I know I still owe you Part Two of The Most Pathetic things
I Did To Save My Marriage, but after the frustrating week I have had (coming to
terms with the difficult realities of e-publishing books from Canada), I wanted
to write something more upbeat and inspiring, something to remind myself why I
need to jump the hurdles necessary to make the e-book thing happen.
Anyone who knows me knows I am passionate about writing. I
have only recently started putting myself out there, but my love of writing was
discovered back in the year 2000. My ex and I lived in Vancouver at the time
(for his career) and I was not working.
One day he said, “You should write a book. I bet you would
be good at it.” I kind of laughed at the idea but it stuck with me. A couple
days later I got out a pen and paper and started writing. To my surprise, I
found myself with some characters and the start of a storyline. I got excited.
It was a murder plot. My ex joked that it was him I killed off in the opening scene.
I wrote a four hundred-page novel and I felt like I had accomplished the world.
When we moved back to Ontario in 2002, it was obvious that I
had officially found love in writing, so my ex suggested that I take a night
course to polish my skills. What
the class taught me was that I had no antagonist, no protagonist, and no story
arcs. In other words, it taught me how to format chapters of a novel. It also
helped me to develop a critique group who constructively edited my writing.
I scrapped the story I wrote in Vancouver, but I was undeterred. I was looking forward to applying what
I had learned to my craft. I came up with new stories. My poor husband was
forced to sit through hours and hours of me talking on and on and on about the
research I was doing for my stories.
My ex has always been an entrepreneur at heart. He always
pushed through the obstacles and past his comfort zone to do whatever necessary
to be successful while I always held on to what I perceived to be a healthy
dose of fear (for the both of us). Hence the reason he is out there being
successful pursuing his dream and I am only now stepping up to the plate.
The divorce threw my writing into disarray for two years as
I got my life back in order, but I am fortunate to have found another man who
encourages my writing, going so far as to read and critique it (something my
ex, although supportive, never did). And I have managed to come back stronger.
You have to be passionate about what you are doing. And you
have to believe in yourself. You need to believe that you deserve the successes
you dream of. If you live in fear, if you live with self-doubt, you will never
believe that you are good enough, and if you don’t believe you’re good enough,
why would anybody else think you are?
I know my writing is good. I have no doubt I will find
success, and for that reason, I cannot let a not-so-little thing like getting
an American Tax Exemption number get in the way of putting myself out there.
My ex will always be the first person who ever believed in
my writing. Heck, he believed in it before I did. He was the one telling the
world I was a writer way before I was ever ready to tell even my closest
family. There is no rewriting history. And that is why my upcoming novel ‘6
Divorces’ (still in early first draft re-writes) is already (cryptically)
dedicated to him.
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