Followup to Goals without a Plan

Yesterday, I wrote about goals without a plan is nothing more than a wish. In fact, I believe it’s more than that. It’s wishful thinking.

However, once you have the plan, you are already on the road to meeting your goals. For me, that’s the fun part. Taking the first step, then the next and then, the next one again. I’ve always believed that to reach the summit, you must put one foot in front of the other. Step over over the pebbles and eventually you’ll step over the stone, and eventually the mountain.

Earlier, I stumbled upon this followup quote.

“There’s no elevator to success. You have to take the stairs.”

Makes sense to me, despite that I wish that it were possible to jump ahead of the line and go right to the top.

No Elevator to SuccessThe image I’ve displayed shows the quote surrounded by a spiraling stair case. I can’t imagine how many steps it would take to climb that stair case and reach the top. Hundreds? Thousands?

However many there are, in real life, it takes much more to achieve our goals. My goals. I’ve spent decades learning, experiencing, and experimentation before deciding upon my goals. Some of my goals have fallen to the wayside in favor of newer, more interesting goals.

Do you know what I find if fun? Working on my goals, figuring them out and taking the steps to achieve them. For me, it’s sitting down in front of my computer and transcribing the dialog running through my head. It’s picking up a pencil or paint brush and putting it to paper or canvas. Adrenaline begins racing throughout my body. I’m excited and the imagery in my mind feeds off the adrenaline and suddenly, my fingers can’t move fast enough. Whether it’s typing on a keyboard or stroke after stroke of my pencil or brush, I pour my heart and soul into each creative work.

Years later, I can look at a painting I did, notice one of my books on the shelves and the excitement returns in an immeasurable instant. Every so often, I review Honey’s story in my book, The Taste of Honey, and I’m filled with joy, wonderment and concern. I want her to be saved. I want her to thrive. I know that she has a goal in mind and that goal will survive death. She’ll make it happen. She has a plan. You’ll see as you delve into her world along with her best friend, Mona Bendarova.

Damn, I love what I do. I hope you do and if you don’t, well that’s okay too. You’re welcome to your opinion. Who am I to tell you what to think. So, to conclude, I hope I can instill this one thought and it’s a motto I’ve lived with my entire life. As far as I can tell, no one else has said this and I’ve repeated the mantra in my head every day of my adult life, and I’ve been around a while. I would be interested in your comments and responses. Please send me a note. I’ll be happy to read them.

My personal motto is this.

“Nothing is impossible. Everything is possible. It’s all in the attitude.” – Richard Verry

Happy at the coming of spring.

I am waking up today to what promises to be a warm spring day. Can this winter really be over? Or, does old man winter have one more surprise in store for me? Whatever the weather, I’ll deal with it. In the meantime, I’m loving the weather.

In the meantime, I have work and projects to do. Spring cleanup of the yard, thinking about cutting the grass again, open the windows and clean the house. Yet, I can’t get away from the urge to write.

I have lots of ideas, scenes and scenarios to write down. They flood my brain. Between a full-time job and the stuff I need to do around the house, there is just not enough time in a day. The bed begins calling me before nine o’clock. WTF? Nine? Really? What happened to the days when I could be up to all hours of the night and be up and about in the morning.

For me, this is the strangest thing going on with me. Frankly, I don’t understand it. I know the years are going by, seemingly faster and faster. What happened to the days when summer vacation seemed to last forever?

What about the rest of you out there? Do you worry that you’ll find your days shortened by an urge to sleep? Are you already feeling it? Or, are you the kind of person who can stay up late and sleep late? Personally, I wish I could do that. Waking at five a.m. without the benefit of an alarm clock really pisses me off.

Brunette drinking coffee outdoor cafe
Hmm, good coffee, honey!

Let me know. Write me or comment on this page. I would love to know what you do, what you fear, and what you do to postpone inevitable change.

In the meantime, it’s time to join my girlfriend (who looks every sexy lying in bed waiting for me) for a cup of coffee and start the day.

Happy Spring everyone!

Please Shut Up! Huh?

