Inspiration

For the next two weeks, I am taking a short hiatus while we take a little trip and then finish our big move. I am so glad you stopped by to read, so I thought I'd share this lovely shot I took a couple weeks ago as my husband and I headed home from South Padre Island, Texas.

Here's a little writing prompt to go with it:

You have two characters, in a car, on this road. Who are they? Where are they going, and what happened earlier in the day that led them to this place, at this exact time?

Annnnddd....GO!

New Horizons and Unique Journeys

Since I first started writing—actually no, strike that—since I first decided to write for a career, I’ve paid close attention to the stories of other writers. When I say stories, I mean their personal stories, not the stories publishers are buying. I’ve paid attention to their real-life journeys.

I admit, there have been times when I wondered what my journey will look like, and if I’ll ever be one of those people with a personal story that is unique enough for others to want to hear it, and successful enough to inspire people to keep their chins up and continue moving forward, even when what they desire most is to quit.

I’m grateful for the inspiration others have shared with me, and so I hope to pay it forward.  Also, I can’t lie. I once thought that paying it forward in that way would have to mean I actually reach that level of success in my career.

But as I’ve mentioned before, success doesn’t always look the way we think it should. And every journey is different. My journey—over the last year in particular—has been a roller coaster of ups and downs and sideways and circular motion that I would never have expected. With the recent announcement that my publisher is closing, I realize how distinctly unique my own story is becoming.

Whether I like it or not, I’m getting my wish.

This year, I’ve gone from aspiring author to agented, published author. And now I’m getting my rights back on that published book and there is a strong possibility that going Indie might be my next step. At the same time, I have other submissions out and other things in the works.

My story has officially become unique, and very different from any other I’ve heard. I have a diverse perspective from others, and something new to share and/or contribute to the world of aspiring authors.

I feel like I’m facing a hurricane, but somehow, as I squint into the wind, I can see the calm of a new horizon. And I understand that all of the best things come at a high price, just like the most precious metals are refined in a fire.

So yeah. It’s all good. I’m just building on my awesomely unique story so that someday, when people ask, I’ll be the one inspiring others to build their own story.

And seriously people, you can’t pay for this kind of experience.

What about you? How is your story unique?

Small Successes that Make All the Difference

The other day, I was watching my daughter play basketball. Her team was losing—badly—but even though the score was so uneven everyone knew there was no way they could come back and win, the girls played hard anyway.

They made some beautiful plays, scored a few three point shots, and came away smiling because they knew they’d played a good game. Even though they hadn’t won, they’d succeeded in something much more fundamental, and were able to celebrate their accomplishments.  For them, it wasn’t just about winning.

It made me think of my career as a writer. My journey has been every bit as rough as one of my daughter’s games. I’ve had lots of ups and downs, and even managed to score a few three pointers. Sometimes I feel like I’m ahead, and others I know I’m way behind. This game has not gone the way I envisioned it when I started out.

But regardless of all that, I have always been happy to celebrate the small successes that have led to bigger, more meaningful ones.

I’m still working, moving forward, reaching and striving for goals. I’m not yet where I intend to someday be. But weeks like this? Yeah, they remind me that this journey is sure a beautiful ride.

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One of the Herd: Post 2

So, Wednesday, I told you about my drive up a canyon and my thought process. (To catch up on that, scroll to the post just previous to this one.)  I was thinking about all of those things, still driving, and then, I saw this: (And I apologize in advance for the blurry pictures--they were taken in motion.)

Some beautiful deer, waiting to cross the road.

A few minutes later, I also saw this:

Other herd members, waiting for their friends to cross over.

I read somewhere that deer are symbolic for an impending or upcoming journey. And I would like to point out how many deer there are in this next picture.

The rest of the herd, braving the wild TOGETHER. 

A lot, right?

So I have developed a theory. I think that all those deer are a sign that I will not be taking any of these journeys alone. That, in fact, I will be joined by a number of talented people who will mean something in my life and/or career, or will at least join me in braving the wild.  

The truth is that I have no idea what is coming tomorrow. For me, or for my family or friends, or anyone else. But I do know this. Everywhere I look, big things are happening for those who are strong enough, resilient enough, tough enough to fight for them. The journey is calling, the road is open, and there is no limit to possibility.

The only question left to ask is who will be joining the herd? 

