Where Will Your Dreams Lead You? / Happenings In The Outhouse 18-Nov-2016

In the cafeteria of the local high school, the following words are displayed at the front, right above the outside windows:

Where Will

Your Dreams

Lead You?

 

Surrounding this are various college pendants.

 

Monday night, as I sat through the football awards night (my son is a senior and thankfully was in his last year of football), I looked up at those words, surrounding by those pendants, and was curious why one's dream always has to go through a college?

So many great minds, innovators, entrepreneurs, artists never got their start in college.  Much of our working class--the ones holding up our economy, from our farmers and mechanics to office workers and waitresses--do not require a piece of paper, hung on a wall, proving that they did what they were told (from two to four or five or more years) while raking up tens of thousands of dollars in student loan debt.

All one needs is a curiosity and a drive to work.

Despite what our media portraits, everyone wants to work, to do something, to make a difference.  Even if it's to put a meal on the table for their family.

Where will your dreams lead you?

Now, I have no problem with education--even education beyond high school.  One should always strive to learn more.  But one can learn so much from watching free videos, taking free courses, or even paying to take a course on a specific topic.  Udemy, Masterclass, and Khan Academy are only three such resources--there are so many more!

So much can be learned from watching a handful of YouTube videos.  Or an online interactive course.

One does not need to spend several thousands of dollars a year, raking up debt that could (and will) hinder one from achieving success.

Again, let me ask you: where will your dreams lead you?  What do you want to achieve?  Where do you see yourself in five, ten, twenty years?

Then, hopefully, alongside the college pendants are the names of YouTube, Amazon, Facebook, Twitter, entrepreneurship, www. (enter name) .com, creativity, self-publishing.  The avenues of where your dreams should lead you are infinite.

Dream.

And achieve.

One historic night / Happenings In The Outhouse 11-Nov-2016

Tuesday night was a historic night.

My latest story--a Christmas-themed novel--is officially a novel.  I surpassed the 40,000 word mark that night.

(You thought I was talking about the other historic events that night, didn't you?)

Four years ago, I wrote a few blog posts in regards to politics.  They seem relevant to post a link to each right here--trust me, no matter your political affiliation, these are for you:

The Election is over.  Get on with your life.

Are you better off four years ago?

Who is your perfect candidate?

No matter how you slice it, Tuesday was historic.  First, for a major political party, we had the first woman running for President.  Second, we had someone who did not go through the "usual" political channels of working their way up the ranks to be President.

Either way you look at it, the night was historic.

But the candidate you should really be looking at . . . is yourself.  Be the best you can be.  World events will happen and, by and large, we have little control over it.

Change your life.

Focus on improving your life.

Make every single day a historic day for you.

Okay, let's be honest, I suck at marketing / Happenings In The Outhouse 04-Nov-2016

I suck at marketing.  Seriously.  Honestly.  Positively.  I suck at marketing.  That is, I suck at marketing my own art.

I have no problem talking about other people's art, promoting them.  But, somehow, when it comes to me, I suck at it.

On occasion, I've had a few people at work inquiring about what I'm working on--I bring a laptop to work, and use it to write during breaks and lunches.  At this point, my stomach churns and my heart races.  What do I tell them?  Should I be specific?

The answers to these largely depends on who's asking.  Are they just interested in what I'm doing?  Most people on breaks and lunches are either chatting or have their nose in their tablets/phones.  A few play card games, but I rarely see anyone else lugging around a laptop.

I have disclosed to a few that I am an indie author, but then I ask what kinds of books they read.  If they don't read, then what's the point of showing them what I write?  Oh, I'm positive they may buy the book, but that's it.  What I'm looking for are readers.  And not just any reader.

Love thrillers?  Click on this link.

Horror?  Got that too on this link.

Suspense?  Check this out.

Military fiction?  Gotcha covered there too.

Can't forget inspirational.  Here you go.

Here's a list of all my books right here.

On my new work-in-progress, I'm currently 35,000 words into it.  I'm shooting to finish this in a month, early December, but at the same time I'm not going to rush it either.  It's fun to write, and I'm even starting to write a little each night too.

Killing off a character / Happenings In The Outhouse 28-Oct-2016

This past Sunday was the season 7 premiere of The Walking Dead.

Normally, I watch The Walking Dead on Netflix, but season 6 ended in such a way that I had to see what character Negan (the newest bad guy) would kill with his trusted baseball bat wrapped in barbed wire.

No, I won't spoil who died.

Was I shocked?

Nope.  Another TV show I watch, Game of Thrones, also kills off several characters--even main characters.  Yes, I've read all of the books so far, and I am eagerly anticipating the next novel to be released.  So the death of a main character isn't shocking to me.

But it must serve a purpose.

And I truly believe the latest deaths in TWD will also serve a purpose.

I'm currently 28,000 words into my newest novel.  It's a stand-alone Christmas-themed drama.  It's been very fun to write.  Then, as I started thinking about the path the book is going to take, I planned on having a character get hurt.  Severely.  Then, I imagined what the story would be like if this particular character died.

