Thursday, November 28, 2013

The Things You Can Control

For those who have followed my blog, you know I went through a major career change this year.  I have learned so many new things this year I can’t even qualify it all at this point.  Some of the lessons I have learned have been more prominent and useful than others.
Focus on the things you can control.
This is applicable in every area of your life.
For me, I focus on the aspects of what I can control.  Prospecting, following up with prospects and current clients and learning as much as I can every day about the myrid of products at my disposal.  Multi-tasking and focusing on the critical activities that need to be done to suceed are important, but you must continue to not get hung up on the stuff you can’t control.
As today is Thanksgiving, a day I have been looking forward to for a long time for many reasons.  My oldest son is sick and so I am staying home with him instead of going to the family Thanksgiving.  I am disappointed but not upset, as this falls into a category of stuff I cannot control.  So you just make the best of it and try and enjoy the day the best you can.
Your attitude about work, your career, your life, your family is your attitude.  The only person who can change it and control it is you.  So why not be enthusiastic and happy?  This is controlable!  Focus on those aspects you can control.
Go through everything in your life and determine what you can directly control and that which you can’t.  Focus on what you can control.  Let go of what you can’t.  Don’t focus on the stuff you can’t control.  Don’t let it get you down or put you in a bad mood.
Happy Thanksgiving my loyal and wonderful fans.
For those who have read “Whisper” and “No Rules Of Engagement” the sequels are being edited and I am still planning on a launch of the next books in both series next year – 2014.
For those who have not read them there is still time.
Whisper
On Smashwords
On Amazon
On Barnes and Noble
No Rules Of Engagement
On Smashwords
On Amazon
On Barnes and Noble

Tuesday, September 17, 2013

Discovering Who You Are

For those who have followed by blog you know that I had a directional change in my life this year as I lost the job I had held for over twenty years.
First off losing my job has turned out to be the biggest blessing God has given me since my wife fell in love with and said I do and my children being born.

Secondly God has further blessed me with an opportunity to begin a new career which has has challenged me in many new and exciting ways.  So much so that I have had to rediscover who I am.
Each day I am faced with new vistas and discoveries as I proceed on my new adventure and career.  I am in one of those phases of life when you don’t fully realize what you are capable of.  You keep going forward, step by step, learning and stretching and discovering new and more wonderful things as I proceed.  Discovering who I am as I go.  Realizing what is most important in the world and embracing it.  Enjoying the things I do everyday.  Excelling in ways that surprise myself as I enjoy the journey, enjoying the journey is what true success is all about.
I am in a situation where I am meeting many new people every day and they have no idea who I am, all that I am, all that I can do to help them, and how truly happy I am to meet them.  It’s amazing because some of these people I will end up having a meaningful relationship for the rest of my life.  We will change each others lives forever as we all proceed on this incredible journey.
I don’t know exactly where this journey is taking me, but I am thoroughly enjoying the journey.  My writing career is on hold until I get good enough at this new career that I get my evenings back and am not working until bed time each night hand writing out thank you cards and catching up on work.
I am sorry I have not been blogging more but I have been terribly busy.  Burning the candle at both ends but in a good way.

Friday, July 19, 2013

PASSED MY SERIES 7 EXAM

As a writer and someone who has experienced the thrill and wrath of written work being edited, the entire Securities Industry needs to be edited desperately!

There is over ten terms which have more than one or two ways of referring to the exact same thing.  There is more definitions for the word BASIS within the same industry, @^#%$&$*.

Any Editor worth their salt could have condensed that manual down by a quarter and determined for the industry what terms and phrases will be used and are acceptable and really clear up a lot of confusion and misunderstandings.

Who ever came up with the bright idea of two three hour tests back to back with only an hour break in between should be tied to a tree and shot to death!  A lady was there testing for her CPA - four tests spread over months that can be taken in any order.  I am not down rating their test in the slightest but the schedule seems far less grueling than the Series 7 Exam.

