Thin butter on Stale Toast

I’m beginning to feel like thin butter on stale toast. Why? Well, I’ve begun to venture on many paths. This might be something that you’ve felt before or maybe your feeling it right now. I am currently on my blog, Two YouTube channels, Two Facebook pages, and writing my second novel. I also work a full-time job. Balancing life with all these tasks have been challenging. Even with the extra time I have given myself in the day. I’m beginning to think I should mould all of it together in one. I fear that I will piss people off when all they want is to read about when my next book is coming out. Or maybe they’re only interested in learning more about adoption. This blog is a blend of all those things and has been doing well. It helps that in the past few months I’ve been giving it love.

This came to my mind as I did my morning journal. I wrote, half asleep, about what was making my days feel drained. Was it waking up at the crack of dawn, maybe I needed to go to bed earlier, or maybe I was all over the place with my projects?
Audience is key. To get the right viewers or sales you need to know your audience and feed them their favourite foods. People love to get what they’re interested in or else they stop coming around. Am I giving them that? I know the audience of my book is those that like to read darker tales, watch horror films, and love the paranormal. My blog is far from that. My vlogs are far from that. And my Facebook pages don’t feed that fan base. I’m banging my head against the wall. I have created a fluffy platform because I’m a nightmare dress up like a unicorn. There will be changes to this in the future. I would like to grab a fresh warm piece of bread and spread on a thick layer of butter. No more of this thin stale crap.

I don’t think I’m going to keep up with my vlog. I will be deleting my adoption vlog and my vlog that’s connected to this blog. This blog and my Facebook page will become my main focus. I don’t know what will become of me in the future. That’s okay. I will continue doing my morning journal and find the weaknesses in my days, platform, and productivity.

I am human. I am change. I am growing.

Every day that passes I am focused on my goals for the future. My writings and books are my main passion. This is where I want my life to take me. If I eliminate the things that are blocking the path then I will become stronger in my craft. I will have more time for research. I will have more time to study. These are the things I am looking forward too.

I would love to hear from you in the comments below. Tell me if you feel like you’ve taken on to much? What do you plan to do about it?

 

Wicked Soul Ascension 
Want a read that will get your heart pumping?
Available in paperback and eBook.

Link: Amazon
Link: Chapters
Link: Barns & Noble

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5 Benefits of Waking Up at 5 Am

For two weeks now I have been waking up at 5 am. The hardest part of the day is getting out of bed when my alarm goes off. I haven’t been perfect. I’ve turned off my alarm in my sleep causing me to roll out of bed at 6 in a panic. I thought that I would enjoy the sleep in, but that’s not the truth. Amazing things happen in the morning! I can’t picture myself two months ago attempting to crawl from my bed just before work to rush out the door. That part of me seems to be far from where I am now.
Here are the 5 benefits I have discovered in the past two weeks:

1. More Energy!
I’m blown away from the energy I have. If you told me a month ago that I would have energy after waking up before the sun I would have walked away. It doesn’t happen when the alarm goes off. I notice it more when I get home from work. I used to dive into bed for a quick snooze before dinner time. After the first week, I found I was awake until my bedtime without thinking of my naps.

2. Time. Time. Time.
I used to wake up at 7:30, eat breakfast, make lunch, and then go to work at 8:30. That was my morning routine. I now have two and a half hours to focus on what I want to do. For you it might be fitness, for me, it’s writing. I do a half hour of journaling before breakfast and an hour of working on my novel before work. This gives me another half hour to work on my physical health that I didn’t even plan for.

3. Accomplishments
What do you accomplish in the day? Do you make your bed? Maybe paint a picture?
Before I used to get to work and survive the day. Yes! I survived. That was my biggest accomplishment. I felt that my life slipped through my hands. A week would go by and I hadn’t done a thing. I made money which paid my bills. That was nice. That didn’t give me the sense of fulfillment. With my extra time, I accomplish the things that I love. Reading books, writing, even having the house clean…yes, I love having a clean house. This is all accomplished before I go plug away at my day job. I feel more fulfilled from my days. If I really wanted I could hike a mountain with the extra time I’ve grasped. I save that for the weekends.

