In the famous phrase “murder your darlings”, “you” are a writer and your “darlings” are the parts of a piece that, despite your love for them, must be scrapped. The work itself is the ultimate darling, which makes such scrapping possible. Once finished, the challenge is to find that work a home.
Before I started freelancing, I assumed my greatest challenge would either be the task of writing (and of murder), or of finding my writing a (paying) home. What I’ve since discovered is that, as hard as writing, rewriting, and finding a home is, what happens next is very often harder still.