I passed!  You need a 72% to pass.  Most do not pass it the first time.  Average passing score is 73%.  I squeezed a 75% to pass, nearly wet myself before finishing the last 10 questions and although happy and elated I feel at the present moment Scooby Doo has me beat by about 50 IQ points.

Thank you everybody who said a prayer.  Tomorrow I start studying for the State Registration Series 66, wish me luck.

It is amazing what we will do so some day we may return to writing.

Thursday, July 18, 2013

New Directions - Training - Series 7 Exam

As I have hinted about previously - my life is taking a new direction.  Part of that is contingent on my passing the registration exam.  In this case it is the Series 7 Registration Exam.

For the past three weeks I have been doing nothing but reading, studying, taking notes, taking tests and getting ready for this two part - six hour test.

Tomorrow I go sit for the Exam.  I have never worked so hard for anything in the entire previous 46 years of my life!  I want this opportunity and chance at a new career and great opportunity.

Please if any of you are of the Christian persuasion - even if you are not.  Say a prayer for me tonight.
Going to go to bed early with this thought on my mind.  I have done the studying, and the work.  Either I know it or I don't.  Tomorrow the test will reveal the truth and my destiny as far this is concerned.

I can't wait to get to life as normal again, tweeting, blogging, writing my novels.
Wish me luck, Say a Prayer, and Goodnight my friends and follows.

Sincerely Future Famous Science Fiction Author
FA for a Awesome Company
and truly brain fried!  Thomas Wilson!

Friday, June 14, 2013

Hibernation

On March 7, of this year I was let go from the company I had been employed with for over twenty years.  At the time I thought it was a terrible injustice and was extremely upset over the entire situation.  I did realize very soon after I had left that I seemed to be a much happier person without the stress associated with aspects of working there.


At other times in my life, I had experienced something which during the time you are going through it seems terrible.  Only after time when things have changed and worked out do you realize you are in a much better place than you would have been in if the event which forced the change had not happened in the first place.
This is what has happened in my life once more.  I am not going to go into the details of what caused me to be let go or the events which have transpired to bring about a completely new, more profitable and totally new direction to my life.  I will say that as of Monday June 17, I will be starting eight to ten weeks of intensive training for this new opportunity.  It is not related to my writing, but eventually will allow me to continue my writing (at a later date), pay for professional editing, professional book covers and advertising for my future books.  I do have two books (the sequels to my first two books) currently being edited and still planning on releasing them later this year or the first part of next year.  I do want them to be as professional as I can possibly make them prior to releasing them.

So for the next few weeks there will be none of the following:
My Daily Twitter Mentions to all the wonderful people I have so faithfully mentioned six days a week.
No New Blog Posts
No Posting of links for my books.

I will still be here, occasionally checking e-mails if I get the chance.  For the most part I will be in very intensive training which is planned to take 6 days a week.  As to give this new opportunity the best I have to offer I will devote all my energies to studying and preparing for this new challenge.  This as I have stated will facilitate and pay for everything else I want to accomplish in the future in regards to writing novels and pursuing a career as a novelist.

As with many things in life – It is one step back, to take several steps forward.  In this case what will be a slight hibernation in blogging, writing, editing, and being a novelist, will be a giant step forward in securing my financial future and making all my other dreams come true.


Wish me luck.  I will be back in a few weeks.

Monday, May 27, 2013

Cover Reveal



Cover Reveal
Cry Me A River
by Devyn Dawson


Caide Palmer, Emerald Isle's resident chef and grieving father.  Everything in his life is turned upside down when his ex-girlfriend Heather dies from an accidental overdose.  She left behind their eighteen month old daughter.  Heather's parents filed for emergency custody of baby Lucy.  Now Caide is in the fight of his life to raise his daughter to the best of his ability.  The courts order Caide to attend parenting classes and Al Anon meetings.  It is there that he meets twenty-two year old River.  She is drawn in by his story, and she wants to mend his grieving heart.  Will Caide allow River in to his world, or will he find his role as single father is to be faced alone?  There's something about her that he wants to save.  Can they really save each other?  