I read a blog post this morning by author Delilah S. Dawson. I found it quite interesting and I think you will too. I encourage you to read it. Here’s the link to the post.

http://www.whimsydark.com/blog/2015/4/13/please-shut-up-why-self-promotion-as-an-author-doesnt-work

She writes about the difference in pushing a book upon the audience and pulling them to the book. She makes a lot of sense. It’s a lesson I am slowly learning. In reading her commentary, I couldn’t help but smile and agree. My social media feeds are full of book covers, promotions and statements that boil down to one message. BUY ME. Sorry, but like Delilah, I skip right over them as I scroll across my feeds. About the only time I stop and look is to study the message and see if there is something in it to pull me in. I’m usually disappointed and move on.

For me, the single most important line in Delilah’s post is:

“The recipe seems to be GREAT BOOK + HARD WORK + TIME + LUCK.”

I can control three out of four of them and I hope I am lucky enough to rise enough to be truly noticed.

I will be the first to admit, that I’m not very good budgeting my time with my writing. I spend way too much time screwing around trying to make a name for myself, promoting my stories and I am not spending enough time writing the stories that I really love. I have outlines for more than a dozen waiting to be written. Argggghhhhh.

I must do something about that. I need to get back to creative writing.

Case in point.

Until recently, I promoted my ‘Mona Bendarova Adventures’ much in the way Delilah hates. They didn’t sell. Watching their performance, I found that my efforts were wasted and might have even pushed my audience away from me. I pulled the promotions altogether.

Another series of books I wrote, ‘Her Client Trilogy’, sell well enough to make me smile. Sales are not fantastic, in fact, they are mediocre when compared to my favorite authors. Yet, to me, they make me happy. There’s not a day that goes by where I don’t seen multiple sales of the books. Whoo hoo!

The funny thing is, which surprises me to no end, I do no promotion of the books. They sell on many platforms, all over the world. What I know is that they are a product of ‘Hard Work’, a ‘Good Story’, and lots of ‘Time’ writing and polishing the stories.

I am still trying to figure out the formula. I suspect that as soon as I do, the formula will have already changed.

So, I’m going back to writing, creatively and writing what I love.

Inspiration from Mark Twain

I recently came across this quote from Mr. Clemens and it gave me pause to think. The more I thought about it, the more I realized that he is so right.

“The difference between the right word and the almost-right word is the difference between lightning and a lightning bug.” — Mark Twain

However, I find it difficult to find the right word at times. The thesaurus is my best friend. I keep it handy and refer to it many times as I write. I scour on-line versions as well as a printed copy. I jump from word to word searching for the right one.

And yet, after racking my brain, time and time again, I sometimes can’t find just the right word to convey the meaning I want. When I get stuck, I’ll ask those around me. Otherwise, I’ll tag it and put it off until later.

Does this happen to you? If so, what do you do to get around it? I would love to read your comments on this topic. In the meantime, have a great day and keep on writing!

You’ll forgive me

Silhouette of nude girlI woke up this morning at 4 am with scenes and dialog coursing throughout my brain. Ok, I was half asleep at the time but my mind was certainly active. Instead of rolling over, I got up and started writing.

And writing.

And writing.

I’m not sure when I’ll get to writing decent reviews but I will. I am just asking for a bit of time, maybe a couple of days so that I can get it all down. Good thing the first thing I did was take voluminous notes. Man, is Mona gonna have some fun in these new scenes in my book ‘Lucky Bitch’ which is getting oh so close to finishing. I can’t wait to see how it turns out.

In the meantime, have a great couple of days. I’ll touch base when I can. Thanks.

When I was a child

boy typingWhen I was a child, I remember going to school, learning my “A, B, C’s”, reading, writing and arithmetic. I remember dinner with Mom, Dad, and my sisters. I remember Saturday mornings hanging out by myself. I remember coming home from school and playing, watching TV, hanging out and doing homework. How much I dreaded homework.

The other day, I had a revelation. I realized that what I learned back then, I’m applying each and every time I write an article posted on this blog. I realized I am writing a 300-600 word essay, each time I write a post.

This revelation brought me back to my childhood when I dreaded writing similar essays in school. I remember the basic structure and objective of the essay writing process. Back in those days, I had zero intention of doing this on a regular basis. Even after the internet came along followed by social media, I never intended on doing this, let alone every day.

Yet, here I am, writing a new essay each day, day after day. Huh? How did I ever get here. Well, if you will indulge me, let me tell you.

A couple of years ago, out of a desire to get this story idea I had in my head out of my head, I wrote a book. That book, ‘The Taste of Honey’, eventually got published. The Taste of HoneyThat started the ball rolling and now I have six published books, another in editing and another in development. I also have at least a dozen storylines written out waiting for free slices of time in my day to pump them out. I’ve hired a publicist to help me expand my exposure.

