Have you heard of Shepherd.com? It’s a new book recommendations site whose goal is to offer readers an alternative to Goodreads, which, let’s be honest, isn’t always a fun experience.
Still in beta, Shepherd currently solicits and curates book recommendation lists from authors from a wide range of genres… including yours truly!
Click here to go there and read my list of the best books with haunting and unconventional love stories that are sure to appeal to fans of Restless Spirits.
I’ve got books listed in TWO multi-author e-book giveaways this month! Check ’em out below and click the banner to go to each giveaway page–and be sure to enter the gift card giveaway contest while you’re there.
Speaking of contests, here’s a link to enter to win a Kindle Fire (or a $50 gift card, if you prefer). No subscriptions or follows necessary to enter. Full disclosure–I’ll get an extra ten entries for everyone who uses that link to enter.
Now go load up on free books!
Happy first Monday of the New Year, friends!
I wrote another version of this post last week. I deleted it because I was in an introspective and melancholy mood that day, and it showed. And also because I went into WAY too much detail recapping 2021, after which it occurred to me that I had already written posts about most of those things, and y’all can just scroll back and read if you actually care.
With all that said, despite everything happening *gestures vaguely* out there, on a personal level 2021 actually turned out to be a pretty good year. It got off to a rocky start, with a brief period of unemployment and the Ice Apocalypse killing our well pump and cancelling our plans to get both an Anatolian shepherd puppy and chicks, but by March everything started coming together. We ended up getting Dixie, work started to roll in from bigger and better clients, we got our garden bed built and actually had our first successful vegetable garden, and then come fall we finally got our chicks and built them a coop from scratch. We made big strides on the homesteading front, and as far as freelance income goes, I had my best year ever. All those setbacks at the start of the year turned out to be prepping us for things to come together and work out just as they were supposed to.
With all the stuff going on, I spent the first half of the year in a bit of an existential crisis that was carried over from 2020, questioning whether I wanted to continue writing fiction and trying to make headway as an author in any way, shape or form, or if I just wanted to scrap it all and become a farmer. After a lot of prayer and soul searching, I realized that yes, I still want to write and publish novels, AND I want to be a farmer. And thanks in large part to Becca Symes and her Quitcast, I figured out what I needed to do both to get motivated to write again and to fit it back into my life. Which resulted in finally finishing my Dominion of the Damned trilogy and getting pretty darn close to finishing the romance novel I’d started in 2020.
(In my original draft of this post it took me more than 1200 words to tell you all of that. Seriously, be glad I deleted it.)
So what did I learn in 2021? A lot, actually. Too much to list here. But here are some highlights:
But all of that was last year. So what about 2022?
I have a feeling things are about to get real interesting. That the last two years were just the tip of the iceberg. I would love to be wrong. I’m not going to make predictions, but with aliens and UFOs and CERN and small pox all making headlines lately, I’m thinking we’d all best buckle up. At any rate, I’ve got all those things on my 2022 bingo card.
But one of my intentions for the new year is to spend less time looking at and thinking about headlines and more time praying, studying the Word and living this pretty great life I’ve been blessed with.
My big goal for the year is to grow my publishing income to a point where it can replace my freelance writing income so I can retire from that. To that end, here’s what I’m hoping to accomplish this year:
I’m also playing around with my schedule to see if I can fit a second writing session into my mornings and increase my average daily word count from 500 to 1,000. If I can do that, I’ll finish my current WIP in a couple of weeks, and I’ll be able to write a novella in about a month. So far so good — this morning I was able to fit in another half-hour of writing after my morning chores and Bible study. The big question is whether I’ll be able to keep that up once freelance assignments start coming back in (the agencies I work for are still closed for the holidays), but hopefully by then it will be enough of a habit that it won’t be something I have to think about.