Cry Me A River is a New Adult book with sexual situations and explicit language.  If you've ever mourned the loss of someone you loved, Cry Me A River will show you that love can conquer when you meet the right person.  Available July 2, 2013.

Add to your TBR list Cry Me a River

The author Devyn Dawson is from Oklahoma, but she kicks up her boots in New Bern, NC.  She spends her days writing about the characters who live in her head.  Devyn has been intrigued by the young adult world and is now branching out to new adult.  This is her first non-paranormal book.  Although the characters are fictional, grief of losing someone you love is drawn from her own experiences of death and loss.

Stalk Devyn's website

Devyn's Blog - tons of giveaways!

Amazon

Young Adult Books by Devyn

The Legacy of Kilkenny - book one
The Seduction - book 1.5
Malevolence - book two

The Light Tamer
Enlightened
Light Bound - Summer 2013

The Wisdom Series
Trust - book one  Winter 2013


New Adult Books

Sapphire, A Werewolf Love Story




Saturday, May 25, 2013

Writing Fiction

It seems that some new writers have a hang up or problem with taking that leap in to altered realities of their made up stories.

Taking that step into the unreal, into the part of your imagination that makes your story fiction, different, unreal, or magical.  What the new writer doesn't understand is that the readers are looking for that special moment or point in the book when it strays into that unreal part with altered rules of reality.
Remember your favorite books or movies and the moments they crossed that line and hooked you.  You didn't need a huge drawn out description of the rules of physics for this particular story.  You didn't need to be lead around it, or have it hinted at to you through multiple chapters, you were looking for it when you picked up the book and started reading it.

That moment in the movie of Jurassic Park when they first see the dinosaurs.  The moment in Jaws when the shark appears at the back of the boat and all the sheriff can say is that they need a bigger boat.  When Yoda lifts the X-wing fighter out of the swamp.  Those are the moments people are looking for in stories.  It’s how the author brings these moments out to the audience that makes all the difference.

It’s your story!  Just write it.  It is your chance to be as brilliant, stunning, shocking, and awesome as you can dare to be.

How many times have you read a story where you imagined a terrific ending and yet the book came up short.  You imagine different alternatives a story could go and it doesn't come up to reach any of them.  These stories made it to become books, plays, and many of them even movies.  Of all the stories, books, screenplays, and movies that are created every year many are garbage, some are good, few are great.  Think about the greatest stories you have read, watched as shows or movies and think about what made them great.

Focus on the moments when they stepped past the natural boundaries and became magical, entered the realm of fiction and the story really began.  Unleash your imagination and write your story, the perfect story you would love to read except you haven’t written it.  Then write it.  If you get that feeling you get when you are reading a great book while writing your story then you are on the right track.

Sunday, May 12, 2013

The Great Gatsby


Review of The Great Gatsby
At the time of it’s original publishing in 1925, F. Scott Fitzgerald’s, “The Great Gatsby” received critical reviews and had disappointing sales.

Fitzgerald once said in 1920, almost prophetically, “An Author ought to write for the youth of his generation, the critics of the next, and the schoolmasters of ever-afterward.”

Well, he definitely did that.  “The Great Gatsby” didn't become great in it’s own right until about ten to twenty years after Fitzgerald had died.  When college students were reading it, later it became required reading in schools before ultimately being considered one of the top 100 pieces of literature from the nineteen hundreds.

My daughter read Gatsby in college and began telling me about how I have to read it.  After I wrote and published my first book I was giving her hell about not reading my book.

“Have you read ‘The Great Gatsby’ yet?”  She snapped.

“No, I don’t have a copy of it.”  I replied.

We left lunch and our argument and ended up at a used book store.  She found used copy of “The Great Gatsby” and I bought it.  It upset me that a used copy of a book that was published in 1925 cost me $7.50 and my new and first novel was selling for 2.99 at the time, and frankly I was giving copies away to get people to try mine.

