right? How cool would it have been to go for the actual acronym. Anyway, go have a nosey the first book is about to go public, and you can still register for the first fireside chat.

Anyway, when the first call for proposals was posted, I put a book proposal in. An idea I had for quite a while, and was encouraged from multiple, rather insistent, colleagues to put mine forward. At this point in time, the editorial board thought it was interesting but was not yet something they would go for being a new press.

Of course, I thought that was a gentle way of saying no, and started exploring different publishers, and then the semester and happened and well you know how this goes… the proposal became an item that was always kind of at the bottom of the priority list–although I half heartedly submitted it somewhere else.

Earlier in the year, I was approached by the new acquisition editor, and asked if I was still interested in submitting my proposal.

Eek! Yes.

Now we finally get to the point of this post.

My second proposal–although still in need of tweaks. Is much stronger than the first one. My critical friend–who has the patience of a group of saints during a meditation retreat–also pointed out how significant the difference is. So we pondered the reasons, and I came to the conclusion that it is all based on confidence or lack thereof.

In my first cold submission, I did not expect a “yes”. So I wrote as if I did not expect a “yes”. Yes. I got professional feedback. Yes. I went through the motions to make it all professional, and writer-y but I didn’t really believe in my book.

And this is the crux of the matter.

This time around, I was asked to submit. Mind you there is still a long process ahead with serval potential points of “no”. However, because I was asked; because there was initial interest; I felt more confident about the proposal and this entirely changed my writing.

No matter what happens going forward and that I need to tweak the proposal some more. I am now proud of my writing.

Write as if the “yes” is a given

My take away from the experience so far:

• Write as if the “yes” is a given.
• Write as if your readership already loves your article, blog post, book proposal.
• Write for the one person you know for sure will love it.