I can take it. Really, I can.

I finally got the courage to put up my short story, The Famous Cassini Brothers for an online critique this week. I wrote it a few years ago while I was still in college. My sister, who hates most of my work loved it, so I figured I wasn't totally embarrassing myself if I sent it out to a few magazines.

Six rejections, unemployment, and a year of feeling sorry for myself forced me to really look at it again. It was painful. Not because it was bad, but because it could have been so much better. How had I not seen this? Why did I let these mistakes get through? Oh. Yeah. Feeling sorry for myself.

Fast forward through several extensive edits I decided to send it to be critiqued online this week. This would be the first real critique of my life. So, I freaked out like I always do - I hyperventilated, tweeted breathlessly, whined to my mother (which reminds me, I need to move out of her apartment), read, repeatedly checked my account for critiques. I had the worst night's sleep of my life, with nightmares about plane crashes and skeletons. I checked for a critique the following morning. Nothing.


Then, I remembered one thing I'd learned from Barbara Sher:

1) If you're scared, imagine the absolute worst thing someone could say about your work. I imagined hordes of angry critiquers throwing out their computers in disgust at my writing.

2) Then imagine the absolute best thing someone could say. I pictured critters reading the greatest short story of all time. It's lame, but visualization usually calms me down. Writing the extreme things people would say or do might be more helpful for some people, instead of visualization.

I'm never going to write the best or worst thing someone has read, so I might as well get over it, use their good suggestions, and toss out the ones I disagree with. And the suggestions so far have been pretty good. The rewrite is going to be daunting because I may have to take the story apart and reassemble it, or write smoother transitions. I'm not sure which yet, but at least I know the story is worth fixing.

Other than the critiques, I got an Oscar themed assignment from my editor. I suggested writing something for the Oscars, and she agreed, giving me specifics on the assignment. So I'll be working on that after the Oscar nominations are announced bright and early this Tuesday.

I also did a little worldbuilding for my fantasy novel this week. I'll be doing a worldbuilding post after this, so stay tuned for that.

How do you cope with critiques? Do you get your critiques online or are you part of a real life critique group? What have you learned from them?

Photos courtesy SXC and iStockphoto.