How to Find Your Purpose and Do What You Love

Need some inspiration? Try this post by Maria Popova:
How to Find Your Purpose and Do What You Love by Maria Popova

Here are a few tidbits from the 7 stars she’s quoted:

“the only way to do great work is to love what you do. If you haven’t found it yet, keep looking. Don’t settle. As with all matters of the heart, you’ll know when you find it.”  ~Steve Jobs

And from the The Holstee Manifesto:

“This is your life. Do what you love, and do it often. If you don’t like something, change it. If you don’t like your job, quit. If you don’t have enough time, stop watching TV.”  (Or whatever else suckss time away from what you’re passionate about.)

And here’s a Ted talk by Alain de Botton:

Making time to follow your dreams may not be easy, but it’s well worth the effort.

I’ve been thinking a lot about dreams and passions lately. Years ago I gave up a heartfelt dream. Everyone said it wasn’t practical, and I believed them. I took a safe, conventional path instead. It’s taken a long time to gain the courage to pursue that dream. But today I put my life on hold and am devoting the next six weeks to following my heart. It won’t be easy, but I hope when I emerge at the end of the first leg of this journey that I will be much closer to living my passion and purpose.

What are you doing today to live yours?

Fear of Success

Inspiration struck today about my business. I realized I’ve been an anchor, keeping things stuck, preventing them from growing because of fear.

Rather than being an anchor, a drag, holding back the ship, I want to be the sail, harnessing the wind energy and directing the craft. We’ll not only go farther faster, but it’ll take a lot less energy.

Are You Feeling Depressed?

I love Eureka! moments. And I had one today. I’ve been sailing along, thinking of how great things have been going.

I’ve tackled lots of projects weighing on my mind by setting aside a Procras- tination Day once a week. I’ve felt lighter and airier without all that guilt holding me back.

I completed a huge assign- ment of 133 articles a week before they were due. (Anyone who knows what a procrastinator I am will realize this was a major victory.) And I completed the art for two book projects within the past two months.

I’m excited about the way my business is going, and I just returned from a terrific conference with Donald Maass that energized me. So why was I feeling so down?

Sure, the weather’s a bit rainy, so it’s dark and depressing outside, but what does that have to do with my internal landscape? Wallowing isn’t usually my nature, but I couldn’t shake this depression that gripped me. I do find, though, when I ask a question out loud, I always get an answer. (And that includes those “Why me,Lord?” ones I sometimes utter.) I don’t necessarily like the response, but it’s always apropos.

Today I asked, “Why am I depressed?”, and got my reply a few minutes later. My Google Alerts, which often drags in many unrelated items, did so again this morning. But I couldn’t resist taking a peek at The Big Leap by Gay Hendricks. I’m so glad I did, because I ran across the following sentence:

“I manufactured the stream of painful images because I was feeling good! Some part of me was afraid of enjoying positive energy for any extended period of time.” ~p. 5-6

Talk about a Eureka! moment. I decided to let myself enjoy my successes and positive moments. Not sure if it was coincidence or the power of positive thinking, but the minute I did, the rain cleared up and the day became sunny.

Fear of Falling

Sometimes as you’re moving along in life, you have an epiphany. A moment when you see things with such clarity that you wonder why you never had this particular insight before. And everything around you appears in a totally different light. This has happened to me on many occasions, but most recently in the area of faith.

Hop to it

I’ve always believed in stepping out in faith, but today I realized how small my giant leaps of faith are to someone who’s looking down from above. I go into them trembling, terrified of the outcome, thinking I have to do it all alone. I forget to look up and around to see all the help that’s available to cross the chasm I see before me.

Maybe instead of worrying about falling, I could use that energy to summon help. Like the ants in the previous post, I may be so occupied with what I’m doing, I miss the opportunities for support that are right beside me or in front of me.

If I look, I might also see that a jump is unnecessary. Someone before me built a bridge that I can use to cross. So there’s an easier way to do things. Before you leap, look around to find all available resources. But then if no one has done what you’re about to do, take that leap. But be sure to leave the trail well marked for those who will follow you.

Conquering Setbacks

You can do it, baby!

Whenever babies are about to make huge advances in their skills, they frequently regress. A toddler who has been taking her first steps may suddenly revert to crawling. A highly verbal child may fall silent for a few days or even weeks. But following that regression, the baby blossoms and shows off a brand new skill.

