Tag: growth

Genuine Connections Will Take You Places Money Won’t

Since we live in a capitalist society, money is the first thing we think about when wanting to go places or do something, and if we don’t have the money, we become hopeless.

And I get it. You need money for everything. Not even a charity can run without funding. What kind of society makes it so you can’t even help people without money?

However, there are two other things we have that can make things easier:

  • Our mind
  • Our connections

Many people ask me about my self-publishing journey, and I can tell you it has been challenging. Nothing about self-publishing is easy, even now. However, what has made it easier is my connections with other people.

December, 30, 2017

When we first moved to Georgia, my husband and I visited the Nubian bookstore in Morrow. Every two weeks or so, we would buy books until we developed a relationship with the owner Marcus. As two nerds, we had no other agenda but to buy as many books as our wallets could afford and our arms could carry.

Two months later, I asked Marcus how I could get my own books into his store. (It had not occurred to me before then.)

To my surprise, we worked out a consignment deal on the spot and put my books on the shelf.

Then, he told me about the Medu Bookstore in Atlanta and referred me to Nia. I submitted I am Soul, which had to go through a review process. 

This is why…editing.

June 13, 2018

A couple weeks later, I got the call that I had passed the review board, and just like that, I was in two bookstores.

While hosting a book signing, I met a guy who told me there was a Barnes and Noble that accepts self-published books. He said I should check it out. I did, and a few moves later, I was in B&N.

Of all the advice I’ve ever given, this is probably the most important:

Building genuine connections and relationships with people can take you places money won’t.

It will allow you to skip steps you would otherwise have taken.

June 16, 2021

Once I am Soul passed the review board, The Women with Blue Eyes didn’t have to go through them to get on the shelves because they trusted me to deliver high-quality work.

In this season, instead of mindlessly scrolling social media, consider ways of leveraging your connections for more growth.

Something to think about.

Check out more Indie Author Basics Here

Embracing the Beauty of Unhurriedness

Photo by Lisa Fotios

We might be at the start of a new year, but it is still the dead of winter. Everything else in nature is still resting and storing strength for the spring. By then, the grass will turn green again, and new life will erupt from what I call the real new year: when everything in nature renews and is reborn.

I cannot help but wonder why we, as people from the earth, aren’t more like it. Why do we feel the need to rush ourselves through life? What would happen if we took five to six months to rest, plan, strategize, pray, meditate, and think? What kind of wisdom would we cultivate in this space of solitude? How much more impact would we make if we were well-rested and revitalized instead of busy and drained?

I think of this as I return from my break and continue my work. Except for this year, that work includes rest and joy. I’m not panicked or anxious about letting people know what I am up to or doing. I am not swayed by what others are doing on social media or concerned about needing to do more because I recognize I am not behind or late. I am where I need to be, and the things I need to get done will get done, each in its own time.

I am excited about the future in ways I have not been before because stepping back and slowing down will help me be laser-focused on one thing at a time, which will help me accomplish more.

In no way do I intend to be booked and busy this year. I’d instead be paid and productive because productivity includes rest.

In this season, I am embracing the beauty of unhurriedness.

No Whining Wednesday: Force Nothing

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Welcome back to another episode of No Whining Wednesday! Today, you cannot whine, criticize, or complain.

If you are new to this blog or new to this segment please visit the NWW page here for past episodes.

I am aware there was no NWW episode last week. It is because I did not have a word to give. And I would rather say nothing than to speak just for the sake of speaking. In the words of Obbie West, the poet, “speaking just for the sake of speaking is the same as being silent.”

I almost didn’t post anything today either.

But as I thought about this series, why I created it, and why its existence is necessary, forcing things came to my mind.

IMG-6546(1)We know we cannot force things to happen, but we try to anyway. It is like we are fascinated by the chase. When we cannot get what we want when we want it, we whine and complain because we feel we failed to make it happen.

We stress ourselves out over things we cannot control. We become upset that we cannot force it as much as we try.

It is not until we let go that things happen as they were always intended to. Ever noticed that it starts to move as soon as you forget about something?

