There was an excellent essay by Stephen Marche for writers  last weekend in the NYT Review section, “Failure is our Muse”.  (It’s another version of what my father told me years ago when I took off for New York to become an actress. He said I was so stubborn and stupid about the competition that I’d probably get work in the theater. He was right on all counts.)

There’s no other way to be a writer. We all fail a lot. And it takes blind persistence to keep going. And also the knowledge that “failure” is moving us toward what it is we really want to do in our writing.

Here’s an except and a link to the complete essay:  “…failure really does bind us. Flaubert longing to melt the stars and the kid receiving her first rejection letter are the same. All of our little streams pour out into the ocean of total uncaring. If there are to be any claims to greatness, they are to be found only in the scope of the failure and persistence in the face of it. That persistence may be the one truly writerly virtue, a salvation indistinguishable from stupidity. To keep going, despite everything. To keep bellying up to the cosmic irrelevance. To keep failing.”  – Stephen Marche

http://mobile.nytimes.com/2014/07/27/opinion/sunday/failure-is-our-muse.html?_r=0