4. Reflection
This wasn’t going to make it on to my list. When I planned out this post ‘reflection’ was in the collum of possibilities. It was close to the end and I skimmed over it multiple times. While I drank my coffee I found that I was staring at the word. It was true that every morning I reflected in my journal. I wrote my ideas down in a sleepy mess. I’m sure I wouldn’t be able to read what I wrote. 5 am me isn’t the neatest writer. In my journal, I wrote about my goals, how I was reaching them, and if there were negatives in my previous day. This freed my thoughts for more creative possibilities. I knew what I needed to do. I felt free of the overthinking that I had been trapped in for many years.

5. Peace
It’s quiet at 5 am. I sit out on the front porch with my coffee and a book while the sunrises. The birds sing their morning songs while the world begins to wake. I feel that peacefulness while camping, on vacation, or on a hike in nature. The thought of it happening at home never crossed my mind. My morning now gives me that moment pf peace where I can breathe.

 

I hope that this helps you discover that you do have time in your day for the things you want to do. It might be shifting things around, dropping the things that you don’t care for or waking up earlier. You can find the time for the things you love if you just make them a priority.
What are the things that you enjoy doing? Have they been pushed aside for other things? I would love to hear from you in the comments below.

Cheers!

Wicked Soul Ascension 
Want a read that will get your heart pumping?
Available in paperback and eBook.

Link: Amazon
Link: Chapters
Link: Barns & Noble

Lost in the Sea of Written Souls

If someone came up to me and told me that writing the book was going to be the easiest part of writing a book I would have gave them a grin of disbelief.

A book is a piece of the soul the author has given out to the world to cast judgment. Whether you like the book or not; be kind. It’s hard work pumping out thousands upon thousands of words. If you enjoyed the story, or not, I beg you to leave a review somewhere. Let others readers know why you did or didn’t like it. Any review is better than no review at all.

My first novel Wicked Soul Ascension made its way into the light November 2016. It hit it’s high in the first few months. For a first time author, I thought the feedback was overwhelming. I got all these phone calls about my story. The rollercoaster that the book took them on left them begging me for more. I kindly asked them if they loved the story, please leave a review. Any review is better than none at all. Leave it where ever you like, just please leave one. I remembered from earlier research about marketing Wicked Soul Ascension to ask for them. They said once the readers read a book, a review is the last thing on the mind. Out of the 250 books that are out there the most reviews I have in one spot is two…that’s not enough to get a new reader into a new author.

Why a review is important from the reader to a reader?

If I were to buy a book; 99 cents? $3.99? $20.00? I would like to know if the author can write. Times are tough for the average person. We’ve come to notice every cent that leaves our pocket to make sure that it is spent wisely. If I don’t know the author, how do I know if the story is worth my money? A review lets me know that my money is worth giving to this author. The same thing goes for anyone that is selling indie merchandise. If you buy music, you’d like to make sure the songs are worth the money?

This is where the dead months begin. I have now begun to think out of the box in hopes that maybe I’d land a sale. If the right person finds my story, who knows what would happen to it. I know that my blogs are my raw writing. I don’t care for my own…all natural writing. I edit it a bit, but not in with the intensity my novels get. This is me in black and white. This may be dangerous to do as it might harm people’s view of my work, but I’m going out on the broken limb.

The Sea of Souls has Many Covers.

There are countless amounts of books in the world that have been published, unpublished, hidden, written and burned, and who knows what has happened to all of these stories. These tiny pieces of souls that have been scattered around the world…and mine is in there. Lost with a tiny title with a unique cover to help if stick out from the crowd. One day it may make its mark. Or, maybe it won’t. I know that it’s little family will grow around it with others members written by C. B. Dixon.

I’ve dipped my toe into the chilly waters of the published world. Even though the plunge is discouraging. I know that I will swallow the twitch to run the other way. I will jump in, eyes open, to observe every moment that will pass me by.

This is My Choice. This is My Life. I Will Enjoy Every Breath. Every Heart Beat. 

Right now for a limited time Wicked Soul Ascension is available for free on Wattpad. Here’s the link: Wicked Soul Ascension on Wattpad

 

Hiccup…was I Drunk?

I don’t remember an alcohol beverage in the last half of my manuscript…sure feels like I was totally wasted.

Normally I have a single drink when I consume alcohol. I know what being drunk feels like, like come on, we were all young once. There was something that happened in the middle of my newest story that made me feel that all my marbles rolled right out of my head and all over the floor. I know that I can’t even blame being drunk.

I love this hobby that I’ve chosen to dig deeper into. It’s a passion that burns within me. This incident made me reconsider my life choices.

I’ve Become to Much of a Dreamer.