I spent a lot of time over the weekend examining my priorities as far as marketing efforts go, trying to determine what will get me the most results for the least amount of effort. Social media and blogging both fell pretty low on the ROI list, so those are going to get less attention this year. Not that I’m not going to do them, but they’re not something I’m going to stress myself out about fitting into my weekly schedule. I may also phase out these coffee talks. I enjoy them, but they haven’t gotten any engagement in a long time, so I may just stick to more thematic, evergreen content when I feel moved to write some, as well as book news updates. If you want to keep up with what’s doing around the ol’ homestead, you can follow my personal Instagram–at least until I get mad at Instagram/Facebook/Meta whatever and decide I’m taking my toys back to my own sandbox, or they cancel me for all my spicy opinions and sharing of unapproved facts.
(Another thing I learned is that my “Strategic” brain is always editing my plans on the fly. It’s not ADHD that makes me flip back and forth so much, it’s just my strategic thinker wiring trying to adapt to life’s twists and turns.)
Other than that, we don’t have any big plans for the year. We’re just going to maintain the status quo, try to keep our current animals alive and healthy, expand our garden and learn some new skills. I started a 30-day diet reset today, but that’s not really a NY resolution, just needing to get things back on track and recover my health after the holidays. It’s not anything major, just avoiding sugar, alcohol and processed junk for the next thirty days to get it all out of my system and lower my chronic inflammation. Today is actually my first day in a while without any sweets. I had a pretty intense chocolate craving earlier, but I got through it. Mid-morning and mid-afternoon are usually my most intense craving times, so I’ve just got one more to get through today. Usually when I do this sort of thing, by day three the cravings start to abate, so I’m pretty confident that I’ll make it.
How’s your 2022 shaping up? Do you have a word for the year? Resolutions? Goals? Intentions? Hopes? Plans? Tell meeeee!
Merry Christmas! I come bearing gifts. The Gift, actually, which is my short, Christmas-themed Restless Spirits prequel, and which is now available perma-free on Amazon, Kobo and various other retailers. Click here to find all the links and download it in the format of your choice!
Okay, that’s just one gift, singular. I’m sorry. But to make it up to you, you can click here to enter to win a Kindle Fire 7 (or a $50 gift card, if that’s your preference) from My Book Cave — no purchases, follows or subscriptions necessary to enter (full disclosure — I’ll get 10 bonus entries for each person who enters using my link).
In other news, I’m going to give myself the gift of a Christmas break. I think today is going to be my last work day this week and I’m going to take a rest from all writing until the Monday after Christmas. I’m a little apprehensive about this throwing off the momentum I’ve got going on my current WIP, but I’m reasonably confident I’ll be able to get my groove back come next Monday. And I hope to be back here next week with an end-of-year wrapup, as is customary.
In the meantime, I’m going to hang with my husband and furbabies, get cozy with some hot beverages, try not to overdo the chocolate, watch some Christmas movies, and also spend a lot of time in reflection, prayer, and thinking about plans for the coming year.
I hope you and yours have a peaceful Christmas and a blessed new year.
♥
Hello there, Bloglandia. It’s been a little while. I just wanted to pop in and touch base and let everyone know I’m still plugging along. There’s not a lot to report. Freelance writing has been keeping me busy, and when I get breaks between articles I’ve been trying to keep up with behind-the-scenes book marketing tasks and housework, and also rest my tired brain. We both haven’t been sleeping so great, and winter is already zapping our energy, so we’re struggling a little to keep up with everything and oh so ready for the Christmas break.
But for all of that, I’ve still been diligent to get up early every weekday morning and work a little bit on my romance novel, which is about two-thirds of the way done. I may end up having to pare it down when all is said and done. I think it’s going to end up quite a bit longer than the typical fluffy romance read. But it’s turning out to not be all that fluffy. I keep tackling some heavy stuff. Stuff like narcissistic abuse, church hurt, C-PTSD, being upset with God… so much for writing a romantic comedy. At any rate, it’s coming along.
We did manage to put out some Christmas decorations, although we had to Dixie proof everything, and we didn’t even attempt to put up the pretty fake tree we bought last year. Instead we harvested a little juniper from our property and decorated it with our unbreakable ornaments.
