Legacy

What will people say about you when you're finished here? The question has been asked millions of times, but have you ever really given it a lot of thought? Honest thought? Will it depend upon who it is that speaks of you? Would your co-workers describe you the same way the waitress that waited on you last week would? What would your parents, significant others, siblings and children say? Do you say hello to everyone, strangers and those you know well and everyone in between, with a smile? Are you nicer to strangers and people you don't know well than you are to those who are closest to you, or vice-versa? Do you do your best to be the person that those around you can depend on? Will some say you were kind and gentle, while others say you were abrasive and hard to be around? Who will describe you as being successful and who will disagree? Is it possible that some would say you are selfish? Needy? Independent? Funny? Honest? Would anyone consider you an inspiration? How many people wouldn't even show up to say anything?
I guess with many of us, it really would depend on who was asked. It is important to consider, isn't it? I am pretty sure, however, that the most important one to ask is yourself. Right now. While you're here. What do you say about you? Raise your hand if you have some things to work on.
(It's okay, I raised mine too.)

Fake

In the past few months I have learned more than I ever thought I would about networking and marketing. It's not my favorite. At all. One of the biggest networking sites for book lovers and writers has been very valuable. Here's the problem: trading reviews. A lot of authors on that site are trading their own books with other authors for review. The more reviews a book receives, the higher it climbs in rankings on Amazon, Barnes&Noble and Goodreads, and the better chance it has of catching the attention of readers. Sounds great, right? Yeah, except that the authors tend to give automatic 5 star reviews in order to get a 5 star back for themselves. I actually had someone tell me, "I give five star reviews within five days." My reply was that I would love an honest review of my book. I got a five star review five days later. Great. She did read the book, as they all do, but in her message to me when she was finished with it she called it "cute". That's nice. It is written for young teens. Cute is good. So why did she give me a five star rating, which means "It was amazing!"?  She didn't think it was amazing, and neither did the other author I traded with. I didn't think theirs were amazing either. I thought they were really good. Interesting. I liked one a lot more than the other one. I should have given two stars to one of the books and three to the other. But I didn't. What did I do? Yep. Just what was expected of me. I am a big, giant jerk. I have just lied to thousands of people who rely on book ratings on that site to pick their next read. SO, I have decided that I will no longer be trading reviews with other authors unless I know that we can be honest with each other and honest with everyone on that site.
I have received many reviews of my book, none too bad, many of them very good. When I say 'none too bad', it means the book was rated 3 out of 5 stars. Anything lower than that would feel terrible (one of the 3 star reviews stung a bit for a few days because the reviewer not only put the writing style down a bit, but decided to give away the entire plot in her review). The best review I have recieved so far was not even a formal review. It was an email from a woman I never met who found my book by accident and was almost late to work because she stayed up too late the night before to finish it. She called it unique and refreshing (I printed the email and saved it in my drawer of special things). If you have read the book and would like to review it on Amazon or Barnes&Noble, I would love to hear what you have to say. Reviews are great, even the not so fabulous ones, as long as they are honest.

Unstuck

She stopped writing, or caring about writing, for a long time. The manuscript sat in a box, finished and edited, for almost a year. She didn't care about the book anymore. She didn't really care much about anything. Before then, she was so sure of herself. She was confident in where she was, what she had and where she was going. She was confident in her words, both written and spoken. For a long time, she didn't care what other people thought about her ways, as long as she was doing the right thing and not hurting anyone. Now, she can make excuses all she wants. She can blame it on the move, or blame it on others, but what really happened was she got stuck. She stopped appreciating the amazing life she was leading, and got greedy. Not greedy for materialistic things, she'd never really been that way, just greedy for more...or just...different. Things were too easy for too long. No big problems. No huge worries. She was bored. She started moving her wheels, and everything was going along fine until she got stuck in the mud. She didn't call for help because she didn't like to ask. The more she tried to move, the more stuck she became and the deeper she went. She had forgotten about the rope. It was right there. Right outside the mud. She had never really used the rope much before, and didn't know if it could hold the weight, but when she finally grabbed onto it, that rope pulled her right out of the sticky pit onto the soft, dry, sweet-smelling grass. The rope let her wipe her muddy face on it, and while she cleaned herself, she realized that had it not been there she would have drown. She took a gigantic breath and sucked in all of the wonderfulness of her world and the rope led her away from the pit. Does she still have dirty feet? Heck yeah! Will they always be dirty? Nope. And they will most likely walk through a few more tiny mud puddles along the way, because she never really has been one to keep her feet clean for too long, but she plans on keeping them clean as much as possible and never going in past her ankles again. Do you know where the rope is now? She does. It's right there. Right now. She is in love with writing again, and she is in love with her amazing life again, and it is all because of the magnificent rope.

What's her rope?
What's yours?

Pushing It

I'm getting a bit turned off to all the social networking. I mean, it's fun and everything, but isn't it a bit narcissistic? It is, isn't it? Everyone is Facebooking, which is fun and great and keeps us from needing to lose ten pounds and figure out what to wear to high school reunions and whatnot, but the blogging and Twittering just seem so self-absorbed. I have to do this stuff if I want to do what I want to. And I really do want to do what I want to do, but I would like to do it without shoving myself down the throat of everyone I know. I try to rationalize it. Sometimes I tell myself, "It's okay Self, at least you have a reason for doing all this stuff." Everyone else has their reasons too I guess. I picture a monk somewhere, sitting in his peaceful place, thinking peaceful thoughts, and I wonder what his response to our obsession with ourselves would be. Would he sit and smile knowingly? Would he secretly pity us for not being enlightened or would he be too enlightened for that? Whatever. Once I've finished writing this, I will post it to Facebook and Twitter, feeling a bit crappy for pushing my junk upon the world once again. I'll picture that monk on his mountaintop (yes, he sits on a mountaintop overlooking a green valley with a river running through it. He sits under a shady tree wearing his orange robe, not worrying about his past or his future, and he is overjoyed) and I'll secretly envy his life. Tomorrow or the next day, I'll do it all again. Then again and again and again until I don't feel bad about it anymore, and tons more people will have read my book and all my friends will be sick of me. I hope the monk remains though. I like him.

Sidetracked

I spent most of the last few days designing and redesigning my new website. Looks pretty good but it isn't accessible from an iPhone. What?! Whatever. There are links to this blog,Facebook,Goodreads and Twitter. Learned a lot. It got me totally sidetracked but I'm just going to have to leave it alone now and get back to writing. I need to get as much writing in as I can before the moving process (ugh!) begins in a few days. I'm on it first thing in the morning...as soon as I get my daily giant iced coffee at McDonalds. So,...yeah.