Wednesday, June 26, 2013

The Art of Letting Go

Sometimes it feels as though the past has the hem of my dress in its grasp and is holding me back. I mean, there's slight movement. I'm inching along, there is forward motion, but it's a struggle. The past has so much power. Okay, yeah, I know it only has the power I give it and life is all about the now, but it's a lie to pretend it dosn't matter. Because it's a part of us. It brought us to this moment. Surely, we shouldn't let it hinder us, but to pretend it isn't important seems a bit ridiculous.

Am I talking complete nonesense?

And so, here begins the art of letting go. It takes time and is different for everyone.

There's something odd about knowing you must let go. Wanting to. But simply not being able to pull the trigger. Imagine what you want to let go of, let's say it's hurting someone you love, it's a ball in your hand. You're standing there, at the edge of a cliff, this orb of guilt and shame and sadness sitting on your palm. And you release it. But it's stuck there. It won't leave you, no matter how many times you shake your hand or blow it off.

I spend time thinking through the things I've done. The people I have hurt. Mistakes I've made. At times, I think I'm doing a good job. I confront my fear. Mend my fences. Forage friendships from the ashes of a relationship I thought would be my last. Things seem okay.

Then I'm bending over at work, stooping to sweep up a pile of hair off the floor, and I'm thrown back five years ago. Or three. Two. And there are tears in my eyes, and that unnegotionable headache pinching between my brows.

Sadness ebbs and flows. I can actually feel it washing through me and leaving again, like it is a living breathing creature. These emotions aren't necessarily a bad thing, but they can surprise me, because they are ones I fooled myself into thinking I let go off. Set free. Come to terms with.They aren't supposed to come back and knock the wind from me.

The question is there, it's bothering me, prodding me.

Why does it still hurt?

Is it because I haven't let go? Or have I, and I simply won't forget? Can you let something go, only to have it come back to you for a random visit in the middle of a grey Wednesday? There is that saying about how if you love something you set it free and if it comes back it is meant to be. Or whatever.

Does that apply to hurts and mistakes and residual feelings of guilt?

I don't know.

All I know is this letting go business is more difficult than anyone lets on. It's a process. A journey.

Not something done overnight after a cleansing meditation session and a crisp apple. At least that's what I thought it entaild. How wrong I was.

Saturday, June 15, 2013

Cars & Girls

For some strange and inexplicable reason, I haven't announced the release of Cars & Girls here.

This raging romp of a read is highly important to me because I have a short in it. The novel was released by Pankhearst, an independent collective, and features four nearly novella length stories all centring around revenge and badass women.

Word on the street is it's all about femme noir. And is incredibly sexy and violent.

Because I also write a few things for the Pankhearst blog, located here, I sometimes forget my friends, followers and fans in this realm need to be kept in the loop. So, first thing first...

If you want to follow an awesome, and I do mean awesome, blog and get a butt load of fantastic information, sign up and follow the Pankhearst blog.

Second, if you are interested in buying Cars & Girls, you can find it on Amazon, or you can click this link. It's available in Kindle and paperback. Choose whichever pleases you.

And last, if you want to try to snag yourself a FREE copy of Cars & Girls, then you should invest your time and energy into the very first ever Thisisnotagiveaway Contest Pankhearst is holding over on their blog. It starts Sunday night at 12:01am. Basically, you write a crime/noir themed Haiku. Details can be seen here.

Oh, and if you want to hear my voice talk about this book, I am featured on For Books' Sake's podcast. CLICK HERE.

Here I am holding the new book:

Wednesday, June 12, 2013

Jon Snow & I

We have a lot in common, Jon Snow and I.
 
Curly, flowing locks.
A true Northerner.
Undeniable loyalty.
 
I am a bastard.

And I also know nothing. 
 
Granted, I would never wear the black.
Giving up sex is out of the question.
 
A little tribute to the pretty faced Snow.
And his permanent pout.