Also, I’ve taken up playing the recorder. I’ve tried and tried over the years to make myself into a guitar player, but the truth is that I’m a woodwinds gal. In my heart of hearts, I want to replace my long-lost saxophone, but those are too expensive. I’ve been drawn to playing the Irish tin whistle as a cheap substitute. But I’ve got this recorder that Matt bought me years ago, so I pulled that out in the hopes that by playing it he’d be more inclined to let me get a set of tin whistles. I looked into some recorder lessons on YouTube and discovered that there’s a lot more to it than I thought. I don’t have as much time to practice as I’d like, but I’m having fun with it. I still want those tin whistles, though. And a saxophone. Some day…
Today is shaping up to be pretty and mild, so we’re going to make ourselves get outside and do some neglected chores. The chicken coop and pen are sorely in need of a cleaning. The plan is to muck it all out and transport all the poopy stuff to our garden bed area, where we’ll spread it around and cover it and let it go to work conditioning the soil through the winter. And we’ve still got a million leaves to rake, and we still need to gather and cut old deadwood for our second hugelkulture bed. Probably we won’t get all that done today, but if we can get the coop cleaned out I’ll be happy. Also, if I ever start a homesteading blog, I’m going to call it “Dirt, Sweat, and Chicken Poop,” and never will there have been a more aptly named blog.
Speaking of the chickens, ours will be old enough to switch from grower to layer feed soon, and we’ve been researching cost-effective ways to feed chickens. Because let me tell ya, commercial chicken feed is ‘spensive. If any of you reading this have tackled this problem and have any suggestions, I’d love to hear them.
Aaand it’s just about time to head out and get to work. I’m hoping to be back soon with an end-of-year update, and hopes and plans for the new year. Because it’s already getting to be that time. Can you believe it?
Oh, and ICYMI, Desolation, Book One of my now-complete Dominion trilogy, is only 99 cents!
Until next time, Bloggy friends!
Hello hello!
I hope you’re all having a relaxing Thanksgiving week (those of you who celebrate it, at any rate). I’m taking it easy this week to rest up from a few weeks of keeping up with an intense freelance writing workload before I dive back in next week. But I wanted to tell you about some final tweaks I made to my Dominion of the Damned trilogy:
Click here to find the complete trilogy on Amazon, and click here for links to everywhere else it’s sold.
Happy reading, and happy Thanksgiving!
October is, theoretically, my favorite month of the year. The milder weather, the turning leaves, the Halloween candy and pumpkin spice, the combo of spooky and cozy vibes… I love it all. And every year I look forward to it like no other month.
And every year, it seems, the month gets crazy, and I barely get to enjoy it, and it’s over and gone before I know it.
I’m in a weird, conflicted place right now of mourning the fact that October is almost over already and lamenting how busy this month was while simultaneously being pleased with how productive it was and being excited that we’re only a few days away from Halloween and the start of holiday season.
And it was certainly productive. We finished building the chicken coop, almost completely from scrap materials that were lying around the property, and got the chicks moved in, where they’re doing great. Our landlords came for a few days and together we knocked down some giant piles of limbs that were waiting for the right conditions to be burned and also cleared a lot of junk out of the warehouse. And we accumulated enough leaves to finally fill our empty hugelkultur garden bed, so those can be composting until next spring (we’ve still got to gather old wood to pile on top of the leaves). That’s a lot of work right there, but if the way our tomatoes have taken off in our first hugelkultur bed are any indication, it’ll be well worth it.
Here’s the finished coop:
And all that’s just on the homestead front. It was also a productive writing month. I FINALLY finished, AND revised, AND published Revolution Part Two! I cannot even begin to convey what a relief it is to finally have that trilogy off my plate (except for the paperbacks I still need to format and create covers for). And that’s not all! I also added a couple of new chapters to my sweet romance WIP. And this week I updated both Eucha Falls and Weather Witch with new titles and covers — all while keeping up with a steady stream of freelance writing gigs. Here are the new covers:
I had so many plans for this here blog this month. I was going to have so much fun with it being spooky season. I was going to continue my examination of the Biblical supernatural worldview by taking a look at what the Bible says about ghosts, I was going to get into the Satanic Panic of the ’80s and ’90s and whether that was real and still going on (short answer: yes on both counts — do a DuckDuckGo search on the Finders cult if you want to go down that rabbit hole, but cover yourself in prayer first and guard your heart and mind if you do), and I was planning a big post on the true history and CHRISTIAN origins of Halloween to combat all the rampant misinformation that’s either guilting or terrifying so many clueless Christians into shunning their own holiday.
