One of the Herd: Post 1

Last weekend, I visited a small town in the mountains near my home (well, my Utah home). While I drove, I thought about the direction my life has taken, and how I stumbled upon this path in what felt like an abrupt turnabout.

Except, really, it wasn’t abrupt. I wrote for years before I finally sold a manuscript to a publisher. And I queried for years before I signed with my agent. And believe it or not, my husband applied for more jobs than we can count, for what felt like a ridiculously long time, before he was offered this new one.  

In all these cases, it was very much about having applications / queries / submissions in the right hands at the right time.

I know what you’re thinking. You’ve heard this advice a thousand times, and you’re trying, right? I know, because I’ve had this thought so. Many. Times. I promise, I’ve been there. It sounds impossible. But in both my case, and my husband’s, we decided to set a goal, and then do whatever we could in order to reach it.

How did we do it?

We got rejected. A LOT. So much I won’t even admit numbers. But they’re ridiculously high. It’s not embarrassing though. Wanna know why? Because for each of us, ONE thing hit the target. One submission. One query. (And yes, my submissions and queries were separate books going out at the same time, I broke a few rules—so shoot me.) One application.

One publisher. One agent. One fantastic job.

One.

I was thinking about all of these things, still driving, and then, I saw something cool, which I will tell you about in my Friday post. So you will definitely want to stop by again.

(Gah, don’t you just hate it when someone leaves a to be continued post? Sorry! I hate when my posts are too long. Also, given my crazy busy moving schedule, one subject = two posts= golden.)

Stepping Stones to Speeding Trains

This week, I’ve been thinking about progress, and how it never looks quite like you thought it would. This isn’t necessarily a bad thing. Sometimes it’s really good. Amazing even. And sometimes, not so much. But good or amazing or terrible, progress forces us to move.

Whether we’re moving forward or backward or sideways, we’re MOVING, and that’s important. Because even when we’re sliding backward, it gives us an opportunity to try to move forward again. Sometimes, it’s the backward movement that helps us to find a path we missed the first time, or one we saw, but passed up. And maybe that path is the right path, so maybe we’ll keep sliding, keep coming back to it until we finally give it a try.

And if that path happens to be right, chances are that once you finally take it, everything else will change. Life will open up in unexpected ways.

If and when that happens, you don’t spend your time wondering what took you so long, or regretting how far back you had to slide to get to that place (or, at least, you shouldn’t). Instead, you focus your energies on holding on tight, because with all the experiences you’ve collected along the way now behind you, there’s an extreme force propelling you forward, and you may not be used to your new rate of speed.

But wow, it’s going to be a heck of a ride!

At least, that’s my experience. What about you? When is the last time you took a path you’ve been avoiding?

The Other Side of the Failure Forest

Remember this post when we talked about how success changes people? I’m still thinking about that, and it occurs to me that there’s another side of this coin. Not everyone succeeds. Some people change their goals completely, go in different directions, or flat out fail altogether.

Let’s face it. Just because we want something doesn’t mean we’re supposed to get it. Just because we hope doesn’t make our desired outcome best for us. And just because we fight doesn’t mean we’re going to win, or even that we should.

When this happens, when we adjust our thought processes, daily habits, and goals in order to reorganize the paths our lives are taking, how much does this change us?

I mean, yes, obviously we should (theoretically) be stronger for the lessons we’ve learned along the way. But after we discover that maybe we’re not cut out for that thing for which we’ve been reaching, or maybe that we’ve been reaching in the wrong direction—do you think that changes us too?

We all have a different purpose in life, different talents, different needs and desires and abilities, so it makes total sense that we’d have individual paths to success. And along the way we ALL experience failure of some sort or another.

The question is how will we deal with it?

Will we let our disappointment swallow us whole? Will we let hurt bury us? Will we allow heartache to still our hands and minds and creative process until we work no more?

OR.

Will we rise above it, set a new path, pick ourselves up, and start again?

Once again, I think it comes down to choices. We get to choose how we react to these circumstances. We get to choose what we do next. We get to choose which road to take at the next fork.

Me? I have decided that just because I only see two roads doesn’t mean I can’t forge my own path. And that, my friends, is EXACTLY what I intend to do.

See you on the other side of the forest.