Friday Food for Thought: Success Is What You Make of It

Well, the good news keeps pouring in. Not only does this upcoming week kick off our celebration of An Empty Cup with lots of fun posts, video, and even a surprise guest or two, but we also get to celebrate the big news that I have just received another wonderful book contract from one of my publishers!

The thrill never gets old of knowing that the publishers love your work enough to invest in publishing and distributing it.

Writing has been a dream of mine since I was a little girl. I learned to read early and even taught all of my stuffed animals 9th grade English when I was just in 2nd and 3rd grade (using my mother’s old textbooks from when she taught high school). I devoured books in school, often plowing through tests and assignments so that I could slip away inside of a book. Luckily I managed to get great grades (with the exception of a C in music because I refused to sing!).

Instead of spending summers at the pool or beach, I spent them exploring different countries, often on my own as my parents would send me to stay with friends of theirs in Europe or the Caribbean. I loved traveling, especially living in Argentina and working on an archeological dig in Alaska for a summer. Travel is extremely important to my writing because I am a firm believer that travel is a better education than any school or college. Experiencing new places, sights, sounds, food, language…culture…it’s core to human development and that is necessary to understand if you want to be a writer.

So here I sit, looking at this amazing new contract and feeling one of those pinch me moments.

I think a lot of people gauge success by what they can achieve materialistically rather than what they can accomplish artistically from following their dreams. Not me. After almost forty years (almost!), I have managed to achieve the dream of success that I always wanted…to write books that move people.

Success is what you make of it…not what you try to let it make of you.