Alas, I didn’t have time for any of that. I’m still planning to tackle the ghosts and Satanic Panic topics at some point (and also revisit the topic of goat demons), if things ever slow down to a point where I can devote time to this blog again, but as for the Halloween origins, I had to settle for throwing together an Instagram story, which you can view by clicking here. Just click and hold your button down (or your finger if you’re on your phone) on each slide to pause and read.
If you don’t want to wait around for me to dig into these topics, then I highly, HIGHLY recommend checking out the Blurry Creatures podcast, which I have been binging like crazy for the last couple of weeks (one of the perks of doing a lot of outdoor work). It started out as a Bigfoot / cryptids podcast but quickly took a sharp turn and became about examining the origins of everything weird and strange in the universe and how it all ties back to Genesis, and the theological and historical implications thereof. Start with the latest episode and work your way back if you don’t care about Bigfoot (although he still comes up in every episode). I’m dubious about some of the claims and theories of some of the guests, but even so, this podcast will blow your mind and rock your worldview.
I’m not going to set a timeline on any of this, because we’ve still got a lot to get done around the homestead before winter hits (that fence around the chicken yard isn’t going to build itself), and I’m promised a steady stream of freelance work between now and the end of the year. But I still need to merge both parts of Revolution into one volume and then set up paperbacks (and maybe hardbacks?) for that whole series. And I’m about to start edits on the sleep paralysis story I wrote last year, which I think I’m going to include in a collection that includes all of my short standalone stories — that will also get released as both a paperback and ebook.
I’ll keep plugging away each morning on the romance novel, which I think is a little more than halfway done, and which I’m hoping to have ready in time for a spring release. And once that’s done I’ll take a break before starting the next book in that series to finally get back to the urban fantasy series I started last year.
I’m really chomping at the bit to get back to that series, but I’m glad I put it off. While it will be marketed as fantasy, the truth is that it will be thoroughly grounded in a Biblical supernatural worldview, which is very real. And while it was always my intention with this series to highlight the angelic conflict that’s happening all around us, I started this back before I’d been exposed to Dr. Michael Heiser’s work, and since then my worldview has vastly expanded to include a wide range of possibilities. Binging Blurry Creatures is also doubling as research for this series. And I’m realizing that there’s so much more I can communicate about this stuff, so much more effectively, through fiction than through a blog or podcast. I can’t wait to get into it, but at the same time, I need more time to process all of it.
So that’s what all is on the horizon. Oh, and I’m also planning (or hoping) to get re-focused on building my mailing lists and participating in some more multi-author book giveaways over the next few months.
But first, I’m going to enjoy a long Halloween weekend, watch some old school scary movies and try not to OD on chocolate. I hope you and yours have a pleasant and safe All Hallow’s E’en/Reformation Day/Fall Harvest Festival/candy day/it’s just Sunday you satanically-inspired heretic.
Peace.
Hi guys. I know it’s been quiet around these parts lately. That’s because we’ve had our heads down finishing projects.
And one of those projects was Revolution Part Two and YOU GUYS IT’S HERE IT’S OUT IN THE WORLD AND YOU CAN GET IT AND READ IT RIGHT NOW OMG!
Please excuse my complete lack of chill. There were times these last two years when I thought this day would never come. But it did. It’s here. Dominion of the Damned is completely finished.
Currently both this new release and Revolution Part One are 99 cents. In about a month I’ll merge them into one volume and unpublish the second part, and raise the price on the complete volume. That means two things: one, you’ve got about a month to grab both halves for under $2 and save a buck or two; and two, if you leave a review, please leave it on Part One’s Amazon page, because that’s where the complete volume will live, and Part Two’s Amazon page will be going away.
And in this day of rule by algorithm, reviews are very, very much needed and appreciated.