So perhaps adults also need times of regression in our lives to gather our strength before we tackle and conquer the next plateau.

The Secret to Publication

Now that I’ve been published, people often ask me how to do it. Learning your craft is important, of course, and so is having creative ideas, but the most important tip I can share is to connect with other writers and form a critique group.

Years ago, when writing was only a glimmer of an idea in the back of my mind, I sat at a banquet table next to an author who was receiving an award. During the meal, I listened with awe as she discussed the members of her critique group–all famous authors.

No wonder she got published with connections like that, I thought.

When I suggested that she was lucky to have such stellar critique partners, she laughed. “We all started out as unpublished writers. After we’d been together about five years, one by one we each got a book contract. Then over the next few years, we started winning awards. Now most of the group members have gone on to become famous, but we actually learned to write together.”

Little did I know that I was soon to follow her path. Last weekend I had the joy of attending a book signing at the Midtown Scholar in Harrisburg, PA. It brought tears to my eyes to know that the members of my very first crit group were there signing their books too. In fact, all of us have more than one book published. And, yes, we did it together. I’d venture to say that without sharing our combined knowledge, we would never be where we are today.

But the story doesn’t end there. I moved to a new state and a new crit group. Of course, I didn’t leave my old group behind. We still crit each other’s work via mail. But I’ve been with my new crit group for several years, and now that group is on the path to publication as well. One of my friends from that group joined me for this Harrisburg booksigning with her first novel in a series of three. And as for the other members of that group, all of them are close to publication. I’ve watched in delight as the submissions for each crit meeting move to ever higher levels of quality. I know that soon all of us will be doing group signings together.

In a few years, some of my CPs (or many of them) may be household names. Then I can say I knew them when. In fact, one member of a crit group I belonged to made the NY Times Bestseller list for a book I helped to critique.Very cool! And other CPs are now winning writing awards and contests. So it won’t be long until I’ll be able to say the same thing as that famous author: “We all learned to write together.”

Moving up the ladder of publishing success often seems to be a painstakingly slow process–one rung at time. Many times you wonder if you’ll ever get high enough off the ground, but when you look down, you can see how far you’ve come. Even better, though, is watching those around you reach that pinnacle of success.

Writing a Bestseller

by Darvin Atkeson

All speeches need an inspirational takeaway. So I asked my Muse for something eternal, unique, and beautiful. In what way could my life or my words be inspiring?

One of the greatest inspirations is hearing how others overcame the odds to reach success. That’s why author talks are so successful (and why people clap even if you mess up–most attendees have always dreamed of being a famous author). But that success is ordinary, although it may not seem so.

Anyone can become an author if they study hard, learn the craft, put hours of sitting in a chair and spilling their guts, keeping submitting in the face of rejection, and never, ever give up. But that’s so NOT what people want to hear. They already know that. And many of them have given it a shot. They want a magic pill they can take that transforms their idea into a runaway bestseller.

And so what do I, an author who has written for 20 some years have to share that will inspire the audience eager for pearls of wisdom? Persistence and perseverance are the keys? Never giving up? OK, let’s be honest: maybe published authors are more stubborn or perhaps more thickheaded?

So that won’t make my speech inspiring. What will? I decided to talk about how I overcame obstacles in my path and went on to conquer them. Some seemed insurmountable at the time, but I have a secret that keeps me on track. I’ll share that secret and the source of my inspiration in Friday’s post.

I Survived… I Think

So, one day after the event, I can look back with equanamity. If you read my public speaking post, you might have gotten the impression I don’t like to speak in front of groups.

That’s partially true. And I’m a procrastinator who avoids thinking about the presentation until the last minute, then…gulp!…realizes that it’s time to go out the door, and I have no time left to prepare. Why do I do that? It means I panic as I rush to pull some thoughts together as I drive to my destination and pray that I’ll come up with an interesting and inspirational topic. Yes, I was asked to talk about myself, but every talk should be structured like a story, with a beginning (inciting incident), middle (rising action), and ending (dramatic conclusion).

Luckily for me, my muse works well under pressure. I came up with several exciting (at least I hoped they were) events in my life and made them steppingstones, using an underlying theme of how I jump into careers, then learn on the job, often after I being forced to change directions by a tragedy or a roadblock. That helped me choose my anecdotes.

