On Accepting & Enjoying Praise, or Actually Allowing Yourself to Consume the Fruits of Your Labors.

This is such a hard one for me!!

I'm tempted to just not write anything, and ask people to comment and tell me how they manage it. But since this is my blog & I'm the one writing this post, I guess I'll write something.

Last night I read an awesome email from one of the advance readers of Mile 21. She said she *loved* my book (just like that with the asterixes)and cried 2/3 of the way through it, and that she felt her blog was the perfect audience to review it. She gushed for a bit. And I was very complimented because she's not the type to gush. I got that warm, happy feeling...

for about three seconds.

And then the usual secondary process took over--concern. Worry. Fear, that she's overestimated my story or that I've somehow set the bar too high with this story and that soon, very soon, I'll disappoint her with my lack of writing ability or my lack of coolness or my next book which will almost certainly be boring.

OK, I know that has Satan written all over it. (Or whatever you call it in your line of thinking--bad Karma, Negative Thoughts, bad Chi etc). And I need to stop.

The thing is, how do you enjoy such things without worrying that you'll be prideful if you do, or get complacent, or that you're taking credit for more than you should (I feel like a lot of my writing is actually kind of through the grace of the Spirit), or that you're really just riding a fluke & you're going to end up disappointing yourself or others if you don't immediately let off a bunch of disclaimers?

The thing is, I really, really love the idea of people loving my story. I write so that people will read stories they love. I want them to love them so, so badly. To be caught up in them, moved by them, changed by them; to make people happy or think harder or even change a little. So when it happens, how come I'm not over the moon? Ecstatic? I could really use that sort of positive energy fueling my writing/life. I have a lot of stuff I do. I work kind of hard some days. I could really use the fruits of my labors. I could use those positive-energy calories to sustain me through the leaner, frustrating times when I am completely insecure in a project and feel dragged down by the burden of my own expectations.

I'm going to make it a goal to figure out how/why it's appropriate to enjoy people loving my books.

& I'd love your suggestions and experiences on this topic. At this point, I'm completely baffled as to how I can be a good/humble person/writer and do this.