by Deborah Clack @deborah_clack

“Hey, Matt, this is Deborah. I, uh … we just met. In the restaurant. With my friends. It’s Deborah. Um… (Clears throat.) I just wanted to say that I’m sorry that didn’t go so well. I’m not really sure what happened. I just, uh, wanted to let you know that, um … I really enjoyed meeting you.”

The voicemail I left for my blind date was awkward enough, right? What if I tell you that I kept talking until Matt’s phone cut me off? Super awkward. Now … what if I tell you that I immediately called back and left two additional messages with extended bumbling explanations? As with the first voicemail, during the subsequent messages, I talked until the the very moment the mailbox cut me off. That’s like … a new definition of awkward.

It’s true. None of the details were changed in the telling of this story. 

Now, picture me at a conference pitching my book. 

“I, uh, wrote, um … some words on a page … uh, they make up the sentences, and I kind of sorted them into chapters. They’re about the stuff … and the people … and there’s some stressful things that they go through, but the two people … they fall in love … but it’s like appropriate, Christian stuff … uh, it’s really good. Oh, right. Um, my name is Deborah. Deborah Clack. I’m an author. No. I’m a writer.” Which one sounds better? “It’s so nice to meet you.”

Okay, so that didn’t really happen. But sometimes pitching to agents and editors sure feels that way, doesn’t it?

The problem is the vulnerability.

In a fifteen minute appointment, we hand someone our hearts on a platter. We’re like Julia Roberts in the movie Notting Hill, imploring Hugh Grant in the bookstore. “I’m just a girl, standing in front of a guy, asking him to love my manuscript.”

I get it. I do. I’m sitting at the table next to you, trying to do the same thing. My insecure dating-Deborah wants to ask someone to love her.

But can I just throw something out there?

What if you are the prize?

I don’t mean for us to swing the pendulum from insecurity all the way to an overinflated sense of importance. Rather, we approach the appointment in humility with a clear grasp that our worth comes from God, not from anything that happens inside of the publishing world.

What if you were sitting in that chair across from a revered agent or editor and you understood, in the core of your being, that you are the prize?

What if you could see God jumping up and down for you, cheering you on? Hear His words? Hear Him saying, “This is my daughter! I created her. Isn’t she amazing? Wait until you hear what she has to say.”

Or “This is my son! Wait until you see how he took My prompting and put it into words. Words that sing on the page. That sing My glory. Wait until you see what My child can do!”

The result would be a different kind of pitch.

It wouldn’t necessarily be a perfect pitch. In fact, in fifteen minutes, you’re bound to still feel jittery, stutter a few words, maybe forget one thing you wanted to say. But it’s a pitch full of confidence. Full of glory.

Full of trust.

Because if we believe we are who God says we are – that we are His beloved, His creation, His child. That He made us this way on purpose, has a plan for our lives, and has a plan for our writing – then we aren’t responsible for how the pitch ends. The results simply aren’t up to us.

There’s a glorious beauty in the surrender of a pitch. It frees us from wringing our hands with worry. It releases us from a false sense of control. Opens us up to learn from the process and find new gifts inside of that fifteen minutes.

And it lets us shine.

Go shine, friends. You’ve done the work. You’ve made it farther than the thousands of people who say they want to write a book and do nothing to move forward. You’re at a conference! You wrote the one-sheet, the proposal, the manuscript. I hope you can stop and breathe in how incredible you are to have completed that level of work.

Now. Go sit in that chair, straighten your shoulders, and shine like the prize that you are. God’s got the rest. Make no mistake. He has a plan. For you. And He’s standing next to you, proudly putting you on display during your fifteen minute appointment.

How do you calm your nerves before a fifteen-minute appointment so you can offer a prized pitch? We’d love to hear from you in the comments below.

Deborah Clack is a former high school AP history teacher. Now she creates stories of her own and asks her heroines, as well as her readers, to dig deep and laugh often. Her work received First and Second Place Contemporary Romance in the 2017 and 2018 BRMCWC Foundations Contests, and was a 2017 ACFW Genesis Contest Finalist. She is represented by Tamela Hancock Murray.

Seven years after that awkward blind date, she learned she was the prize, and a smart man named Lance figured it out too. They are now married and live in The Lone Star State with their family.

She would love to connect with you on her blog at deborahclack.com.