Annie F. Downs: What’s Holding You Back?

Lee C. Camp (0:02)

I'm Lee C. Camp. This is No Small Endeavor, exploring what it means to live a good life.

Annie F. Downs (0:09)

My first book came out summer of 2012

I wrote it in 2006 Now, it's easy to say these numbers to you now, but between writing it and even having an agent interested was three years.

Lee C. Camp (0:25)

That's New York Times bestselling author, Annie F. Downs, from start to finish the arduous journey to get her first book published took six years.

Annie F. Downs (0:34)

The agent and I worked together for a year and a half. We got 47 nos.

There aren't even that many publishers. That is multiple people sitting in the same office going, we don't want to publish this girl. And so what happened to me was not that my dream of being an author died. It's that suddenly I stopped believing that I could be an author. So my belief in myself got stolen.

Lee C. Camp (1:01)

Annie had been working as an elementary school teacher in the Georgia public school system. When she fell in love with writing, she was teaching a Monday night Bible study and a student asked her to staple the pages she'd written into a kind of makeshift book. It was then she realized she had the beginnings of a manuscript. So in 2008, she took a gamble, quit her job, sold her house, moved to Nashville to become a writer.

But things were not looking good.

Annie F. Downs (1:27)

I had put all my identity in the fact that I was an author. And then when suddenly you're not and you've moved to this city and said, I write books, and then no one will pay you to write a book. Suddenly I have to reintroduce myself to everyone I've met and I don't get to have any pride in my career. So I say it felt like ripping apart raw chicken, ripping from me that my identity was an author.

Lee C. Camp (1:53)

Annie found a job working in the cash register at a local taco restaurant and despite the vulnerability and disappointment, she continued to chip away at that first manuscript, spending as much time as she could writing in coffee shops and working late into the night. As difficult as this season was, she says it was integral to her eventual success.

Annie F. Downs (2:15)

Whenever you're walking through anything painful, there is a part of you that needs that thing to happen because of the growth it gives you.

I needed to have that dream stolen from me for a minute because when it came back around, I was like, okay, this is my job. I can do this for a long time or I can go back to teaching school. It's not who I am anymore.

Lee C. Camp (2:36)

Since then, Annie has gone on to write multiple bestsellers for adults, teens and young children, selling over one million books and counting.

Annie F. Downs (2:44)

I'm realizing in real time that I've been telling the same story in every book.

You are the only you and we need you to go be you. We need Lee to Lee so hard. We need Annie to Annie so hard because you're the only one like you on this whole earth.

Lee C. Camp (2:58)

Her latest book, Don't Let That Hold You Back, provides a practical roadmap for facing past disappointments and from there to learn to dream and do again.

Annie F. Downs (3:08)

We can probably look at our lives and lay out every heartache and go, was something stolen, killed or destroyed?

Is something gone that needs to be returned to me? Has something died or is something in shambles? Then you go, oh yeah, everything falls into one of those three.

Lee C. Camp (3:26)

Today, a conversation with Annie F. Downs.

SPEAKER_3 (3:32)

College football is back, so Hilton called on me, the superstition concierge, to make your fan rituals a reality. Need a room to match your lucky number? We got you. Want to make sure our team doesn't wash your lucky jersey? Oh, that smells lucky.

Hilton's unmatched hospitality can keep up with any superstition. Even a marching band wake up call at 555 and 55 seconds. Hit it. When you need a team that will do whatever it takes on game day, it matters where you stay. Hilton, for this day.

SPEAKER_4 (4:03)

Low energy, unfocused, foggy, you might be dehydrated, whether it's hot yoga, over 100 degree weather, or too much sun.

Gatorlite, with a specialized blend of five electrolytes, was scientifically designed to help move fluids into the body faster for rapid rehydration. Shop now at retailers nationwide. Gatorlite hydrates faster than water. Is it in you? Symptoms noted are signs of mild to moderate rehydration. Consult a health care professional if symptoms persist.