The Climb—Southern Utah Style

In Southern Utah, just outside Moab, there’s this enormous sand hill. I say hill, not dune, because you’re driving along on the highway, surrounded by hundreds of extremely tall red cliff formations, and then you come around a bend and there’s this hill, which is part of one of these cliff-type mountains, only it’s made entirely of red sand.

And being made of sand, of course, people have to play in it. Because that’s what sand is for, yes? So you pull off the highway and park, and stand at the bottom of this hill and you think, yeah, I can totally climb this bad-boy. Easier than the stair-stepper at the gym. Cake. It’s just sand, and what’s softer, easier than sand?

Um. Yeah. Not so much. Because then you roll up your pants and take off your shoes and start climbing. And it’s harder than you thought. But, you know, you’re in decent shape, and a little hard work doesn’t scare you away. You look up, see a few people ahead, figure they’re still climbing, so it’s possible. And you keep going.

You come to a big rock. It’s a good place to rest, so you sit on it, turn around and look how far you’ve come. It looks a lot farther down than you realized. “Yes!” you think to yourself. “I’m awesome.” And you do a little dance (but carefully, because you don’t want to tumble down). Then you look up again. And it looks so. Far. Away.

But there are still people ahead, and you’re in good shape. Plus, you’re brave. So you start up again. Once again, you find a rock and rest. This time, you don’t look up or down, you just rest, let the air cool your sweat-soaked skin, and try to ignore the throbbing in every one of your muscles. This climb hurts more than you ever imagined. But at this point, you’re so close to the top that you’d be insane to stop now and miss out on that photo op with you at the top of the world.

So you climb some more. And some more. And some more. And it feels like you’ll never get to the top. Except eventually, you do.

You look down, and wave at all the people below, feeling accomplished because you. Made. It. Then you turn around, and you look, take in the place you thought was the top of the world. And you find a whole bunch more hills. And you’ve only scaled one. But it was a big one. Maybe the biggest one you’ve ever climbed. So you hold out your arms and you scream with delight, because all your hard work got you to the top of this really difficult hill.

And now you know how to climb the next one. Hopefully, it won’t be made of sand.

Dauntless

You know what I’ve discovered in all my thoughts about success and failure? Both require a large amount of bravery. Serious bravery. Because in order to succeed, you have to be willing to also fail. In order to fail, you have to be trying to succeed. (Unless you get into something deliberately planning to fail, but seriously, who does that?)

Whichever way you look at it, the only difference between the two is the end result and how we react to it.

Every success story is told with an interesting sequence of failure-type events which drove the story forward. They’re probably the most thought provoking, interesting stories you’ll ever hear, because they tell about how one person set out to succeed and FAILED, then failed again, and then a few more times, before finally reaching a level of success. And then they probably failed a few more times before making it to the top. If they ever made it to the top. Maybe they made it to a completely different location and decided that was where they should have been going all along. You never know. The point is they made it somewhere great. Somewhere AMAZING.

That’s how success goes. It’s how every game is won. It’s how every plot is driven. It’s what keeps us pushing on and shooting forward with a mad desire to get to the other side.

I am not afraid to fail. (Say it with me.) I AM NOT AFRAID TO FAIL.

But I’ll tell you what I am afraid of. I am terrified of never reaching my arms out and trying to pull myself higher. Because that is when I’ll realize how many times I’ve fallen down. No one wants to have to face that.

I am not afraid. I am NOT AFRAID. I AM NOT AFRAID! I. Am. Dauntless.

The question is, are you?

By Comparison

A friend and I had a recent conversation about comparing ourselves to others. Doesn’t matter to whom, just that we have these tendencies. We all—every one of us—do it, whether we mean to or not.

We compare ourselves as wives, as mothers, as daughters, as housekeepers, as beauty queens, as authors (yeah, even if you aren’t one), as scholars, as… everything. It’s so easy to look at those around us and see their strengths as our faults. Or if not faults, at least something different than what they really are.

That person is thinner than me.

That one is more beautiful.

That person is stronger, is more fit.

That person is smarter.

That person must be better at ____ because they are on the path to (or have already found) success.

On my best day, I couldn’t even compare to____.

Why do we do this to ourselves? Life is about progress, about moving forward and growing as a person with each new day. There are no two people on this whole entire planet who have the exact same lives or circumstances. Think about it. There are billions of people on earth. And no one—NO ONE—is the same as anyone else. So why do we torture ourselves with comparisons?

I could look at the career paths of 500 different authors, and they are all different. Does that mean I’m not as good an author as them? Or that I should try to be like them? Or that I should want to? No, it does not. What it means (at least to me) is that each of them had the determination, the strength, the timing, the work, the…whatever else was necessary, to move forward on their path.

