If you took part in the StoryADay May Challenge you might be finding yourself confused.
You wrote so much in May and now? Now, it’s hard to get anything done.
You’re Progressing, Not Graduating
As a creative person, there is never a moment that you can point to and say, “That’s it. I’m finished.” We will always strive to be better…and so it’s important to notice the milestones along the way.
Don’t beat yourself up for losing momentum after the challenge (or any big writing push).
It’s possible you needed a break.
But it’s also possible you miss the structure of the challenge.
So, in case Option B applies to you, here’s my suggestion for the next four weeks, so that you can feel yourself making consistent progress without burning out.
Each week I encourage you to focus on one thing (while, obviously, doing many other things at the same time) so that you can feel a sense of accomplishment at the end of a defined period (in this case, the next four weeks).
It’s tempting to think that other writers have it easier, or other times were easier on writers.
Wasn’t it easier to get published when there were more independent publishing houses?
Wasn’t it easier to make a living at writing in the golden age of magazine publishing?
All those other writers who are selling their work must have some kind of cheat code that they’re not sharing with us, right?
This week I read the editorial in the February 1951 issue of Galaxy Science Fiction magazine, a relatively new publication at the time. The magazine was making its mark, in part, by offering the highest rates in the market in order to attract the best writers. And they did—publishing Brandbury, Asimov, Clarke, Del Ray, Simak, in their primes.
But here’s a snippet from the editorial that I found weirdly encouraging. Editor H. L. Gold was trying to explain to readers how the economics of the writing business work, but I think he left an important message for us writers, too:
“Counting false starts, stories that won’t work out, stories that shouldn’t have been written at all but seemed good at the time, research, productive labor, etc., it takes a stupendous amount of writing even at the highest rates to support an author and his family on magazine sales alone.”
-H. L. Gold, Galaxy Science Fiction, February 1951
There’s your cheat code: there is no cheat code.
There’s just ‘a stupendous amount of writing’.
Which we love to do, anyway, right?
Looking At The Wrong Metric
When people think of success as a writer, they tend to measure external, visible rewards: sales, income, awards, praise, etc.
But the rewards, if we’re honest, hit most deeply in those moment when a story draft pivots towards it’s real purpose, when you suddenly know what the story is really about; or when you realize you’ve revised it as far as you can, and it’s ready to be read by someone else.
The real reward is in the writing.
What stalls a lot of people is the sense that you’re doing it wrong if you’re making ‘false starts, stories that won’t work out, stories that shouldn’t have been written at all but seemed good at the time…’
If you feel like you’re ‘not a real writer’ because it requires a stupendous amount of writing to generate the occasional piece that works, H. L. Gold would like a word…
He left those words in his editorial to justify paying the highest rates on the market; and they serve to remind us writers, that this was never easy. And that’s OK.
Write a stupendous amount this week
If you’re an ambitious* writer, you have to write a stupendous amount to reap the rewards you’re after. It’s not a race or a competition. You don’t have to burn out. But you do have to write. Probably more than is comfortable.
(*And ‘ambitious’ doesn’t have to mean ‘support myself financially via my writing’. That might be part of your ambition. But I suspect the true ambition is to do the best work you’re capable of.)
StoryADay May is an opportunity for you to find out what ‘a stupendous amount of writing’ feels like, over one month’s time. Are you capable of pushing through, writing when you don’t feel like it, and giving up on those ‘stories that should never have been written’?
If you want to feel the sharp satisfaction of success – whether that ‘success’ is ‘a day of good writing’ or ‘a story sold’, both are valid – remember that ‘a stupendous amount of writing’ is the baseline. It’s the thing that helps you find the stories, tell them well, and sense your own progress.
It’s OK if you don’t want to do all that work. If you have better things to do with your time, by all means do them.
But if you’re floating through life waiting for it to become easy I have some bad news: the struggle is frustrating, and annoying, and sometimes painful, but it’s also where the rewards lives.
What will you write, this week?
Here are the most recent prompts from the StoryADay challenge
Not sure how to get started with prompts? The StoryADay 2026 Handbook has custom warm-ups and brainstorming exercises designed to catapult you into your day’s writing. Get it now (NOTICE: PRICE WILL INCREASE ON JUNE 1, 2026)
Get the StoryADay Challenge Handbook for 2026 – custom warm-up and brainstorming exercises for every prompt, delivered as a private podcast with transcripts. SUBSCRIBE NOW
Get the Essential StoryADay Challenge Handbook (the one that’s a short story course disguised as a challenge) from 2024. Video, audio, written lessons & captions START HERE
The StoryADay Challenge has rolled into its second week for 2026, and there’s a lively community of writers leaving comments about their writing, over at the blog.
Even if you’re not taking part in the challenge, why not read through them and commit to writing one story sparked by one, this week?
We writers can be in such a rush–to get this project finished; to submit; to hit the best-seller list; to make our fortune—that it’s easy to get discouraged. It can feel like we’re not making progress if the writing is slow, or ‘successes’ don’t come often.
