I’m thinking about how many times life has taught me to stay the course. To continue the footwork even though the footwork doesn’t seem to be getting me the results I want. It has been a couple of months now that I’ve been sending out my book query to agents and publishers in an attempt to get someone to believe in the book enough to publish it. Mostly I’ve received no response, which in the publishing business is a hard pass. The responses I’ve received have been that the project doesn’t sound like a good fit for the agent or publisher.

Although the term “stay the course” came from the early 19th century horse-racing arena, I learned about staying the course from my cross country coach. He said it meant to continue to put one foot in front of the other either literally or figuratively all the way through to the end of something. There were times during a marathon or training for a marathon when it seemed the small steps being taken were never going to get me to the end of the road. Or on a forever long hill where legs and lungs burned and pleaded with me to just stop. But my coach would say keep going, stay the course. He said that too about training. Sometimes I’d hit a plateau in my times regardless of how many miles I put in or how much speedwork I did. And then out of nowhere, there would be a 30 second drop in my time in a road race. It came because I stayed the course and kept doing the footwork.

I’m currently recovering from a total hip replacement. Recovery feels fast in some respects but it still seems like I’m a long way away from getting back to hiking my beloved trails. Walking ten minutes feels like a big accomplishment right now…how will I ever get back to hiking eight miles? And yet I hear Coach’s voice, “stay the course.” Those ten minute walks will add up. The length of time I walk will expand. Before I know it, I will walk a mile and it will grow from there.

So back to my book, I believe in my book. I believe it is an important message and story to put out into the world. I tell myself maybe there is a timing in the universe that I am not aware of or that isn’t quite ripe yet. I have seen staying the course pay off many times before. I have too much evidence to doubt it at this point. So, I will continue to research publishers and agents, send out book queries, and trust in the timing of the universe.