And guess what? I have that too. The difference is that I am me, and they are them, and we will never, ever be the same. And that’s how it should be.

Success isn’t just a destination, it’s a journey, an individual one. When and how and where we finally reach our final goal may be a complete mystery, but that’s the beauty of it. Don’t you think? A gift we an anticipate, a final outcome we will be individually proud of because no one knows more than us just what it took to get to that point.

And that, my friends, will make it all the more sweet. Don’t you think?

Hit the Gas and Go Around (or Holy Scary Snowstorm! Part II)

Still wondering how I survived driving in the storm mentioned on Wednesday?

Here’s what I did. As the fog thinned enough for me to see the tail lights of the SUV in front of me, I decided (at first) to follow that person. As long as they stayed on the road, so did I, and when they didn’t hit ice and slide around, neither did I.

Unfortunately, that only worked for a few miles.

Turned out, the incline was too much for that particular vehicle. The driver chose to slow down at some point, and ended up sliding backward. Bad for two reasons. One, they were sliding toward me (eek!). Two, I had to slow down to avoid them, and ended up starting to slide backward as well. Solution? Hit the gas and go around that SUV. (I was already in 4WD, thank goodness.)

Next, I tried driving behind a snowplow, because in the past, I’ve discovered there’s no better place to be while driving in a snowstorm. They’re spreading salt or sand, and plowing the worst of the snow out of the way, right? Not so in this case. No salt, and the plow wasn’t picking up much snow because everything was ice. The large tires threw a lot of slush on my windshield, impeding what small amount of visibility I’d gained. And my traction was no better than before. Not only that, the plow was sliding too. Solution? Hit the gas and go around.

That night I passed vehicles of all sizes and capabilities stuck in various positions of distress. I have no idea why some did well and others didn’t. Maybe it was timing, or driver mistakes, or possibly just dumb luck.

The journey that should’ve taken me 40 minutes took over two hours, but I did not stop. Sometimes I followed other vehicles, sometimes I forged my own path. Once I slid and once narrowly avoided doing a 360 merging onto an interchange, but I never allowed myself to stop or go off course. I prayed the whole way, shaking in fear of all the what ifs, but I kept my eyes ahead, having faith that even though I couldn’t see it, the goal was ahead of me and within reach.

I succeeded in making it to the airport the same way I’ll succeed in the other important goals in my life. One mile (or one step) at a time, using my best judgment, and more often than not relying on faith that I have the ability to see it all through.

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(Hint--scroll down two posts.)

Holy Scary Snowstorm! (Part I)

Last week I drove through a massive snowstorm unlike anything I’ve ever seen. I'm not crazy. It's not like I wanted to go out in that mess. You only drive in conditions like that for a person you love a whole lot. I mean really, really love, because that wasn’t snow, it was a complete white out and the scariest, most unreal driving conditions I’ve ever experienced.

I had to get to the airport to pick up my husband. A lot of people left their loved ones stuck at the airport that day, and once I got going, I figured out why. Scariest. Freaking. Storm. EVER.

Picture this: Wind blowing at a ridiculously high speed, with air so cold it freezes any and all moisture on contact so that as you drive, your windshield freezes—even though the wipers AND defrosters are on full blast.

As that’s happening, you drive into this enormous cloud of white (but not the dreamy kind, the scary kind), and even though you slow down, there’s no avoiding this thing, because it envelops your vehicle until you can’t see anything. Not the vehicles on the road with you, or the sides of the road, or the road itself. No street signs. No sky. Nothing. Oh, and you’re doing this going up a fairly steep incline and then back down the other side. At night. The road is made of the same ice that continues to coat your car.

You consider stopping to wait out the storm, but as soon as you slow down too much, your vehicle starts sliding backward. And worse, you occasionally spot flashing hazard lights from other vehicles stopped in the middle of the road, which have somehow managed to stop without back-sliding. This creates a veritable obstacle course you must traverse blind, except for the occasional flash of taillights in spots where the fog is less dense.

If you stop, you risk being stuck and possibly hit by another vehicle. Depending on how long you’re there, you also risk freezing to death. If you keep going, you risk sliding off the road (or down a mountain) and / or hitting into something.

What do you do in a situation like that? How do you proceed?

(To find out what I did, read part II, which will post on Friday.)

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(Hint--scroll down one post.)