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One of the many unavoidable facets of the writing life is the waiting. Writers wait until their prose is polished to perfection. We wait for feedback from writers’ groups and trusted readers. We wait for weeks, months or years for responses to our queries. Even when the ultimate goal of publication is achieved, we wait for galley proofs, cover art, reviews, bookstore releases, and signing tours. And sometimes–oh, the horror–we wait for the next idea to seize our writing muscles and spur us into action.

If your writing career is beginning to seem like an endless stretch in a crowded doctor’s office-only to find out the doctor is on vacation and won’t be back for a week-you are not alone. Other than listening to the Musak of your internal communication system while you’re on hold (which often sounds like this: why did I query that agent–she doesn’t even read thrillers! What if a wild dog ate my manuscript? What should I change my name to when the New York Times rips my debut novel to shreds?), what can we do to hold on to our sanity and stick it out until our sorely tested patience pays off?

To avoid staking out your mailbox, checking your e-mail every fifteen minutes, or haunting your Amazon listing hoping for a boost in your rank, try these tips to get off the waiting train:

1. Write something else. If you’ve just sent out half a dozen carefully targeted, well worded queries to your dream agents or editors, resist the temptation to sit in a lawn chair at the end of your driveway and ream out the mailman for delivering you grocery store flyers instead of used SASEs. Plant your butt right back in front of the computer and start something new. You may find yourself so caught up in your new project that you miss the mail for a day or two–and discover a pleasant surprise waiting for you when you return.

2. Do something non-writing related. Even writers need a break. Sure, we all know going into it that the word “vacation” would soon retreat from our vocabularies until the memory of it became an urban legend. But there is no rule stating you can’t take a few hours to do something you enjoy. Go for a long walk, read a great book, have lunch with a friend you haven’t seen in weeks (because you were immersed in the final stretches of revising your manuscript for the hundred and eighth time), or take up a new hobby. Know that your writing will still be there when you come back.

3. Do some research that will further your writing prowess. As a writer, you no doubt have a score of ideas that have been percolating on the back burner while you slaved over your work-in-progress. Now that you’ve begun the excruciatingly long process of delivering your baby to the world, choose one of those ideas and flesh it out. Dig up as much information pertaining to it as you can online, and then head over to the library to find out more. If you don’t have anything specific in mind, you can simply start reading up on something that interests you. You’ll probably find the kernel of an idea in your research that will spark a whole new project, and soon you’ll be stabbing blissfully away at your keyboard with thoughts of important e-mails clogged in spam filters and evil, query-eating postal employees behind you.

4. Learn a new language. You are in the business of words, after all, so what better way to bulk up your business than to expand your cache of raw materials? You don’t have to write your next novel in Swahili, but your life–and your writing–will be enriched with your understanding of a whole new culture.

5. Vent your frustrations. Write a nice, long letter to a fictitious editor at an imaginary publishing house (or a real one if you prefer–just make sure you don’t actually send it out!) and tell them how all this waiting makes you feel. Reveal your insecurities, question their methods, or accuse them of using the pages of your manuscript to line their hamster cages. This can also help to deal with the pain of rejection. Confidently assure this fictitious person that you are an excellent writer, and won’t they be sorry when Berkley offers you a million-dollar advance and a three-book deal while they’re sitting on your manuscript for months on end.

Writers wait. It’s a fact of life. You can drive yourself crazy mentally listing the what-ifs and the should-haves during your on-hold times, or you can get out there and improve yourself and your craft. Instead of viewing the wait as a specialized form of torture created to punish you for making the stupid decision to try and be a writer in the first place, take action. Learn to see these interminable, unavoidable waits as opportunities to grow.

Most important, keep this in mind: somewhere out there, an editor or agent is waiting for you and your writing. Don’t disappoint them!

Get more writing resources and free stuff when you sign up for S. W. Vaughn’s free bi-weekly newsletter LIT: A Slightly Addictive Newsletter for Writers and Readers, with writing tips, writing markets, book reviews, contests and giveaways, and more. To sign up for LIT, e-mail author@swvaughn.com with the subject: Get LIT!, or visit the LIT Home Page. Also, check out S. W. Vaughn’s main website at swvaughn.com for free fiction, contests, and even more resources for writers.

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Under a microscope, all baseball boils down to is the mechanics of the at-bat. Is the pitcher/batter a left-hander or a right-hander? What is the pitch count of the starting pitcher? What are the balls and strikes to the current hitter? Are there runners on base and in scoring position? We can go on and on.

Some teams fare well against right handed pitchers and some against left handed pitchers. In some rare circumstances you get a team that hits both of them equally well, those are generally called World Series Champions at the end of the season like the White Sox in 2005.

The natural thing to do when you lose a game in baseball is to analyze the loss for how to improve in the next game. It also makes you more likely to work the count in your very next game. All this seems to suggest that if you lose a game to a right handed pitcher, you want to face a right handed pitcher your next game. Keeping the orientation of the pitcher the same, your hitters have a better chance to get comfortable. By changing the orientation, your hitters have to readjust.

We looked at teams off of a loss and found that when they go against a starting pitcher with the same pitching orientation, they have about 5% more value against the odds than if the pitching orientation switched.

This little tidbit of information is a very good nugget of information that I like to use to add onto systems of mine. Off all the managers I have seen over the years, Bobby Cox of the Atlanta Braves is the mastermind of pitching-hitting dynamics. He puts his pitchers in positions to win. Keep an eye out for his pitching changes before game time.

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