Hey, hey friends, and welcome to this week’s episode of indie-author adventures! What a crazy year 2019 has been so far! Some days I shake my head and wonder if I’ve managed to stumble into one of my own stories! ? But I digress… so, let’s jump right in!
This Past Week
This is probably going to be one of my (few) personal types of blog posts. It’s just not something I do often… or well… if I’m being completely honest. Having spent the majority of my life as extremely independent by necessity, vulnerability and openness sometimes feel like foreign concepts on the typical day, and on the other days something I tend to struggle with just a bit.
And, this has been a huge focus for me lately because of the crazy year 2019 has been so far. I’ve seen one business go under, and another one grow. I lost my youngest brother recently, and even more recently a dear, dear friend, who was instrumental in helping me to be where I am right now, literally.
It has been a year of things being stripped away. And I’ve comforted myself knowing that things must be stripped away so that other, often better, things and circumstances have room to enter.
Which is where my writing comes in. I get to bare my soul (at times) through the fictional lens of my characters. Things I wish I could do or be, pain that needs to be unloaded, joy that shouts to be shared… for me, those are much easier through that fictional lens.
And you may be thinking… phew… that gal has issuuuuuues!
(Um yeah, but show me many writers — or people in general — that don’t!) ?
So.. what’s the point, you ask?
A couple things. Most everything we want — you know, those really BIG things — are almost always waaaaay outside what our current comfort zone includes.
Also, our readers want to connect with us. The real us — as much as our writer persona accommodates for that, of course. And sometimes that means being more vulnerable than we are used to from inside our comfort zone.
Here’s two important somethings I’ve learned:
- The biggest gains toward our dreams are found outside of our comfort zones.
- A comfort zone isn’t really all that comfortable when you have big dreams.
What each of us has to decide is:
Is NOT achieving what I want more important than my discomfort?
Which one of those “hurts” more? Stepping outside your comfort zone? Or, not achieving your dreams and goals?
What is something that you know you could do to further your goals but you’ve not done because it’s outside your comfort zone? Comment below and share it!
Just some food for thought. ❤
What I Accomplished
- Getting my technology woes sorted… Imma just blaming my tech crashes on the Mercury retrograde and leave it at that. LOL
- Given that a majority of my income / work comes from my tech work with authors… having computer hardware failures is a big issue as you may imagine!
- Started working on my TBR list since my work time was limited — you’ll be seeing book reviews being added to my site soon! ?
- Took an awesomely brilliant marketing course — super excited to start putting this into practice!
- Managed to not melt (completely) during this awful heat wave we’ve been having — and thanking the air-conditioner-deities for keeping my AC running and the power on! ?
The Big Takeaway
[bctt tweet=”Sometimes we have to choose: which is more important maintaining the status quo of our comfort zone… or stretching outside our comfort zone to grow and reach the next level?” username=”MoriganShaw”]