A year older - and maybe wiser...

It's almost a year since I last wrote on this blog. A busy year - some good, some not so great. All of it engaging in the day to day struggle we call life.




I know you know what I mean.




I have a good life - a great life in many respects. I won't challenge "worse" - I'll smile and be thankful for what blessings I've accumulated. I'll bow my head and work harder to overcome the challenges I'm capable of facing. I'll turn away and not burden myself with challenges I have no influence over.




The past year saw me reunited with my brother and separated from a family member by the ultimate distance - death. It brought a promotion at my Day Job, and a complete lack of progress in my avocation as an author. The year has definitely had it's ups and downs, highs and lows, gives and givebacks.




So, what's new? Doesn't every year present us with the challenging cycle of progress and failure? I think so - and I think a lot of how we perceive these events depends both on the degree of each as well as the support system or network around us.




I mentioned before - mainly in SM - that last year felt terribly hard to me, for no specific reason. And I realize now that I had closed myself off from a lot of the friends, family and followers I had previously relied on to sustain me through the hard times.




I doubt that I'm unique in this - I think we all crawl into our tiny shells from time to time, rock back and forth and wail "woe is me." It's how long we allow ourselves to stay in that shell, how loudly we wail and whether we find the strength to crawl back out that is the true indicator of our personal strength.




I think I'm pretty strong. In fact, I know I am. I just keep getting up and plowing forward in a relentless pursuit of progress.


Want to help? Well, last year I posted this on the economic of Indie publishing... I hope you read it. It was an honest discussion of fact and finance, and it's important. Every independent author is, in fact, a small business. We support a multitude of other small business in every transaction with editors, copy editors, formatters, cover designers, swag fabricators, etc. Collectively, we have a significant impact on our economy, and yet we gain very little from each book sold. Not to mention the fact that Authors are facing more book pirating than ever before. And we face a constant barrage of readers begging for free books, and berating us when we don't provide them.


So, in response, I ask simply that you share this article, educate your friends and family on the real cost of those books they download from a "free" site, and understand that free books are available at library's, where authors at least get some recognition and reimbursement for use or download.