Celebrating the Birthday of Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr.

Martin Luther King, Jr. (January 15, 1929 – April 4, 1968) was an American Baptist minister, activist, humanitarian, and leader in the African-American Civil Rights Movement. He is best known for his role in the advancement of civil rights using nonviolent civil disobedience based on his Christian beliefs.

On October 14, 1964, King received the Nobel Peace Prize for combating racial inequality through nonviolence. In 1965, he helped to organize the Selma to Montgomery marches, and the following year he and SCLC took the movement north to Chicago to work on segregated housing. In the final years of his life, King expanded his focus to include poverty and speak against the Vietnam War, alienating many of his liberal allies with a 1967 speech titled "Beyond Vietnam".

In 1968, King was planning a national occupation of Washington, D.C., to be called the Poor People's Campaign, when he was assassinated on April 4 in Memphis, Tennessee. The Martin Luther King, Jr. Memorial is located in West Potomac Park in Washington, D.C., southwest of the National Mall. The national memorial is America's 395th unit in the National Park Service. The statue of King was done by sculptor Lei Yixin, a prominent Chinese sculptor.

Hold On To Those Rejection Letters

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Now why on earth would you want to hold on to something that has announced its rejection of you? Are you trying to self inflict yourself with more pain? In the beginning I cried at each rejection letter and note that I received. I literally took it personal. I was crushed and my feelings were hurt. In the beginning, the rejection letters were coming so frequently that I could have decoupaged my walls with them. At first it affected me so horrifically that I stopped writing for a while. I had my usual pity party and thought that writing was for the eccentric, literary genius. The results - no submissions - no rejection letters - no acceptances!

After hearing about some high profile authors and entertainers whose works were rejected hundreds of times before they became famous, I regained a gratifying sense of hope. I re-read and dissected some of my rejected pieces and found grammatical and guideline errors that could have easily been avoided. After some self-chastisement regarding those crazy, careless mistakes, I opted to turn my negative energy into positive results. Even what I considered to be a polished submission, somehow, it was still shredded to pieces.

I heard a young lady make a comment about her father, who was a writer, throwing away every one of the rejection letters he received. She said that this sent him into a deep depression and ultimately he stopped doing the one thing that he loved to do. Apparently, he allowed his anger and hurt to overpower his passion to write. What a waste of probably some very good talent! I told her about my experiences with rejection letters and how I overcame them. Hopefully, she will share my story with her father and perhaps it will give him some inspiration to get recharged and start writing again.

Under normal circumstances, it is human to rid yourself of the painful presence of some "thing" or some "one" inflicting the feeling of rejection towards you. In this case, I found that my rejection letters helped me to create a therapeutic poem entitled "Rejection From The Red Pen Bandit." The more I got rejected, the more I tweaked and rewrote again. Some of my pieces that were rejected at one publication, I elected to revamp and submit elsewhere. Sometimes this resulted in a published piece. Needless to say I would be in shock, but nevertheless very elated! Now-a-days, if I receive a rejection letter, I will re-edit my piece and shop for publications where my submission adheres to their guidelines and send it out.

Turn rejection into approval by refusing to settle for defeat and accept the sweet smell of victory! While striving towards writing perfection, don't allow obstacles (attitudes, emotions, people, and situations) to divert your attention from your destination. Be sure to abide by ethical standards. If you are a member of a writing group, sometimes membership packages will include editing services. Read your compositions out loud to see how they flow. Find someone who shares interest in your craft or a mentor who wouldn't mind giving you some constructive criticism. Don't allow rejection to "break" you, let it "make" you! Who knows, that rejection letter could turn into an award winning novel.

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