Most of you know that I'm involved with the PitchWarriors community*. I help run 2 Facebook support groups: One general group, and one group specifically for YA writers. This post is for them.

Some of you are new to PitchWars and some of you have been here before.

Some of you are new to the support groups and the network -- even if you pitched to PitchWars before, and some of you have been critiquing and learning with each other for years.

Some of you eagerly sent off your newly polished draft that you started in early this year and some of you are anxious to find out how to fix that novel you've been reworking for ten years.

Your nerves are shot. You're trying not to get your hopes up, but you really think this manuscript might be the one and you're praying to everything you believe in that you picked the right mentors to submit your manuscript to.

That among the mentors you queried is THE MENTOR.

The mentor that will see the heart of your story, who will read your pages and just can't bring themselves to walk away. The mentor who sees what's holding your manuscript back from being the legendary thing you know it can grow into. The mentor who knows just what you need to get it there.

You're hoping for the mentor who not only gets your novel but gets YOU. Who becomes your friend, your cheerleader, and the harshest-kindest taskmaster as you prepare your novel.

The mentor who crushes your manuscript of coal, who drives you harder than you've ever worked before, who helps reveal the diamond it was destined to be, letting it glimmer before the agents.

Waiting is hard. You hear rumors of people getting asked for more pages, synopsis, or more (but people stay discrete). You see tweets with teasers about everyone else's stories.

You second guess yourself. Should you have chosen that other mentor? Should you have written THIS thing instead of THAT thing? Maybe your query should have been that OTHER style.

In the end, some of you will be selected and some of you won't.

It hurts.

I know this personally.

I will be excited for everyone who is selected.

I will be So. Very. Proud. of all of my writers from my PitchWars support groups who have helped each other grow, who I've watched learn and blossom as writers.

And after the selections?

I know that those who are selected will be excited and nervous and maybe, just maybe, suffering a touch of survivor's guilt or impostor syndrome, that you made it when all those other writers you know and love didn't. But you've got a spark and the mentor who selected you knows just what you need.

I know that those who are not selected will be excited for their friends. And they will hurt.

Some will feel the energy of all those fellow writers revising, will look around and decide, "I didn't get chosen, but I choose to go on!" And they will find Critique Partners and revise and push forward, to see what they can achieve without a mentor, just by leaning on each other. And I will cheer you on.

Some will decide it was a sign that they need to stop polishing their novel and put it out there. It's time for them to query agents. And I wish them the best of luck!

Some will decide that the traditional route is not for them and self-publishing is where it's at. And I wish them amazing sales!

Some will need to take time away, to heal, to recover from their disappointment. And that's okay.

But no matter what? You've done it.

You wrote a novel. You plotted, revised, and polished that sucker.

All those people out there, just talking about their big idea, the story they want to write, or want someone else to write for them? You've done what they only talk of.

Once a PitchWarrior, ALWAYS a PitchWarrior.

Go. Write. Polish. Publish.

I wish you all the best of luck, in pitchWars and beyond.