Think about misplacing something. It can literally be right in your face as you tear the house apart. Only when you calm down, relax, and focus on something else that you see that thing sitting on the table.

You think, “How in the world did I miss this? I’ve looked at that table four times!”

Or did you?

You looked at the table, but did you see what was on it? 

People are fascinated by my locs. They want to know what products I use, what my routine is, and how in the heck I got my hair to grow down my back.

These conversations are fun, especially for women. We get to giggle and be girly about products and things.

But the only honest answer to this question is nothing. I don’t do anything to my hair.

Of course, I wash it, oil it, and all that good stuff, but for the most part, I leave it alone, and it grows wildly.

Sometimes, you just need to leave that situation alone. Don’t complain about it, don’t stress about it. Don’t even think about it. Stop trying to force the revelations to come. What will be, will be.

So let it be.

No Whining Wednesday: Humility

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Welcome back to another episode of No Whining Wednesday! Today, you cannot whine, criticize, or complain.

If you are new to this blog or new to this segment please visit the NWW page here for past episodes.

Today’s inspiring word comes from Katerina Stoykova Klemer:

In my opinion, confidence is liking yourself. As simple as that may sound, the act of liking ourselves is not always easy. It means appreciating who we are as a person while being humble enough to know that we have strengths and weaknesses. I think low self-worth, however, is focusing only on our flaws and not liking anything about ourselves.

The tricky part is that arrogance is liking ourselves too, but it’s also thinking everyone else should like us. While humility makes us more empathetic to the struggles of others, arrogance makes us more judgemental.

That’s why this quote is so powerful to me, and honestly, I am still meditating on it. As someone who has struggled with low self-esteem, I am always thinking about ways to keep a good balance of confidence and humility.

It makes me think about this series because, in my experience, not being a complainer requires a level of humility. It takes humility to support other people, admit to our own flaws, and accept correction.

I also think of appreciation. When we appreciate something and allow that to show in our actions, we display a form of humility. I believe this makes us more grateful, secure, and less stressed.

If enduring struggle (in whatever form that may be) does not make us more appreciative, then I would predict we will continue to suffer until we have learned whatever lesson life is trying to teach us. Sometimes, by worrying and being anxious, we make situations worse.

Humility helps us surrender the need to control every outcome and strengthen our faith that things will work out as intended.

No Whining Wednesday: Celebrate Yourself

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Welcome back to another episode of No Whining Wednesday! Today, you cannot whine, criticize, or complain.

If you are new to this blog or new to this segment please visit the NWW page here for past episodes.

Today’s inspiring word comes from Michell C. Clark:

I needed to see this quote the other day as I found myself complaining more than usual. Wednesdays have gotten a lot more peaceful for me since I started this series, but I still complain on the other days like the rest of us humans.

The source of my complaint was about the struggle that comes with being a Self-Published author in today’s world. Being an independent artist, in general, is always a challenge. While it’s a challenge I chose to pursue, it does make me sad to struggle for exposure when authors published by traditional publishers release books to citywide book tours and New York Times Best Sellers list. Not to confuse my melancholy at these revelations for a desire to be traditionally published, though I see nothing wrong with it. I am just a woman hoping to make a difference with her work in a way that transcends social media.

“A lot of people won’t celebrate you until your wins feel “big” enough for them.”

I pondered the many ways we do this in society–from rushing out to buy a book recommended by Oprah to not supporting our friends’ “little” business until it becomes a “big” business. There are, sadly, tons of ways we ignore people because it doesn’t seem like what they are doing is a big deal.

“But you can celebrate yourself now. You can be proud of every step you take and every sacrifice you make.”

This is why I post about getting into bookstores and such. It is not to be braggadocious or even make it seem like I am “doing it big,” whatever that means. I do it because I learned years ago the importance of celebrating all wins, not just the ones deemed significant in the eyes of the world.

