The Myth of Overnight Success

We talk a lot about talent. Sometimes about inspiration. But not nearly enough about stamina.

The myth of the overnight success is stubborn—it suggests that if you’re really good, the world will recognize you immediately. Your first draft will be brilliant. Your debut will change everything. But most of the writers I admire didn’t arrive in a flash. They built something brick by brick, rejection by rejection, revision by revision.

Take Stephen King. Before Carrie became his breakout novel, it was a half-finished draft tossed into the trash. His wife, Tabitha, pulled it out and encouraged him to keep going. He was working as a high school teacher at the time, writing in the laundry room, submitting short stories to men's magazines to help pay the bills. There was nothing glamorous about it—just persistence, belief, and showing up to the page when no one was watching.

Or Toni Morrison. She was a single mother working as an editor at Random House, waking at 4 a.m. to write before her children were up. Her first novel, The Bluest Eye, wasn’t an instant hit. In fact, it received little critical attention at the time. But she kept going—not because success was guaranteed, but because the work mattered. And eventually, the world caught up.

We don’t talk enough about that quiet stretch of time between starting and succeeding—the years where you’re working, revising, questioning, submitting, and often hearing “no.” And still writing anyway.

That’s what tenacity looks like.

Tenacity isn’t glamorous. It’s not exciting. It’s the part of the writing life that doesn’t get celebrated enough: showing up even when you’re tired, even when you’re not sure if it’s working, even when no one is asking for your next piece.

I think that’s what really separates those who keep going from those who stop. Not luck. Not connections. Just the willingness to stay in the work.

Success might come quickly. But it probably won’t. And that doesn’t mean you’re doing anything wrong. It means you’re doing what all writers do: you’re building something real. Quietly, steadily, on your own terms.

And that’s the kind of success no one can take away.