Here’s the deal. I had written 80,000 words in my new story. I breathed life into the characters. The setting couldn’t have been more magical, and the plot twists left this yearning. The fourth draft gem was almost ready for a polish. As I read the words I noticed this tiny problem that seemed to rip until all the words dripped from the pages with my tears.

I Dreamt Up the Best Part…

I remember pounding in the words to this part. It was an almost all nighter. The piece was so juicy that I ignored my own blatter to write…and there in the pages of the story I bled. The characters connected better than I thought they would. Their unlikely team blended together better than cake and icing. The creation of such a piece made me write day after day off of that part.

Until, last Thursday. I needed a small bite of information that was in the story. A bite that didn’t exist…it wasn’t there. The piece that I had fallen in love with had vanished. No, it wasn’t lost from not saving. The chapters never had a skip. The more I thought about the writing experience, and where I was at the time that I wrote it. The whole thing didn’t make sense. My desk was in the wrong spot, there wasn’t anything on the walls, and my cat never interrupted me. All things that brought me to the conclusion…I dreamt up the perfect part.

Here’s Why I Didn’t Catch It.

I don’t read back into my script until I have finished writing it. I spend to much time messing up my story if I do. I only go back to find the small things, if it’s important. I didn’t do this with my first book and spent too much time editing when I should have been writing. I’m glad that I did go back this time, or I would have finished the story with a gaping hole. It wasn’t even something I could add in…I couldn’t remember it. I could only remember the feeling it gave me.

And that will end this entry to the journal of being a writer…Today’s mood towards it:

Today’s mood towards being a writer: …no comment.

Book Promo: Wicked Soul Ascension

Our Journey to Family

Mark and I have had a lot on the go lately. We’ve moved across the water, ocean, from Vancouver Island to the mainland. I got a new job that made me switch from being a nanny back into daycare. And, now, our announcement! We’re adopting!

For anyone that has found my tiny channel on YouTube called Our Journey to Family, you have most likely seen the announcement video. If you haven’t and would like to see it, here it is: (click photo)

Click Photo!

 

I will be getting on the ball with the videos soon. I’ve been enjoying making them. I have a lot of great updates since we’ve moved. I hope you all enjoy.

Mark and I have chosen to adopt through the foster system here in BC, Canada. I expected it to be a long tiresome process, but that hasn’t been the case. We have had great success with the new setup they have for the application process. It’s all online, at first

It’s all online, at first it was strange, weird, and felt as if I was online shopping for a child…but when all the pieces fell into place so smoothly I withdrew that thought. It was straight to the point, fast, and user-friendly.

Our choice to adopt came from Marks idea that there are many children in the world that need a loving safe home. It took a while for me to sink into the idea. I had always pictured me having my own kids. Now, I look at that thought differently. Own kids, I always thought of that as giving birth to a child makes that child mine. After chewing on the idea for, well it as a year or more, I realised for a child to be mine doesn’t mean I have to give birth to the child. I have to love, care for, and guide the child through their life. To parent the child. Not like what I do at work, daycare, where I raise other people’s tiny humans. This child will call me mom. They will rely on me for more than guiding them by the hand day by day until their parent comes and takes them home…I will be that parent that picks them up.

Once I started thinking about adoption, I started thinking about kinds of adoption. There were more than I thought. Domestic; a birthmother chooses you. International; you chose a country other than the one you live in to adopt from. Or adoption from foster care; a child is removed from their biological family due to no fault of their own. I thought about domestic, a baby, I’d have a baby! And then…I’d think about all those children already in the system. Lot’s of people want a baby, I know I want a baby…but all those children that are waiting…they were a baby once.

After battling with myself I talked to Mark about adopting through the foster system. That’s already what he was planning on doing, but he knew I wanted a baby. International was already out of the question, for now. It was then that we started our application.

Now, here we go on Our Journey to Family.

 

Work based Play: 5 Helpful Ways to Get Back on Track

Whether you’re a writer, painter, fashion designer, or mechanic, or whatever your thing is, we all get distracted from our hobbies. Family, friends, and our careers; these are important to everyday life, and I highly suggest you keep them around.

Friends and family help you create even when you don’t think it’s a helpful opinion. They tend to push you to be your best…when they’re not getting in the way of course. Family and friends are the procrastination brain BFFs. They know you want to have fun. This causes you to pull away from doing that other thing that you love. That thing where you play your music at your volume, where you’re alone tweaking your craft. This seems to be the time that they find you. Elbows deep in your work, “Hey want to hang out? Go for coffee?” Or, “I have something that I have to tell you!” Friends and family are notorious for that type of behaviour.