But I also like to give each audience a takeaway, something meaningful that they can apply to their own lives. My muse, my creative mind, my subconscious didn’t fail me. It dredged up a wonderful idea–one I’d heard years ago in someone else’s speech that had a powerful effect on my life…

Stay tuned for: Seeing the Other Side

Why Do I Fear Rejection?

Lauren Barnholdt just posted a great link to a blog about rejections. It got me thinking. If I hung my rejection letters side by side, I wonder how much footage they’d take up. But that led me to a different thought. How long would my string of acceptances be?

I’ve written more than 850 articles for magazines, educational publishers, and websites, plus I’ve sold several books. So I’ve had quite a few acceptance letters. Obviously, some letters (or emails) asked me to write more than one article, but still, let’s say I had 400 acceptances. If I multiply that by 8.5″, I have at least 3400″ of acceptances–or about 283′. Hmmm… And I’m guessing I have about 100-150 rejections, which gives me 1275″ of rejections or about 106′.

So why am I scared to send things out? Odds are, I’m much more likely to get an acceptance. But I still dread it.

I spent this past weekend at the SCBWI Carolinas conference, where several people urged me to send out my picture book dummy. I hate to say how long I’ve had that dummy worked up. I’d been dreaming of doing it for years. Back in the early 2000s an editor at a large publishing house expressed an interest in the text. She said she had the perfect illustrator in mind for it. I was thrilled. But before it was contracted, she left publishing. And there went my dream.

I turned back to magazine and educational writing, which blossomed into my career. But that picture book kept nagging at me. I took a picture book illustration class with Robert Quackenbush, and he liked that text and urged me to illustrate it. I was too scared and sure I couldn’t do it justice, so I illustrated a humorous easy reader with cartoons.

Several years later I took another illustration class with Matt Novak. Once again, I was encouraged to illustrate this text. I took the plunge. I spent hours on detailed pastels that my classmates praised. I even received an “A” in the class for my work. So why almost 5 years later is that picture book dummy still sitting in my art cupboard?

I dusted it off this summer and took it to an SCBWI critique group organized by Lauren Patton. Again, I was encouraged to send it off. But this fall it was still sitting in my cupboard. It went with me to the SCBWI Carolinas conference, where once again I heard I needed to send it off. So now I’m trying hard to talk myself into it.

OK, I followed the suggestion in the blog and hung up all my rejection letters. Then I hung up all the acceptances. So now I have to ask myself: if people who have only received rejection letters so far can keep on submitting, why can’t I??

Ooh, better go send it out quickly, before my internal critic can think of any negative replies. Anyone else have this problem?? Or these fears of rejection??

How Do You Deal with Rejection?

I’m looking for suggestions from fellow writers on ways they deal with rejection. Post your helpful hints or healing therapies, special potions, or magic formulas at Romance Writers on the Journey for a chance to win prizes.

Here’s the address:
http://romancewritersonthejourney.wordpress.com/2009/08/30/meet-debut-author-laurie-j-edwards/

Come on, even those of you who are mega-successes have rejection stories to share. Eating a whole gallon of ice cream? Bawling in the shower? Throwing darts at the editor or agents picture? Pounding a hole in your office wall? Or perhaps something more constructive (unless you’d already been planning to enlarge your office by knocking down a wall).

Calling a supportive crit group member?? Running 10 miles on a treadmill? (Hmm, just think how svelte that would make me.) Spending a session on your psychaitrist’s couch?

One of the crit groups I belonged to rewarded members with a candy bar for every rejection they received, and every year, we had a rejection party and gave out prizes for the cruelest rejection, the nicest rejection, the funniest, etc. And the person who had gotten the most rejection letters won the grand prize. In another group, we ritually burned our rejection letters in a bonfire while chanting, “I am an excellent writer and I deserve to be published.”

Okay, so I admit it. I hang out with wackos. At least I haven’t danced naked under a full moon while chanting curses against editors…yet. Hmmm, think my crit group would go for that one?

So pop on over to Romance Writers on the Journey and share your rejection stories. If you don’t have a solution, then just share your most painful rejection. We’ll all sympathize, which is bound to help.