Phew! So what else is new? We finished the chicken coop and got the chicks moved in. They’re no longer chicks, really, but adolescent chickens. They’ve about got all their feathers and they’re starting to make clucking noises. It’s still pretty darn cute. AND I’m pretty sure we’ve got a rooster in the mix, which makes me glad we didn’t order one.
Now that things are calming down I’m hoping to get back to some kind of blogging schedule soon. Until then…
Happy reading!
Coffee Talks are where I chat with you as though we were sitting down together over coffee, updating you on my life, my work, and what’s been on my mind lately. I’d love to hear what’s been going on with you, as well, so keep the conversation going in the comments!
Welp, another week, and still no conspiracy post. I swear, you guys. Maybe Somebody’s trying to tell me I shouldn’t post that thing and get myself in trouble. But between a batch of freelance assignments and the new chicks, there just wasn’t time. I don’t really have time for this post, either, so I’mma try to keep it short.
Sadly, we lost the tiniest of our tiny babies, the rest of whom are getting less tiny by the day. One of our little speckled Sussex (naturally, the breed of which they only sent us three of the five we ordered) struggled from the start, and seemed to be underdeveloped compared to the rest. We isolated her enough to let her get plenty of food and water without any competition, and rest from getting knocked around and run over, and she seemed to be growing stronger, enough so that we were getting our hopes up that she’d make it. But sadly, those hopes were dashed by noon on Tuesday when I found her lying on her side in the brooder, having passed away after a morning of fooling us into thinking she was doing well.
The rest of the chicks are doing great, though–healthy, strong and growing like weeds. They’re already flapping their wings and trying to reach the top of the tub, so we’ll have to transition them to the big brooding box soon. Their individual personalities are starting to come out, too. They’re so much fun. If someone had told us that chicks were this fun and therapeutic, we’d have gotten some a long time ago.
Click here to see them in action.
As I said up top, my freelance writing picked up this week, but that hasn’t interfered with writing my novel, which I dare say is going great. This morning I had to stop midway between the big (spoiler alert) showdown between Hannah and Esme, but there’s not much of that scene left to go, and then I just need to write the denouement, and then it will be finished, save for typing up and revising all these handwritten scenes. Barring some major life circumstance stealing all my energy and focus, I really think I’ll reach the end by next week.
Making myself write first thing in the morning (well, first thing after letting Dixie pee and then making coffee) is really making all the difference. And it’s having a trickle-down effect, too, revving me up for the day and making me more productive in other areas. I really hope I can keep this momentum going.
With that in mind, I’m rethinking my previously stated plans to take an extended writing break starting in November, and just continuing on in the early mornings with my next project (though I may take a week or so to write up some of the longer blog posts I’ve had in mind first) so I don’t lose that momentum and then have to spend a lot of my energy getting started again. I guess I’ll play it by ear, and if I feel like I need a break, or I just end up not writing, I won’t beat myself up about it and I’ll just take a dadgum break.
Although last weekend ended up being more hectic than I’d expected, what with wrangling with tech support over losing access to my website and having to seize the good weather to get out there and work on the chicken coop, I did manage to get some time to strategize the next phase of my writing career and plan out my future projects. Although the Mae Bishop urban fantasy series I started early last year is calling to me, I think first I’m going to turn my focus to my sweet romance series and spend some time building up that pen name — mainly because I think it will be more marketable and stand a better chance of generating some significant income.
But probably what I’ll end up doing is alternating between them, writing and releasing a Mae Bishop novela in between each of my sweet romance books, and keeping both of those series going as long as I can. And then maybe, hopefully, on the side I can work on one of my stand-alone YA passion projects that have been brewing in my brain for a good long time. As grateful as I am for my freelance writing work and the income it brings in, I really, really hope I can finally get a handle on making my books work for me and replace that freelance income with publishing revenue so I’ll have more time freed up to write all the stories in my head. And also to focus more on growing our little starter homestead into a full-fledged dairy and fiber farm.
All of this is quite the one-eighty from a couple of months ago when I was saying I didn’t even want to write or be an author anymore, isn’t it? If you’ll recall, I prayed a lot about that, asking God to restore that desire and drive if that’s what He really wanted me to be doing with my life, and, welp, here we are. I saw this quote the other day, which I posted on my author instagram, and I’ll share it here, because it’s been true of me pretty much my entire life.