Whoa? A publicist? Yup, that’s right. I’ve hired a publicist and slowly, I’m going from being in the red to being in the black. Ink that is. To expand my brand. Oops, my brand? My ‘name’ is my brand? Apparently so but I digress. I’m told that if I am to expand my brand, I need to talk about it, my books and things that are of interest to me but more importantly, of interest to my followers. And yes, I now have followers. A lot in fact but she tells me that I need more. To get more, I need to blog, daily.

At first, when she told me that, I thought it would be easy. What’s 300 to 600 words? That’s nothing, compared to my novels which number in the tens or hundreds of thousands of words.

Now, after doing this for several months, it’s not so simple. To come up with a fresh thought or idea that would be of interest to others each and every day. That’s hard. This is work. Hard work and I have to think outside the box. I have to come up with original ideas and work them down to just a few hundred words.

Documenting facts and figures.I’m not composing an article of random thoughts, flushing incoherent crap from my brain. I’m composing an essay, focusing on a single subject with an objective supported by facts, informed opinion or data. Essays that I learned how to write in school decades ago are now articles posted on my blog. In some ways, I feel like I’m a reporter for a newspaper. Techniques that I learned a long time ago and went unused, unexercised and unpracticed for more than forty years are now being forced into use. Ouch.

I can tell I’m getting better at writing these articles. I’ve made mistakes and I’ll make more. They say ‘practice makes perfect’. Well, I’ll never be perfect but that doesn’t mean I won’t try. I’m more determined than ever to work hard and perfect my skills. My novels are what drive me and I want them to be successful.

As I finish this essay, I would like to close with this thought. Here I am, writing another one and I am very curious.

How am I doing? Am I meeting your needs or couldn’t you care less?  I would love feedback and constructive criticism. I look forward to reading your comments. Thank you in advance for your precious time in reading this article.

This is Richard Verry, writing to you live from Rochester, NY. I trust you will have an awesome day.

Normal? What is normal?

Do you consider yourself ‘Normal’?

Of course I do. I feel that I am the most normal guy one could meet.

Sometimes, my girlfriend has a different opinion. From reading, editing to discussing my books and novellas, she thinks I’m something different. I suppose and hope that is why she likes me. Just to remind everyone, we’ve been together for over twelve years.

Having said all that, let’s get back to the question. I spoke recently about the imagery that flies around in my head all day. I suppose that makes me different, since I am convinced that most others don’t have those experiences yet abnormal? No way!

Webster’s Dictionary defines normal as:

  1. a: according with, constituting, or not deviating from a norm, rule, or principle
    b: conforming to a type, standard, or regular pattern
  2. occurring naturally <normal immunity>
  3. a: of, relating to, or characterized by average intelligence or development
    b: free from mental disorder

Open bookWhen I compare myself to Webster, if there is any question, then by definition, I am normal. While I am unique, I also personally know hundreds of people and by extrapolation, millions who think like me and enjoy similar interests as I do and follow the same shows, hobbies and genres. In so many ways I conform to standards and patterns that society expects of me. I work for a living, pay my taxes, maintain my own home, take the garbage out and enjoy a daily shower. That last is really important.

My mother carried and delivered me naturally, though she told me later that I almost killed her as I wanted to come out sideways. She tells me that they had to push me back in, turn me around before delivering me. Does that make me abnormal? No, I don’t believe so. Breech births do happen. Of what I know now, if I was born more than a hundred years ago, neither me, mom or my sisters might not be around. Medicine back then wouldn’t be equipped to handle the difference from a normal birth.

psychiatric hospitalAm I categorized as of having average intelligence? I think so. I definitely know that there are people smarter than myself and others who are not. That makes me normal.

That leaves ‘free of mental disorder’. That’s a subjective term in so … many ways. While I know that there is scientific, medical definitions of various mental disorders, no one has ever accused or diagnosed me of having one.

I can only conclude I am normal. What about you? Do you consider yourself normal? If so, why? If not, really? I want to hear from you. Perhaps I can turn your story into a book. We should chat. You can use the comment section below to get started. I would so enjoy hearing your story.

Under the weather – followup

Under the weather – followup

Yesterday, I wrote about my month-long cold/whatever it is/was. However, since I wrote about my ills over the last month, I feel the need to write a followup.

