| Last week I talked about how everything changes, even language.
This week I want to talk about being at a crossroads and how to navigate that phase of creativity and of life.
I have a confession to make. I reset almost daily and sometimes multiple times a day.
What this often looks like:
I look up from working on a project. An hour has gone by and I feel drained. What was I just doing? A feeling of disorientation descends and I feel like I just wasted an hour.
But actually I haven't. I remind myself how what I was doing (maybe research reading lots of articles for my next novel and the ones after that) connects to my greater goal.
What greater goal?
I literally have to remind myself how what I was doing connects to my bigger goals.
What do I want? I ask myself.
I want... my energy dips as I search for the answer. I feel bummed the answer isn't right in front of me. (I should have it right in front of me.)
Should. Smould.
What do I want?
I want... to be sharing my stories with the world, stories of empowerment. And -- I want to be supporting writers achieve their dreams.
Simple and yet so complicated.
Once I reconnect to what I want, I take a deep breath and feel my body. Breath and feelings help ground me in the present moment.
The present moment is where my power is, where all our power is, I remind myself.
Now that I feel grounded, I can look outward and wonder:
How can I support you?
I'm at a crossroads in my business.
I still want to empower writers with my courses on writing, editing, and marketing.
And, my offerings are also shifting toward helping creative entrepreneurs vision and create their business on their own terms.
This focus includes fiction writers.
The moment we decide to publish and share our stories we're entering into a relationship with readers who want to buy our stories. This kind of exchange we call business.
Trade has functioned as a way we humans cross-pollinate ideas and goods for millennia.
When did business get divorced from art? Why can't doing business be artful, on one's own artistic terms? Why does business need to be painful?
I actually want my business at all levels to feel as delicious as it does when I'm creating my stories.
To sink into the storytelling trance, I need to be aligned with my heart and my senses. As I write and edit my novels, I need to synched up with the story vision and with my characters.
Why can't being in business be like that deep connection between mind, body, heart, and soul?
I want to take a stand for being in business as being artful, heart-connected, and a win-win for all involved.
We've been trained by our culture to see commerce as exploitative, power over, and extractive.
To be clear, so you get a sense of where I'm coming from, I speak as an American, a Westerner, and someone rooted in a family history of rebel artists, Communists, Eastern European Jewish immigrants, English and Irish freedom fighters and religious conservatives, slave holders, slave liberators, feminists, teachers, working class, land holders, and gypsies.
I also speak as a woman in a male-dominated culture and as a person born with a disability in a culture that seems to value plastic perfection.
Lastly, I speak as a humanist, futurist, and a prepare-for-the-worst / hope-for-the-best type.
All this to say, let us remake our economy by the way we show up in our exchanges.
Let's be kind. Let's be real and speak the truth. Let's accept all emotions. Let's be respectful. Let's have strong boundaries and stand up for ourselves and those who can't stand up for themselves. Let's be hopeful. Let's be generous when we can be. Let's be compassionate, first toward ourselves and then towards others. Let's be curious and discerning, open and rooted, playful, even joyful. Let's be grateful. Let's be in the present moment.
These are many of the way I want to explore being in business with you.
If you'd like to explore that with me, let me know.
I am open to the conversation. I'm curious to know what you want, what you want business to be like.
Reach out and let me know what you need.
Let's evolve together.
You can also schedule a 1-1 call here:
While I continue to share my self-paced courses at Barany School of Fiction, work 1-1 with clients, run our Group Coaching Program for Novelists, and craft courses for clients, and offer our annual 60-Day Novel course (enrollment will open in Aug/Sept), I'm looking to expand into more collaborations.
Reach out via email or schedule a chat here and let's explore what we can create together. | 