I read the book soon after that.  I don’t believe my daughter has read my book as of yet.  Neither has several of my very good friends or my wife.  I wrote a blog post after reading the book because one distinct point in the book caught me, spoke to me, and convinced me of Fitzgerald’s genius as a writer.  He described something I had experienced but never formed into words before.  He nailed it completely.  The description was so perfect and took me to that existential place that time stood still for a moment.

“He smiled understandingly – much more than understandingly.  It was one of those rare smiles with a quality of eternal reassurance in it, that you may come across four or five times in life.  It faced – or seemed to face – the whole external world for an instant, and then concentrated on you with an irresistible prejudice in your favor.  It understood you just so far as you wanted to be understood, believed in you as you would like to believe in yourself and assured you that it had precisely the impression of you that, at your best, you hoped to convey.”

This was the instant in the book that Nick Carraway meets Gatsby face to face and Carraway’s description of Gatsby’s smile.

On my birthday, May 10, last Friday night, my daughter took me to the new movie on the opening night in Kansas City, of the “The Great Gatsby.”  Because of our history with discussing this fantastic book and the many layers of meanings and symbolism, this movie had a special significance to each of us.

Very seldom does a book capture the spirit, the visual interpretations and the heart and soul of the original book.  This movie surpassed my expectations and was as true to the book as I could have ever imagined.  The casting was inspired and only surpassed by the talent of the actors involved with movie.  I almost felt as if it took Leonardo DiCaprio to reach this age and maturity as a great actor to be the perfect person to totally capture the essence of Gatsby.

Tobey Maguire has also matured so much since Spider Man and portrayed Nick Carraway better than what I ever envisioned in my imagination when reading the book.
When Gatsby (DiCaprio) turns and smiles at Nick (Maguire) it was every bit as magical as Fitzgerald’s description.  The Director (Baz Luhrmann) must have sensed the greatness of Fitzgerald’s description because they had Maguire narrate the words from the book as if we could hear his thoughts.  The result was dead on target bulls-eye!
I don’t know what was CGI and what was real but it looked as if you were seeing New York in the 1920’s.  The octologists sign which was featured on numerous versions of book covers.  The Green light at the end of the dock.  The elements of the mansions, the decadence and extravagance of the times before the crash.
Unfortunately many of the people who will go and see the movie will have never read the book.  They will have no idea the great and monumental lengths those who worked on that film went to in order to capture the essence, detail, and relive a piece of the past.  They won’t understand the part of the last sentence and it’s significance to the story, plot, and Gatsby’s fatal flaw.

I give the movie a ten out of ten, perfect score.
As a writer, who is working through my life's work, that which will be my future legacy, I pray I write at least one piece as great as this in my life.  That I write for the youth of my generation, the critics that follow and the schoolmasters of ever-afterward.  That one piece that is hopeful, fun, tragic, true to life and enduring.  To see Carraway write the story in long hand by pen and type it with that antique typewriter spoke to my soul as a writer.

Thursday, May 2, 2013

Snow in May


I am extremely competitive and love to see records broke of about any type, but for snow in May, that one I can do without.  My wife looked it up and the previous record was 1.7 inches of snow in 1907.  Yeah that’s right.  We have the chance to break a hundred and six year old record for Snow in May, in Kansas City, Missouri.
I remember feeling elated that the Ground Hog didn't see his shadow and how that was supposed to predict an early spring.  Somehow a snow storm in May doesn't sound like an early spring.

Wednesday, May 1, 2013

Synchronicity


Synchronicity is . . .

Is the experience of two or more events that are apparently causally unrelated or unlikely to occur together by chance.

"meaningful coincidences"

a causal connecting principle

an apparently meaningful coincidence in time of two or more similar or identical events.


Any of you who read my stuff, here or in my books, will find out sooner or later I am religious, converted later in life mostly because of my wife.  I still have a problem with cussing, in that I still do it habitually out of habit even though I know it is wrong.  My wife and two young boys have enlisted in the crusade of trying to correct my bad habits.