Wednesday, June 5, 2013

Quitting Is For Quitters

On a whim, I decided to go through all the blogs I follow. As it turns out, everyone and their mother has a blog and apparently I was diligently following them. The list mostly consisted of other wannabe-authors like me. Men and women toiling away, churning out blogs about their journeys, posting articles about writing and editing and just awesome life events and crap that is important to them.

Oh, wait, hold on.

While the blogs I followed were mostly other writers, they certainly weren't posting anything. This blew my mind. Not literally, just figuratively. Out of the 127 witty blogs with wonderful play-on-word titles, only thirty of them were still active. Most of them hadn't had posts in months and a lot years!

Now, I know how this works. Some of these blogs had been abandoned for new blogs, and I simply wasn't given the memo, but most of them were left out in the rain, much like that cake in that song. But, but, but, the abandoned blog owners will say. Everyone has reasons, right? Reason why they didn't write. Reasons why they didn't respond. Reasons, reasons, reasons. We are full of them.

Alright, I can sympathize. There are dry spells. When you're moving or birthing a child into this world, you can go months without posting but still have the intention of returning to your virtual stomping ground to deliver amazing content to the boys and girls following your blogs. You might be sitting there, baby on teat, thinking about all the things you want to say.

But those people are the exception, not the rule.

As I axed the inactive blogs out of my list of worthy reads, I picked out over seventy people who hadn't moved, gotten married, or pushed a child into this world. What is their excuse?

They are quitters.

Plain and simple.

Surely that's going to ruffle a few feathers. As it should. No one wants to be considered a quitter. But it doesn't matter how you cut it. Quitting is for quitters. And if you have a blog you haven't posted on since last fall. You're a quitter. I don't care how good your intentions are. That baby is out there floating in the blog abyss, cold, hungry and wondering what it did to drive you away.

Don't you love it when I personify a blog? I do.

Some of these crappy blog owners might say they ran out of things to write about. I've heard it before. No really. I have.

If that's the case, perhaps the whole writing thing isn't for you. Because, let me tell you, even when my wells run a bit dry, there's still water seeping in through the cracks in the foundation. The soil is always moist, if you know what I mean. Granted, I completely understand if you don't. It was a weird analogy. I think the point is - you should always have something to say.

Simply put, people give up. Sure, I am only talking about blogs here, and maybe they don't seem important to you, but if you can't muster enough creativity or energy to post a blog once a week then how the heck are you going to stay on top of marketing your book or responding to your readers.

Think about it this way. All these people out there who start a blog, write a book, self publish, sell ten copies, don't achieve the staggering famedom they were anticipating and just throw the towel in. It kind of terrifies me to think of how saturated Amazon is with these types of cases.

But people don't read my blog, the quitters moan.

Boo-hoo!

Perhaps you're putting boring as dirt posts out into the world. Or maybe you aren't utilizing tags. There might even be a chance your really crappy at networking. Comments and views and reads ebb and flow depending on the time of day you post to what it is you're writing about. Word on the street is that twenty thousand people start a blog each day. (Those numbers seem a bit high these days, but as we know humans are extremely opinionated) With those numbers, it's hard to fathom making a splash in that sort of a pool, right? I get it. I understand.

But here is how I think about this whole writing into the blog abyss. It's practice.

Practice for when my seven figure deal comes rolling in. All I am doing is showing the world I have drive and tenacity. That I am not going anywhere. No matter how few of views on my vlog, reads on my blog, or likes I get on my sardonic but ingenious Facebook updates, I am sticking around. Because this is what I want to do. This is my passion.

I ain't no quitter.

That said, I cannot guarantee the content posted here will always blow your socks off. But it will most of the time. Blogging is work. Whoever told you otherwise was lying.

Oh, yeah, I've decided to delete blogs off my reading list if they go a month or longer without posting. It's a harsh rule, I know, but maybe this will motivate some people to actually start taking this social media, blogging, virtual crap seriously.