Success
A Humble Thank You To Steve Jobs
Many people are mourning the recent passing of Steve Jobs, and for many reasons. I never knew him personally, of course; like most folks, I imagine, I knew him only as the head of Apple. I have to confess that I didn’t even realize he founded Pixar, among his many other accomplishments.
Ironically, I’d never heard him speak, or bothered to watch any of the recordings of his many speeches and presentations until after his death. My wife, Jan, played a video on YouTube of his commencement address at Stanford in 2005 that was making the rounds on Facebook after the news of his passing had come out. I’d like you to listen to it, then I’ll continue on:
His speech would have been inspirational under any circumstances, but for me it was particularly timely.
You see, after I released SEASON OF THE HARVEST in February 2011, I enjoyed a spectacular explosion in sales. And “spectacular” is no exaggeration: my royalties went from a few hundred dollars a month to $30,000 each in June and July.
Since then, however, sales have tapered off dramatically, with September royalties roughly a third of what they were over the summer months. Is that still a lot of money? Heck, yeah!
But that downward trend started to really challenge my faith. Had I made a mistake leaving my comfy but mind-numbing day job at NSA? What if sales keep dropping? Am I going to have to go out and get another day job to make ends meet? Was this whole thing with incredible sales over the summer just a fluke, a cruel joke?
It was really worrying me, what we might be facing if the downward trend in sales continued. We certainly have enough to get by for a fair while, but it was like a dark cloud over me that I just couldn’t shake.
Then I watched the video you just saw, and felt like a huge weight had been lifted from my shoulders. I realized that the royalties I made over the summer were simply the catalyst for a new phase of my life. I would have been a fool NOT to take the chance and leave my cushy job where I was stagnating, and had been for years. Writing and communicating is my passion and what I really love. Maybe I’ll never be making the sort of money that some other authors are (although I still plan to try!). Maybe I’ll have to go out and get a job to keep enough food on the table when things are really tight. Maybe we’ll have to eat a lot of peanut butter sandwiches for a while if push comes to shove.
But that’s okay. Because after hearing Steve’s words, the stories of the things he both endured and accomplished, I’ve come to the realization that I’m right where I’m supposed to be. The drop in sales? I don’t know if they’ll go up or down, but that drop wiped the stars out of my eyes and made me hungry again. And that’s a good thing.
Thank you, Steve.
Did You Know?
I think this is something that everyone should see, particularly those with children. I blog periodically about what it means – and takes – to be successful as an author, but those same principles extend to just about any endeavor, including life in general.
But this is simply fascinating, and is even more motivation for my wife and I to prepare ourselves and our children to be successful.
Why Success is Like A Marathon
Well, we did it again: my wife Jan and I ran another half-marathon, this time at Virginia Beach, Virginia. This was our third half-marathon, and was by far the most challenging.
For those who may think we’re nuts, you’re probably right. That would be especially true for this race (well, “event” would be more appropriate for us, since we’re not racing against anything but exhaustion), because we didn’t have time to train for it like we did for the previous two we ran. Just as a hint: running 13.1 miles without some serious training is a Bad Idea.
Amazingly enough, my legs didn’t fall apart on me. I was deathly afraid that I’d have a recurrence of the shinsplints I got after we ran this race last year (note: shinsplints are amazingly, incredibly painful), and I’ve also had problems in the past with tendonitis in my left knee.
Jan, however, suffered problems with both knees. She’s been having issues with her left knee on shorter (3 miles or so) runs, and during the race that knee started hurting first, then the right one. And just to let ya know, Jan shrugs off pain that would make me curl up and bawl like a baby, so she was really, seriously hurting, and had to have both knees iced after the finish line.
But the real reason I’m telling you this isn’t to recap our run: it’s to tell you that ordinary people can accomplish extraordinary things if they set their minds to it. Jan and I both hated running, but we set ourselves a challenging goal of being able to run half-marathons, and we did it.
The life lesson is one that I’ve applied to my career, setting the challenging goal of leaving my relatively secure and well-paying day job to pursue my dream of being a full-time author. As the saying goes, it’s not the courage it takes to finish something, it’s the courage it takes just to start. And thanks to readers like you, I’ve been able to make that dream come true.
For me, that’s just the start. The other trick is to have the guts and endurance to stick it out like Jan did in this race. I say that because book sales aren’t guaranteed, and even though things have been quite bright thus far, I expect that there are going to be some tough times along the way, because that’s just life. But if I believe that if you stay focused and determined – and don’t give up – you’re going to succeed in the end.
My Books
Led by Commander Owen McClaren, the TNS Aurora is embarked on an extended survey mission, searching for new worlds that could support human life. Drawn to an uncharted star system that appears to have not just one, but two potentially habitable planets, the crew of the Aurora discovers something even more unexpected: the planets are already inhabited, but not by humans. Approached by gigantic alien starships, the human crew prepares for humanity’s very first contact with another sentient race. Read More >>