I am a devout Christian because of things I have witnessed which can only be nothing short of a miracle or divine intervention.  A faith Experience.  Many believe, but until you experience something personally that cements your faith in God almighty, you will struggle with faith and your belief.  I love the church my wife and I attend because they are very big on knowing what you believe and why you believe it.  They don't tell you what to believe.  They preach the Holy Word of the Bible and even present different view points on some of the controversial topics, but they believe a you should know what you believe in and why you believe it.

There are times when God has plans for your life and ready or not, when it is time, God moves.  Your plans don't matter.  You want to make God laugh, by all means put your hands together and tell him about your plans.  You understand that point much better when your three year old and five year old son start laying out their plans for the way the evening is going to go.  It dawned on me while explaining what was really going to happen, to my two sons, that God pretty much does the same thing with us, only he doesn't always explain as well to us.  Then again maybe he does but we are listening like a couple of small children and more concerned with our plans.  We don't see or listen when he is speaking to us.

I am old enough and wise enough to realize that not everything is a coincidence.  God brings people into your life for a reason, and it might be years before you figure it out why.  We may never figure it out.  Looking back I can see how my plans and my life has changed and not quite gone the way I had imagined it would, and as it turns out I have ended up in a much better place and better off for what has happened.  I know when God is working in my life and adjusting things, getting ready to change things, and I am wise enough to sit back and marvel in his awesome power and design and watch it unfold.  When I was younger, I would act like my children fighting and kicking while trying to resist the changes.

 There is an oriental proverb that says, that every grain of sand is exactly where it is supposed to be.  When you understand that proverb, you’ll realize we might not like everything that is going on, but it is all according to his master plan and design.  You can fight it, refuse it, change the course but in the end it just means you end up at the same point later in life having taken a little harder and longer road, than you might of.  I probably could have listened to the writing and English teachers years ago and been a writer years ago, but it probably wasn't the right time.  I needed to be seasoned, experience more of life, be tempered by challenges and difficulties, and mellowed in certain areas to get to the place where I am right now.  The Place that is “Exactly”, where I am supposed to be.

We should open our eyes and ears, listen and watch what's going on around us very closely.  We live in a supernatural world and too many don't see all that is truly going on around them.  Most people are going through life sleep walking, while a few of us are walking around totally and utterly amazed at what we see.

Tuesday, April 30, 2013

New and Different Paths


In 2010 I made the decision to challenge myself and try to start and finish writing a novel.  I primarily did it just to see if I could do it, and the book “Whisper” is the result of my efforts which I published in January 2011.

Prior to writing a novel I had spent the last seventeen on the same path, with the same job, with the same company.  I have heard about prisoners developing a fear of being able to exist outside the walls of their prison because they had gotten so comfortable with what they know.  I have felt pangs of that fear recently as my life has taken what I would call drastic changes.

On Google Plus, Jillian Michaels, posted a picture that said "Every Accomplishment starts with the Decision to TRY."  I saw it tonight as I applied for a possible new position with a company that will take my life in a completely new direction.  A new path, a new direction, new challenges, and a chance to grow, stretch myself, and expand my horizons to new vistas.

I have skills and talents, a plethora of them, that I have honed over the last 46 years through many challenging things I have tackled in my life.  To make such a change in my life, to not play it safe, but put myself out there fully into unknown realms is a little daunting to say the least.  I realized something today while going through this process of meeting with a company representative, and then formally applying for the position, and that it is something I want to do!  I feel excited and energized more than I am afraid of the unknown quantities involved with it.

One of the pins I have on Pinterest under the board entitled Quotes is the following.
“Decide that you want it more than you are afraid of it.”  Bill Cosby.

So now I begin the formal process of trying to get a chance at this new job, this new challenge, this new direction.  Wish me luck!