But writing isn’t just one thing. And none of the activities that make up a writing life are particularly quick.
Developing ideas takes time
Drafting takes time
Revising and rewriting benefits from time and space.
Improving our skills demands time, and experimentation, and wrong turns.
It’s OK to be what my friend, coach Jennie Mustafa-Julock, calls “impatiently ambitious”. At the same time, we have to cultivate patience for the parts of the practice that just go…well, slowly.
The Benefits of ‘Slow and Steady’
This idea of ‘going slow’ has come up a couple of times in the Superstars community, this week.
“I’ve had to come to terms with the fact that I’m a really slow writer,” said one person, who writes beautiful, immersive stories.
“I’m embracing being slow,” said another writer, who I’m watching make huge strides in their practice.
World-class athletes, actors, and musicians spend a lot of hidden time practicing their craft; only occasionally stepping onto the big stage to perform.
We writers spend a lot of times doing work that doesn’t end up in front of anyone else. And that’s OK, especially when we are focused on improving our skills.
Couture Vs. Fast Fashion
In a world of fast fashion, people still crave a tailor-made suit, a custom-fitted wedding dress, and a beautifully hand-crafted hat. And those who can, value that quality enough to pay premium rates for it.
In this moment of instant-access to information, and AI-everything, there’s a lot to be said for slowing our creative lives down to a human (humane?) pace.
Let’s reclaim the time and space for deep thought, wrong turns, course-corrections, and insights that only come with prolonged effort.
These are the spark of humanity – of creativity–that AI can never replace.
Spend some time this week giving yourself the chance to stare into space, make some mistakes, erase some words, and write something nobody will ever see, just for the sake of having done it.
P. S. Want to put some craft-building writing time on your calendar this week? Try the 3-Day Challenge, a self-paced journey through the short story.
Listen carefully, writers! Do you hear ‘the submission echo’?
or: Why Shouting into The Void Isn’t Always Bad…
Writing and submitting manuscripts can be discouraging.
It can feel like shouting into the void.
You send your stories, your queries, your pitches, out into the world and hear…nothing—-or ‘no—so often you start to “wonder what’s the point”?
I’m always preaching about the benefits to you of doing the work anyway, but recently I discovered another benefit, that I’m calling ‘the submission echo’, and it came after a flurry of ‘shouting into the void’, myself.
The Little Story That Couldn’t
I’ve been through a spell of ‘not sending things out’ and now I’m in a season of sending stories out to find their place in the world, again. And there’s a lot of waiting around for answers.
This week the answer was ‘no thanks’.
The publication I had lovingly crafted a story for, didn’t want it.
Hmmph!
But…This one didn’t sting as much as some other ‘non-acceptances’ (I’m not using the R word!) because this one had brought me much more than an opportunity to be published.
This story had been a challenge to write. I’d had to research cutting-edge science for it. I’d walked away and come back to it. I’d enjoyed the process. Some readers I gave it to it to enjoyed it.
In the end, I simply like this little story.
That’s why I was so surprised that the ‘no thanks’ didn’t sting as much as I expected, and here’s why:
I noticed the ‘submission echo’.
The Submission Echo
That’s what I call the effect when creativity begets more creativity, courage begets courage, and one story drives you to write more stories.
Lots of surprising things happened after I submitted that story:
Yes, the story had been tricky and the research had stretched the limits of my understanding of a particular field…and energized me. It reminded me that I love writing.
Yes, it took courage to push the ‘submit button. But the little hit of excited dopamine made me want to do it again. Which meant more writing, more market research, more wrangling with tricky plot points…only now, that felt exciting, not overwhelming.
And yes, I gained renewed confidence in my ability to push through a problem in a story. (Since submitting the Little Story That Couldn’t, I have added three new scenes to my previously-stalled novel-in-progress.)
Shout Into The Void
When writers tell you not to fear rejection it’s not just because acceptance is a numbers game1.
It’s also because pushing yourself to finish the story, polish the story, take a chance on showing it to someone…all these things make you uncomfortable and it is in the discomfort that we grow.
Submitting stories isn’t the only way to force yourself to stretch, and grow as a writer, and next week I’ll send you some other ideas on how you can push yourself to grow as a writer.
But I hope you push yourself to do something that feels like ‘shouting into the void’ in your writing life, this month…because you never know what you’ll hear in the echo.
P. S. Need more practice writing stories you can send out into the void? Consider the StoryAWeek newsletter: 52 weekly lessons and writing prompts.Find out more.
Assuming you are a halfway decent writer, the more stories you send out, the more likely you are to hear a ‘yes’ ↩︎
Find out more about the StoryADay
Superstars
The only qualification to be a ‘Superstar” is a desire to write and support your fellow writers.
A supportive group of committed writers, who meet virtually, support each other’s efforts, and inspire each other.