Oh, and while I’m sharing things here that I shared on IG, here also is a little sneak peek at Revolution Part Two:
Okie-doke, I’ve still got an article to write, so I’d best get to it. I don’t know how my weekend will shape up, but if it doesn’t rain too much, I’m guessing it will involve more coop building (we’ve got three sides up! We just need to install the nesting box partitions and roosting poles, then we can put the front and roof on).
Talk to me, Goose. How are things with you? (Bonus points if you can name that movie.)
Coffee Talks are where I chat with you as though we were sitting down together over coffee, updating you on my life, my work, and what’s been on my mind lately. I’d love to hear what’s been going on with you, as well, so keep the conversation going in the comments!
Note: I wrote this post on Friday, but lost connection to my web host right as I was ready to post it. So that’s why you’re getting a rare Saturday post, following a lot of back and forth with tech support to fix the issue.
Happy September! So it’s basically fall now and also already Halloween. Yes, yes, the equinox is still weeks away and temps are still in the high 80s and 90s, but that’s a minor detail. Bring on them pumpkins and candy!
(Also, just so you know, Christmas this year begins on November 1st, so you should probably prepare.)
And now for our big news: THE CHICKS ARE HERE YOU GUYS!!!
And I’m going to be spamming all my feeds with unsolicited chick pics from here on out, so be warned.
Thankfully, they only had to travel from Missouri, and the weather stayed nice and mild for their trip, and they all arrived safe and sound. We’ve got three Speckled Sussex and six each of Buff Orpingtons and Easter Eggers (aka Americaunas — they lay blue and green eggs). We actually ordered five of each, but they were short on Sussex and substituted one each of the other breeds, which is fine.
We also ordered all hens, but I’m hoping a rooster made it into the mix. With fifteen birds, we figured there was a good chance that might happen, so we didn’t order a roo. But I’ve read that it can be hard to get an established flock to accept a new rooster, and we would really like to breed them and have a sustainable flock, so I’m a little apprehensive about that decision, and crossing my fingers that at least one of our new babies is a boy.
For now we’ve set up a brooder for them in our master bathtub, one of those extra-wide and deep garden tubs that come standard in double-wides that we never use. It’s working great. When they outgrow that we’ll move them out to a transitional brooder in the warehouse until they’re big enough for the coop–which we’ve now got a definite deadline to finish building.
Oh! I got so excited about the chicks that I forgot to mention that Mr. B. and I celebrated our 15th wedding anniversary this week. The chicks were something of an anniversary present for us both. I shared on my personal Instagram about what I’ve learned in all these years about keeping a marriage strong — you can read that here.
Moving on to writing news, I’ve found my groove again, and the last half of Revolution is chugging along. This week was the first week in I can’t even remember how long that I’ve written every day. I switched things up by going to pen and paper and also shifting things around so I can write first thing in the morning, and those two simple changes have made all the difference. This morning I brainstormed and plotted out the remaining scenes, which are four in number. The end is so very nigh, y’all!
I’d love to finish it next week, but even if I don’t, I’m on track to finish it this month. I would also love to release it in time for Halloween, and since I’ve been editing as I go, I think that might actually be a realistic goal. I’ve already got the cover ready so all I’ll have to do is format it, which is mostly a matter of pasting it into a template, and then proofread, and then it’s done! Yay!
Speaking of figuring out what works for me, this week I discovered The Quitcast by Becca Syme. Well, “discovered” isn’t really the right word, because Becca’s been on my radar for over a year now. But I finally got around to checking out her podcast, and now I’m kicking myself for not doing so a year ago. She’s a writing and self-publishing coach who centers everything around the Clifton Strengthsfinder, which is less of a personality test and more of a strength and aptitude test that’s based on actual science, and can tell you a lot about how your brain is wired.