I am still working with my editor to edit and prepare the sequels to both my books.  As soon as they become available I will be doing some promotions, and a lot of that shameless self promotion that us authors have to do from time to time to get the word out about our new releases.  If we don’t, nobody else will.  We have to get you, our followers to read our books so you can do the real magic which is telling the rest of the world about this great book you read.  So stay tuned.

FYI – I am almost finished with book five, a start to a new series.

Monday, April 29, 2013

Write Down Your Ideas


Before I started writing full time I read everything I could about writing, especially the stuff that was written by my favorite authors.

I remember reading that Piers Anthony wrote that he lost more story ideas than he ever wrote because he didn't write them down at the time he had them.

I can’t count the number of wonderful ideas I have had in the morning taking a shower and how they vanished like the fog on the mirror by the time I was dressed and had reached work.

I have had numerous discussions with individuals about the need for a way to take notes while taking a shower.  One of the last people I had that discussion sent me a picture and link to get a water proof computer.

I have lost several ideas over the last three years because I didn't write them down when they were tearing across my brain as my muse whispered to me.  I like to write down the good and bad ideas, because later on you never know what not so great idea might meld or congeal with several other ideas into something phenomenal.

I have taken to traveling with a pen and small notebook everywhere so when I see, hear, or experience something that sparks an ideas for a character, a scene, or a completely new novel, I can write it down immediately.  I still am losing ideas in the shower because I can’t afford the water proof computer and with two small boys in the house my wife will never let us put a computer in the shower.
Have a Great Day and Keep Writing.

Wednesday, April 3, 2013

Writer Versus Singer


90 Seconds versus the first Chapter!
As I was watching the television show ‘The Voice’ it reminded me of hearing Johnny Cash recall how during an audition where the music producer told him to sing something, anything, in 90 seconds to convince him that he had what it took to be signed by him.
On the show, ‘The Voice,’ the contestants have 90 seconds to sing in order to get one of the four judges to turn their chair around.  How many times throughout music history has an artists career been decided in 90 seconds or less?
As a reader for years before I became a writer, I know that avid readers are a bit more tolerant and patient than 90 seconds before deciding to not read something new.  Trust me, the pressure is just as great to capture and hold the readers attention, as ever before in history.  There is so much to read, that a reader couldn't possibly read everything thing they want to in a single life time.  Recently, with the advent of self publishing, there is a exponential increase in the amount of written material to be read that hasn't been seen since the invention of the printing press.

Writers have to compete with music, video games, texting, social networking of many various forms which all compete daily for peoples attention, time and money.  Thankfully there is also a rise in the amount of stuff being read and bought by readers.  With all the things competing against books and the tremendous influx of free and cheap books that are available on line and even traditionally published books at the book stores, it is amazing that the market is growing!  I had to stand in line at the book store the other day for quite some time just to purchase a book.
Many readers are getting more particular about what they do spend their money on and more importantly what they spend their time to read!  I don’t believe any of them are so strict or harsh that they decide on a book in the first 90 seconds.

When people are looking for a new read, surfing the web, browsing book shelves they may pass by many possible selections in less than 90 seconds.  In this case you have literally 4 to 6 seconds on-line to grab a readers attention, to get them to pause enough to see what the book may be about, but that’s a topic for another entirely different blog post.

Friday, March 22, 2013

Names For Characters


I devised a system a while back that I use for coming up with names for characters in my books.  I use names from people I connect with on-line through social media sites.  Not the peoples names directly as I find them on the different sites but I put the names in cells in a spread sheet so they can be manipulated and re-arranged.  Then I put first and last names together at random until I find a name I like for a particular character.

Even as random as this system appears to be, I am sure that I come up with names which match the names of real people somewhere.  Many years ago and what feels like a different life time ago I was a clown (Hobo) with the Red Cross Clown Corps.  In doing so we needed to make up names for our clown characters.  I drew a lot when I was younger and had several cartoon characters I had come up with and made several cartoon pictures with these characters.  One was a duck and the other ‘Elsworth’ the Dragon.  So I came up with Hobi Duckworth as my clown name and for the next couple of years when I was performing people kept asking me if I was related to this bunch of Duckworth’s or that bunch of Duckworth’s.  I realized back then that no matter what name you dream up for yourself somebody probably already has that name or something very close to it.