Believe it or not, I had tears in my eyes when I thought of it.  I still do, knowing I may have to end this person's life--fictionally, of course, but that doesn't make it any less hurtful.

Will it serve a purpose?

At this point I hate to answer that.  Because I know what my answer may be.

An example of putting yourself out there / Happenings In The Outhouse 21-Oct-2016

Let me take a small moment this Friday to brag about my son.

He's eighteen, a senior in high school, a member of both the football and golf teams, and he's light-years ahead of every single member of his class.  And I truly mean it.  Every single one.

Why?

Because he's putting out content.  On his own.  Many people talk about it.  Many of those people even study about doing it.  But they never get around to actually doing it.

My son has.

The other day, I heard rumors from my wife about his YouTube videos.  The rumor was that he had some swearing in them.  I honestly didn't care too much as I had watched the one and only video I thought he had put out there.  The swearing was minimal and done all in the nature of the content he was providing.

Then I went to his YouTube page (by the way, I was his very first subscriber) and was completely shocked to see he had over 170 videos and over 50 subscribers.  Holy cow!  So I watched a few.  Heck, he even had advertising on them, which means he's making some money from it.  A few cents here and there add up over time.

And the swearing?  In the few videos I watched, I didn't hear a single one.

Now, I will not share his YouTube name nor provide a link to it as his audience and mine do not mix.  In looking at a Venn Diagram, our two audience circles, if they were to intersect, would barely touch each other.  If at all aside from yours truly.

My son has done exactly what I told him to do.  And that is exactly what I do with indie publishing.  I'm putting myself out there.  And so is he.  While he puts out daily content, he's also studying what others in the YouTube field are doing.  But he's not just studying the how's, he's putting it into action.  That is what puts him light years above and ahead of all of his classmates.

What content have you created?  If you have, what are you waiting for?  Put it out there.

Writing is fun / Happenings In The Outhouse 14-Oct-2016

Last week, I blogged about how I thought writers block was an excuse for being lazy.

I closed with the notion that writing is fun.

It is.  For me.  If you're not having fun, don't do it.  Do something that you do enjoy.  Woodworking?  Painting?  Working on an old car?  Collecting Star Wars toys?  Volunteering at the local animal shelter?

It's not all about money, but trust me when I say money is nice to have.  Try going without and you appreciate having it.

This is why I love indie publishing.  I can write what I want.  I have four novels in a thriller series, and, instead of working on the fifth book, I published a Halloween-themed novelette titled Grave Secrets and I'm roughly 16,000 words into a Christmas-themed family drama novel.

Afterwards, I'm going to finish the Shadowkill trilogy.  I wrote the first book a few years ago, and I want to close out the series when it appears that the genre is starting to get hot.

In the end, writing is fun.

Writers block is plain laziness / Happenings In The Outhouse 07-Oct-2016

**Forgive the slight profanity in this post here.**

Let me be frank and bold: writers block is a crock of shit.

Was that too bold?  Sorry, but it had to be said.  I was listening to a podcast last week and one of the topics they discussed was writers block.  I agreed with the interviewee, who said there really wasn't such a thing as writers block.  The interview, obviously, disagreed and tried to wallow his way out of the argument, but failed.

In my opinion, writers block is just plain lazy.

Don't agree.  Let's replace writing with . . . oh, let's say exercise.  "I have exercise block," one says.  No, you're just too damn lazy to get your ass out of the chair and walk or jog or lift weights or eat right or any number of things to help lose weight.

I have "eating right" block.  This is the same thing as exercise block, except it deals with food.  One is too damn lazy to NOT pop that pizza in the oven and just open a bag of lettuce.  Oh, hell, grow a few vegetables, if you are so inclined.

I have a crab apple tree in my yard, which has been producing results for the past two years.  I get excited during the late summer, because I can pluck something from a tree in my own yard and eat it.  Now, I agree that it's not cheap and easy to buy fresh veggies and fruit all the time, but then again it's not cheap and easy to get a heart attack and die!

Okay, back to writers block.  I'm currently 12,000 words into a new novel.  It's a Christmas-themed family drama.  It's a far cry from what I normally write, but I've been having loads of fun with it.  Do I write every single day?  No.  I've been keeping track of how much I write each day on a spreadsheet, and so far I've written about 75% of the days.

Some writers have replaced writing with researching.  Sorry, not the same thing.  Write original words.  For me, I re-read the last few pages, just to get a feel of what's going on and then away I go.  I write whatever comes to mind.  No over-analyzing or agonizing.  Just plain writing, hands on the keyboard.

Try it sometime.  Don't overthink it.  Write whatever comes to mind.  There's really no trick to it.  I know, there are tons of books on writing faster.  Sorry, but I think they're all bullshit.  Not a single one has helped me.  They're too gimmicky.

Banish the thought that you ever suffer from writers block.

Write.

And, most of all, have fun doing it.