I have a hope that one day I will not have to count the stores housing my books because they will be everywhere. That vision starts with appreciating where it is now. I know Indie Authors want to be a #1 Amazon Best Seller, but I don’t care much about that. All this online stuff is cool, but I am striving to carve a space out in the real world too.

“And you won’t need other people’s applause to be proud of how far you’ve come.”

This part reminds me of the saying, “you have today what you once prayed for,” or something like that. I don’t remember exactly how it is worded, but it always brings me back. Not only is someone praying for the life you have now, but you once prayed for it too! Isn’t that amazing?

The more we learn to celebrate ourselves, the less discouraged we will be when others don’t see our value, and the less dependent we are on the need to have them acknowledge us.

Today, celebrate yourself. You deserve it even if no one else knows it but you.

PS. I celebrated myself by ordering an expensive Veggie Delight Burger I wouldn’t usually buy but that I had been lusting after for a while. Today, I decided I deserved it. The world will not end if I pay a few extra dollars to eat what I want.

No Whining Wednesday: Gratitude and Faith

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Welcome back to another episode of No Whining Wednesday! Today, you cannot whine, criticize, or complain.

If you are new to this blog or new to this segment please visit the NWW page here for past episodes.

I don’t have much to write to you today, but I want to share this quote with you. I hope it will inspire you as it did me.

Gratitude and faith are such a great balance to me. One requires that we appreciate all we have, and the other challenges us to believe that what we do not yet have is on the way. We can be both content and consistently striving for better at the same time. This contentment does not become complacency, and this striving does not diminish our humility and appreciation for what is.

When waking up with gratitude and laying down with faith, what is there to complain about?

No Whining Wednesday – You Are Inherently Worthy

NWW(1)

Welcome back to another episode of No Whining Wednesday! Today, you cannot whine, criticize, or complain.

If you are new to this blog or new to this segment please visit the NWW page here for past episodes.

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How other people view you is not a measurement of your worthiness. Both online and off, good decision or bad decision, right or wrong, your value does not change.

A Quick Story.

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When I first moved to Georgia in 2017, I enrolled in Argosy University, Atlanta. This was before Covid, so I had on and offline classes. In one of my campus classes, we always did these exercises. In one activity, we were talking about hot personality, cold personality, and warm. We had to say which one we thought we were and why. A few of my classmates mentioned I was cold. This perplexed me because we had not known each other that long. When they said it, most of the class agreed.

I went home feeling down. Their words had seeped into my soul, and I questioned what made them think I was a cold-hearted person. Had I done something to them? Did I offend anyone? Had they heard something about me?

Then, I thought back to my childhood and realized this wasn’t anything new. I remember being told my twin would be a bride for Halloween and that I would be the devil. As a kid, I remembered thinking, “the devil?”

I laugh at it now, but it affected my self-esteem and how I thought of myself back then. This was not the only time, someone had also decided I would be a witch years prior. “A witch?” I remembered thinking. It was weird to me because my sister was some kind of animal. If we are twins, why am I a witch and she’s a cute kitten?

I was always referred to as “the mean twin,” and it affected how I felt about myself.

Going home after that class made me think of all these things, and I questioned if I was a good person.

know-your-self-worth-quotes

What I’ve realized since then is how we tend to tie our self-worth to other people. We look at the way others perceive us, and we measure ourselves up to that image. That person doesn’t like me, so I am not a good person, or that person admires me, so I am a good person. This is especially true in the age of social media. This person I admire didn’t like my post, so I guess it wasn’t a good post, or this person did like it, so I guess it was good.

All of this is a lie.

The same worthiness you have when people think highly of you, or when you are winning and making the right choices, and being the best version of yourself is the same worthiness you still have when people think of you in a negative light, when you make mistakes, or when you are not your best self.

There is one truth, and it is the only truth that matters:

You are inherently worthy.

This worth does not need to be earned or won or acknowledged to exist. You have value and purpose the moment you enter this world. As the scripture says, “before I formed you in your mother’s belly I knew you, and I did set you apart.” (Jer. 1:5)

How other people perceive this set-apartness does not determine if it exists. It is there and was there from the very beginning.