So if I have followed you on Twitter, Facebook, Google+, or some other social media site your name is probably in my homemade data base for names for me to mix and match.  Sooner or later part of your name may end up in one of my books as one of my characters.

I was presented with a sweatshirt from one of the ladies of my book club who was responsible for me actually taking the plunge and trying my hand at becoming a novelist.  The sweatshirt says on the front of it, “Be careful, you may end up in one of my novels.”

Wednesday, March 20, 2013

The Vernal Equinox

The word Equinox comes from the Latin and means ‘Equal Night.’  The Vernal Equinox is the Spring Time of the year where the days and nights are roughly equal and from here on out the days will be increasing in the amount of daylight, the temperatures will be warming up, and the earth will begin the rebirth of plants until fall comes.

The grass will turn green, the trees will regrow their leaves, and the flowers will grow.  Soon will be planting time to begin gardens and refill the flower beds for the summer.
Summer time is on the way.  Once again the cycle of rebirth will begin and transform our world in the northern hemisphere one more time.
Please take time to enjoy the season, see the new plants sprout, plant a garden, and smell the flowers as they bloom.
Happy Spring Time Everybody.


Sunday, March 17, 2013

Changes and Silver Linings

From time to time life presents us with changes.  Maybe we move to a new house, get a new job, a new relationship, or a new car.  Sometimes these changes are planned for and expected while other times they are a total surprise.  Changes manifest themselves in many wondrous ways.

Maybe your old car died.  Maybe you had to move to a new residence.  Maybe you lost your job.  Maybe you lost a person who was close to you.  Obviously the many wondrous ways changes can manifest themselves isn't always in the delightful, heart warming, fuzzy way you would have liked it to come about.
“All Changes, even the most longed for, have their melancholy; for what we leave behind us is a part of ourselves; WE MUST DIE ONE LIFE BEFORE WE CAN ENTER ANOTHER.”  ~  Anatole France.
The one thing you can truly count on besides getting older is that one way or another things will always change.  Many people fear or hate changes and have trouble coping with changes as they barge into your life and change things.  It’s so much easier, just like getting older, to embrace them both with an open mind and child like wonder as you look for the silver linings in the aspects of changes and getting older.  It doesn't do any good to avoid changes or attempt to keep from getting older.
How you embrace changes and getting older can determine how happy and fulfilled you can be throughout your life.  As I have stated numerous times through blog posts in the past, success is the journey, not a destination.
True Confessions Time – 
On March 7, 2013, I was let go from the company I had worked at for the last twenty and a half years.  It was un-expected, a total surprise, and definitely what one would describe as an unexpected life change.  For the last seventeen years I drove a company vehicle, so not only did I lose my job but I lost my means of transportation also!
I know something like this could devastate some people, maybe most people.  I know a lot of people have lost their jobs since the collapse (or major hi-cup ) of the economy in 2008.  Success is the Journey not the Destination.
What would be some Silver Linings of a situation like this?
I haven’t had my own vehicle in seventeen years.  Each time the company I worked for would switch out the vehicle I was going to be driving they would ask what I wanted.  I would always ask for a CD player in the vehicle.  Every other vehicle the company owns has a CD player and for the last seventeen years all I could get in a vehicle was AM/FM Stereo.
I will be getting my own New Vehicle with not only a CD player but with the MP3 player adapter so you can listen to the music off your MP3 player.  I have never  owned a new vehicle myself in the thirty-four years I have driving.  A Silver Lining!
I was initially upset, felt betrayed and angry.  Really, who wouldn't be after faithfully coming to work and helping grow and run a company for so long.  After some serious soul searching I realized that I was excited about the opportunity to try something new.   I have found that I am extremely happy and in a much better place since being released from my previous employer.   To find another company that I may be able to help grow from a small company and build  into something much bigger and more valuable over time is exciting.  This is a major chance, exciting opportunity and wondrous Silver Lining of a magnitude that many people never get an opportunity to attempt.
Since the seventh of this month  I have used my time to secure a vehicle, because let’s face it without reliable transportation your chances of securing gainful employment are slim.
I have made a resume for the first time in twenty some years, and it is much more impressive than what I had twenty years ago, another Silver Lining!
I have started working out daily, not that I was in bad shape to begin with for a man of my age.  It is amazing how quickly you can tone back up and rebuild muscle mass you had when you were younger.  I am blessed that not so many years I was in awesome shape.  There was a time when I would work out in the morning, have breakfast and then go work in a tire warehouse all day long. 
In retrospect my time with my previous employer changed me in many ways.  I am much older and a hell of lot wiser than I was twenty years ago.  I have seventeen years of hard management experience learned and earned in the trenches of real lives, hard business with brutal competition.  I have learned that I am capable of things that I would never believed possible twenty years ago.
Most people in life have no concept of their true potential and capabilities unless pushed to extremes by extreme circumstances.  I have been blessed over the years to face some large and daunting challenges along my journey.  Having survived and succeeded in these challenges opened my eyes to my capabilities, gave me the confidence in my abilities and convinced me of boundless opportunities I am capable of rising up to overcome.  The chance to face new challenges with a new company excites the hell out of me as it is an opportunity to grow to new and greater heights in my journey of success.
As a writer, starting a new book is as easy as taking a new idea and beginning a new word document.  Given time and an active imagination and weeks of writing and you have a new novel.  Months of editing and polishing and eventually you have a marketable new book.
In real life starting a new book with your life isn't so easy.  In real life you don’t know where the story is going to end up or how the story is going to play out.   In real life we are the characters in our lives dramas and the decisions we make, our daily attitude toward the situations we are dealing with, and the attributes our own characters will largely determine if the outcome is positive or negative.
It is exciting as I enter a new phase, a new book, with new chapters in my life.



