Seeking approval
Why we love it, loathe it, and can't live without it / Issue 1,203
Oh, hi friends!
I was so moved by a few things I've read lately, and I wanted to share them with you. I hope that’s OK. I love that this newsletter has no rules.
What does being vulnerable look like?
First, this, a newsletter titled "When no one shows up," by Erika Bolstad, who wrote about how it felt when only one person came to her book event.
"I snapped a photo of the unfilled seats, documenting my mortification. I will write about this, I told myself. I will want to remember what it looked like, how all those empty chairs are visible through the windows facing two streets."
I saw in her beautiful, honest, not-at-all petty recounting of her day a nice fat bunch of my own failures, and those of people I know.
What happens when no one buys the book. No one shows up. No one remembers. No one cares.
Honestly, I think it's less about the self-pity that arises than the question the failure poses: Is this actually happening right now? And if it is, how will I survive?
Yes, and yes, and you do survive, like Erika does, by documenting the process. By divesting yourself of the sting of shame. By realizing you're not alone.
(Go buy Erika's book, Windfall, by the way.)
What happens if you keep waiting for someone to show up?
"I have dropped the ball," said Charlie Kaufman. "I have wasted years seeking the approval of people with money. Don't get trapped in their world of box office numbers. You don't work for the world of box office numbers. You work for the world. Just make your story honest and tell it."
He said this at the WGA Awards. You can replace "people with money" with "people with power" and you'll have a catch-all for whatever gatekeeper is standing in front of your dreams.
We seek approval from so many people. Almost everyone!
When you can, try to remember this though: You don't work for their world. You work for the world. Just make your story honest and tell it.
What happens when Oprah calls?
You can make what you want, share it, and say you don’t care who sees it.
But then, of course, in the back of your mind: Is that really true?
You want Oprah to call. We all want Oprah to call.
Oprah did call Ann Napolitano in October 2022 and told Ann that her latest novel, Hello Beautiful, was the 100th book chosen for Oprah's Book Club.
As written in the New York Times: "Napolitano’s career was rife with rejection and disappointment. She wrote two novels that never sold…After being turned down by 80 agents, she signed with one who, sadly, died a few years later. She juggled a series of jobs — teaching, editing, corporate and educational writing, working as a personal assistant for Sting and Trudie Styler — while carving out short windows of time for her novel in progress…Her second published book, “A Good Hard Look,” (2011) took seven years to write, and “Dear Edward” (2020) took eight."
“I’ve always had low expectations,” Napolitano said during an interview in a conference room at Random House. “Everything went so slowly or badly that all I wanted was a chance to do it again. I have to keep writing. I wasn’t ever counting on success.”
Oprah doesn't call everyone. That’s not the point. And if she did, it wouldn’t really be so special, if you think about it. Oh, Oprah called you? Well, she called me yesterday, so.
But let’s rewind to something from that interview: carving out short windows of time for her novel in progress.
And one more: all I wanted was a chance to do it again. I have to keep writing.
What does being vulnerable look like?
Being less alone.
What happens if you keep waiting for someone to show up?
You lose years.
What happens when Oprah doesn't call?
You carve out short windows of time, and you keep going.
And you keep going.
Keep going.
If you find value in this newsletter, please forward it to a friend — and thank you for being here.
You are such a gem, Kara. 💛 ✨
Thank you for this, and for all of it.