Every day, I have to remind myself that I've already "won" Pitch Wars. I have to remind myself that my mentor Kathleen saw something in my writing, my story and me that was worth investing three months to guide me through this revision. I have to push back the self-doubt and the feeling that I don't deserve this -- that Kathleen made a mistake and that she'll be disappointed in me at the end of this.
Getting in was the hard part, I tell myself. The rest of this is icing on the cake.
The rest is what I choose to make of the opportunity I've been given, and while I've chosen to challenge myself to the highest degree and basically rewrite the whole manuscript from scratch, I know that I can only do my best and see where that leads me.
The reality is that regardless of the journey we take in these next two months of revising, editing, and proofreading, we all end up in the same place: an agent showcase. And regardless of our journey, we all experience some sort of imposter syndrome along the way. We *would not be human* if we didn't feel at least a little out of place amid the real joy that is getting in to Pitch Wars in the first place.
I have to remind myself that as long as I'm trying and doing my best and taking advantage of my mentor's insights, there's not much else I can do but enjoy the ride.
As for my ride so far: Act 1 is done! Not dusted, but done -- and that's good enough for me for now. After having a serious case of imposter syndrome myself (I never said I was immune to it!) I sent it to Kathleen on Wednesday.
She got back to me within the day with lots of HOORAYS, words of encouragement, and plenty of line edits, of course (to be expected -- and much appreciated too!). There are some things that I need to fix, but I'm going to hold off until I get to THE END, as I had initially planned.
In the meantime, by next week's update, I should be *roughly* halfway through my rewrite. I'm hoping to send Kathleen Act 2A by Sunday, Dec 1. Act 2A revisions are very straightforward, though -- with only 2 scenes of 13 that I need to rewrite from scratch. The month of December is when the real tough part begins: total REWRITE of Acts 2B and 3.
Seeing as next week is Thanksgiving, I would like to add that I'm forever grateful for this experience. No matter how difficult this manuscript has been for me to write (and I'm talking about PRIOR to Pitch Wars), I am really thankful for this opportunity to get this story right.
By the way, my family is basically a glorified version of A Christmas Story's Chinese family. We eat ham for Thanksgiving because my dad doesn't like turkey. For Christmas, we will be singing "Fa Ra Ra Ra Ra" at our local Chinese restaurant. To this day, my parents do not understand what the holiday fuss is about -- and I LIKE IT that way. So there, Santa!
Happy Turkey/Ham Day to you all.