I’ve taken the test before, some time ago when it was free, which is no longer the case. Out of curiosity, I took this free knockoff earlier this week, and my top five matched my Strengthsfinder results, which are Strategy, Empathy, Ideation, Intellection and Belief (Communication, Relator, Futuristic, Context and Consistency round out my top 10). Becca helps put all that information into the context of what it means for you as a writer, how you function, why writing advice does or doesn’t work for you, how to figure out what actually does work for the way you’re wired, etc.
While I’m sure her coaching delves a lot deeper into figuring these things out on an individual basis, her podcast has been giving me a lot of insights into my own writing habits, successes and failings. And while it hasn’t exactly taught me anything about myself I wasn’t already aware of, it has helped me come to terms with and accept that there are things about the way I operate as a writer that are never going to change. I’m never going to be the kind of writer that churns out several novels a year, and I’m only going to burn myself out if I try to work at that pace. I need LOTS of time and space to think and process, and I need a lot of time between big projects to recover my energy.
It’s also helped me understand that, as someone who has a high degree of empathy and is also future-focused and doesn’t cope well with uncertainty, these crazy times we’re living in are extremely draining for me. I’m spending tons of energy just coping with the way the world is right now, and that’s why I’ve been so ridiculously tired lately and why it’s been such a struggle to find the mental energy and the will to write. So that’s helpful. I think that’s why moving my writing to first thing in the morning, before I get on social media or get exposed to any news, has made such a big difference. And I’m going to spend the weekend thinking about ways to protect my energy from all the insanity and stress without entirely sticking my head in the sand.
Another thing it’s helped me realize is that I’m prone to magical thinking about the future–thinking things like, “Okay, that didn’t work, but next time will be different”–and that I need to learn from the past and adapt my behavior accordingly. For starters, I’m going to accept the fact that I never get any novel writing done from about mid-November until January 2nd. And instead of making plans to start a new novel during that time and then beating myself up over neglecting it, this year I’m going to be intentional about taking a break from writing during those weeks, and instead focus on other tasks that I’m more likely to actually do. For one thing, I’ll focus on ways I can repackage my Dominion trilogy, since it will be done by then — like finally getting the paperbacks done and putting together an electronic boxed set. And I’m thinking that would also be a good chance to finally migrate my mailing list from Mailchimp to MailerLite and create a new series of autoresponders. I’ll probably take part in some giveaways, too. And already, just thinking about not having to worry about writing during the holidays and getting to focus on these things I’ve been putting off for so long is getting me jazzed about the season.
That might be too much of a look at how the sausage is made for your taste. But even so, I highly, highly recommend checking out Becca’s work and her YouTube channel. She’s got a series of books for writers, too that are going on my wishlist (that’s an affiliate link, btw — if you use that link to make an Amazon purchase I’ll receive a small commission at no cost to you, which I have to tell you because the FTC is extremely concerned that you don’t know how affiliate links work).
Before I sign off, I want to say one thing regarding current events. I think everyone who leans toward being apolitical or moderate or who prefers to stay out of the political debate has a threshold where they feel compelled to get off the fence and choose a side. While I haven’t exactly been moderate for a long time, I did generally avoid voicing my political opinions online for far too long. My threshold was crossed last year, and I found my voice and my courage to start using it to speak out against evil and stand up for righteousness and liberty.
I don’t know where your threshold is, friend. But if the recent actions of the current administration haven’t been enough to push you past your limit and compel you to choose a side, then I don’t know what it will take, and by the time you reach your limit, at this point, it might well be too late for it to make a difference. I’m not saying everybody’s got to start going to rallies or become keyboard activists. But if you haven’t already, now is a real good time to look around at what’s happening, at who is doing what, and make up your mind about where you stand, and what you stand for. Because in the immortal words of somebody famous and probably dead, “If you stand for nothing, you’ll fall for anything.”
And that’s all I’ll say about that in this space, although I’ve got plenty more to say in my personal Instagram stories if you’re interested.
And now, I’m going to sign off and start my weekend. I’m going to take a break from writing and let these last four scenes percolate in my head while I spend time with our new baby chicks and watch a scary movie or two.
Have you taken the Strengthsfinder (or something like it)? If so, what are your Top 5?
Oh, and PS – I’m still working on that conspiracy theory post, which is seeming more relevant by the day. Watch for that sometime next week!
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