Most important of all is … thank you for all of the kind words sent to me wishing me get well soon. I really appreciate them. It means a lot to me. I don’t normally like to write or talk about health related issues. Normally, it’s no ones business. To demonstrate how I feel about that, when I broke my leg a 15 years ago, I didn’t tell a soul. Even though I was living alone at the time, I kept that private. That’s life and I dealt with it.

As I wrote yesterday, I did go see the doctor and go through several tests. Doc tells me that I am presenting a very strange case, one that doesn’t seem to fit normal progressions of winter colds and flu. Yes, I did get my flu shot this year. The tests came back either negative or within normal ranges. So, no help there other than discount the norms.

So, what’s going on?

No one knows. She suspects that I am the victim of serial multiple cold or other viral infections. She suspects that this is the case as each one, taken along presents differently and is treated differently.

Today, I am feeling much better. She’s put me on a new stronger regime of antibiotics, which seems to be doing the trick. And while I’ve heard this before, I am crossing my fingers. I plan on returning to work tomorrow. And after that, get back to writing. Whoo hoo!

 

I have a long way to go to finish up my next novel, ‘Lucky Bitch’, the third book in the Mona Bendarova Adventures. Time to buckle down and get writing.

Wow! I’m a serial victim? Sounds interesting. It could even an idea for a book or story. I’ll have to give it some thought.

4

Under the weather – followup

Under the weather – followup

Yesterday, I wrote about my month-long cold/whatever it is/was. However, since I wrote about my ills over the last month, I feel the need to write a followup.

Most important of all is … thank you for all of the kind words sent to me wishing me get well soon. I really appreciate them. It means a lot to me. I don’t normally like to write or talk about health related issues. Normally, it’s no ones business. To demonstrate how I feel about that, when I broke my leg a 15 years ago, I didn’t tell a soul. Even though I was living alone at the time, I kept that private. That’s life and I dealt with it.

As I wrote yesterday, I did go see the doctor and go through several tests. Doc tells me that I am presenting a very strange case, one that doesn’t seem to fit normal progressions of winter colds and flu. Yes, I did get my flu shot this year. The tests came back either negative or within normal ranges. So, no help there other than discount the norms.

So, what’s going on?

No one knows. She suspects that I am the victim of serial multiple cold or other viral infections. She suspects that this is the case as each one, taken along presents differently and is treated differently.

Today, I am feeling much better. She’s put me on a new stronger regime of antibiotics, which seems to be doing the trick. And while I’ve heard this before, I am crossing my fingers. I plan on returning to work tomorrow. And after that, get back to writing. Whoo hoo!

 

I have a long way to go to finish up my next novel, ‘Lucky Bitch’, the third book in the Mona Bendarova Adventures. Time to buckle down and get writing.

Wow! I’m a serial victim? Sounds interesting. It could even an idea for a book or story. I’ll have to give it some thought.

3

Under the weather – followup

Under the weather – followup

Yesterday, I wrote about my month-long cold/whatever it is/was. However, since I wrote about my ills over the last month, I feel the need to write a followup.

Most important of all is … thank you for all of the kind words sent to me wishing me get well soon. I really appreciate them. It means a lot to me. I don’t normally like to write or talk about health related issues. Normally, it’s no ones business. To demonstrate how I feel about that, when I broke my leg a 15 years ago, I didn’t tell a soul. Even though I was living alone at the time, I kept that private. That’s life and I dealt with it.

As I wrote yesterday, I did go see the doctor and go through several tests. Doc tells me that I am presenting a very strange case, one that doesn’t seem to fit normal progressions of winter colds and flu. Yes, I did get my flu shot this year. The tests came back either negative or within normal ranges. So, no help there other than discount the norms.

So, what’s going on?

No one knows. She suspects that I am the victim of serial multiple cold or other viral infections. She suspects that this is the case as each one, taken along presents differently and is treated differently.

Today, I am feeling much better. She’s put me on a new stronger regime of antibiotics, which seems to be doing the trick. And while I’ve heard this before, I am crossing my fingers. I plan on returning to work tomorrow. And after that, get back to writing. Whoo hoo!

 

I have a long way to go to finish up my next novel, ‘Lucky Bitch’, the third book in the Mona Bendarova Adventures. Time to buckle down and get writing.

Wow! I’m a serial victim? Sounds interesting. It could even an idea for a book or story. I’ll have to give it some thought.