I recently wrapped up a writing project. Two middle-grade books written in under 4 months. It was a fun project, but the short timeline made it stressful. (For more about that, see my article on Work-for-Hire Writing.)

I turned the second book over to a critique partner to read (thank you, Karin, for great suggestions on a ridiculously short deadline!) And as I breathed a sigh of relief at having a couple days off, I began thinking about the project I’d pick up once this one was submitted. I’d hired a book coach to provide developmental edits on my YA thriller and was super excited to jump back in and make the story better.

Thoughts swirled through my head.

• How would I fix the problem she’d identified at the start of my story?
• How could I build up the backstory for a couple of characters I’d neglected?
• How fast could I get that and all the smaller issues fixed?

The timeline looked longer than I wanted it to and I began to wonder how I could get the work done more quickly. After all, this was a book of my heart. As much as I loved the work-for-hire project, those books weren’t going to get me an agent. I needed to polish the YA thriller to be ready to query.

Then I realized my mistake.

Instead of celebrating the (near) completion of a 2-book project and taking a moment to breathe before starting something else, I was stressing myself out.  Advice to celebrate writing milestones is not new . . . but even if you know it, you might forget to follow it as I did.

Luckily, I’d planned to (virtually) attend the New England SCBWI conference and it happened to land at the perfect time. I put my revision out of my mind and spent the weekend getting motivated by keynote speakers, diving into writing craft presentations, and catching up with friends via Zoom breakout sessions. The 2020 conference has been canceled because of COVID restrictions, so it had been 2 years since I’d seen many of these folks.

The result: when I started my YA revisions a week later, I had the creative energy I needed to tackle them. I wouldn’t have had nearly as much energy for solving the manuscript’s problems if I’d just pushed from one project straight into the next.

So I’m sending out this reminder to you. Celebrate your writing successes, and not just big ones like landing an agent or getting a book deal. Celebrate your messy first drafts, a deep revision that strengthens a project, sending out a round of queries, or turning in a work-for-hire manuscript.

You won’t always have a perfectly-times online writing conference for your celebration like I did, but there are other ways to celebrate:

• Plan a meet-up with writer friends.
• Take a break and get outside. Enjoy a hike or just taming the weeds in your flower beds (or is that just my flower beds?)
• Get some creative cross-pollination with a trip to a museum, a comedy show, or just reading outside your genre.
• I’m recently in favor of inexpensive sparkling wine just because . . . bubbles!
• If you’d like an impromptu online conference, you can always check out the recordings from this year’s Writeoncon.

Congratulations on whatever writing milestone you might be celebrating right now! And don’t worry, your next project will be there waiting for you when you’re ready.