Courage In The Quiet Moments

I've been calling myself a coward for being so, uhm, cowardly in sending my manuscript back out into the wide world for publication.  I know, I know, you will get hundreds of nos before you get that one yes.  You stop getting nos after that, it's just getting that one yes that is driving me bonkers.  I've been looking at a new possible publisher called WiDo.  I'm pronouncing it "We Do" in hopes that they do publish my manuscript.  I've been told by other publishers, in their "Thanks but no thanks" letters that it's a good story, but it doesn't mesh within their wheelhouse. It not like I've recieved a bunch of no's for my work, it's just the handful that I have had are so, I dunno, discouraging.  If I can't handle the single no from a publisher how am I going to handle it when I am published and even if the critics love it there's always one who hates what eveyone loves (you know who you are)  and he says that it's crap-on-a-stick and a tragic waste of trees to print it.  I can't be afraid of the little no, I need to straighten my weak knees, focus on the prize and stop looking at the no's behind me and start hunting for the yes to come.

I hate giving myself pep talks, they all seem a bit self-serving, don't you think?