Thursday, February 28, 2013

The In Between Time

My favorite days are the ones In Between.

Everybody has a certain amount of routine which naturally gets sifted into their lives.  Life then invades our time with dinners out, shopping trips, birthdays, party's  special events, deaths, funerals, visits to the hospital and on and on.  Sometimes it’s bigger interruptions like planned trips to places you have never been before, sort of mini adventures away from your stomping grounds and venturing in to a new region of the world just over the horizon.
Most people spend their lives living from one special event to the next.  They have to have something to look forward to, a reason to check the days of the calendar to count down to that next big event.  They live the rest of their life just getting by, doing the least amount possible to just get through to that next event.
I live for the days in between the events.  The events to me are an interruption of my work, my life, my time that I use to accomplish my goals the time I spend with my family.  The in between times are the normal every day days of our lives, where you read another chapter or two in the book you are reading.  Get another chapter finished on the book you are writing, or write another blog post.  It is another lunch by yourself, dinner with the family and catching up with what is going on in their lives.  It’s listening to the radio and singing along with it.  Wearing comfortable clothes and not trying or having to try and impress any body.

It’s the in between times which are the back bone of our everyday lives and moves us to the special moments.  It’s the wise use of and the really hunkering down and enjoying the in between days that add up to make an ordinary life an extra ordinary life.  People don’t notice all that you do.  The kind word here and there.  The many things you have done just a little bit of work on today and everyday in between, which are slowly and quietly adding up to an inconceivable level over days, months and years.
So if you don’t have anything special going on today or tomorrow – relish in the fact that it is a in between day and knock yourself out taking full advantage of it.  Suck the marrow out of life.  Carpe Diem!  Slow down and smell the roses.  Express yourself!  Share the love! 
Make everyday, especially the in between days, the best and most productive days of your life!


 
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