That brings me to your career. Unless you can make income from your work by doing what you love, your once hobby, don’t give up your day job. This is important. The bills won’t pay themselves, no matter how many times you wish for it. Materials for your craft can get expensive. Food that gets cooked and placed on your table will not come free. A day job is one of those things that you will need.

Other distractions come from the everyday living as a human. Just like how money doesn’t come for free, your house won’t clean itself, your body doesn’t magically stay clean, and the little things, well, they don’t do their thing on their own. Unfortunately, this isn’t the Weasleys house from Harry Potter. Even if we all wish that it was.

5 Ways to Get Back on Track

1. Make a time for your work. If you need an hour a day, give yourself an hour.
This is why scheduled programs work so well. Everyone knows not to contact you between 7 and 8 because you’re at yoga. Do the same thing for yourself. Let people know, “I’m painting between 7 and 8. Could we go for coffee at 8:30?” This way they know when you’re busy.

When you have children, this is the most difficult. You’re too tired to get up an hour before you need to get the kids up for school. At bed time you’re still cleaning up from the day. When is it possible to sit down and get an hour? Only you will know that. If waking up an hour early works for you, then all be, do it.

For those of you that don’t have children, you’ll have to look at what you do on a day to day basis. Find yourself some time to do what you love.

2. Put away your phone.
Here’s one of the hardest to do. We’re all attached to our phones. Mine is in my pocket right now. I’m sure if I forgot to turn it off, the second that it rings I will answer it. Not only that. If I don’t turn it right off my computer and Fitbit tell me that someone is trying to get ahold of me. This is more difficult if you have family that need to reach you during the day. That’s why I added number one first. Making time for your craft during an hour of the day where you will not be needed, or an hour where people are less likely to contact you. Combine these two ways to get back on track.

3. Get started.
With your time picked out and your cell no longer being a distraction, get started. When I try to get started I notice the little things…like my coffee is almost half full, I should fill it up before I get started. Oh, look over there my husband left his plate out…I need to put that in the sink before I get started. These things don’t need to be done right away like my brain tells me, I’m procrastinating. A half hour goes by, and nothing is done but the dishes, new pot of coffee made, and the cats are fed. Have your time picked out, and be where you need to be as if your career was starting. Would your boss be happy if you missed half the day because you needed to clean your house? I didn’t think so.

4. Find a buddy.
Find a craft buddy to come over, or you go to their house, about once a week or every two weeks meet up. Switch it up or stay the same. These buddies are like your procrastination fillers. If you’ve been good all week your most likely going to slip near the end of it. Have your procrastination buddy to feed that part of your brain while doing your craft and getting new ideas. I have a friend that I go out for coffee with. We bring our notebooks, write, laugh, drink our hot overly expensive espresso, and socialise. I’m locked up in my office for quite a while, I always go over my hour a day. It’s nice to have someone to get out of the house with, while I work. You should find a buddy that lightens your week and helps your craft.

5. Set yourself a deadline.
This one always makes me laugh. Deadlines. Who even likes those? Not this girl. I scramble the day before deadlines. If you give yourself a deadline you’ll finish your projects faster. It took me three years to write my first book because I didn’t have a deadline. Now, I am aiming for a year to finish all the drafts of the second. Be sure that your deadlines are reasonable; how fast you work, and the project that you’re working on. If you give yourself too little or to much time you might become discouraged or distracted.

Giving all these points a try will help your work. Think of it the same way you do when you’re at your day job. If you start late all the time or on your cell, you might get fired. Working alone you can get lots of things done, but it can get lonely, making you not want to do it. If you don’t meet your deadlines things become complicated. Think of your hobby as work based play. Have fun to get it done.

The Deadly Journal

I tried many times to keep a journal by my side. I’m not 100% sure why I never kept up with it. I bought one from Indigo with a gift card I got for Christmas. The colours of the book are eye catching. The caption on the front speaks to me, grabbing my attention making me want to write in it. I’m not a fan of gold, but it sure is shiny. This brings be back to why I haven’t been able to write in a journal. I don’t think the look and feel of the book have anything to do with the fact that I don’t like to write in one.

So, why did I buy it?

Well, I understand the importance of capturing the spur of the moment ideas. By the time that I sit down to write that amazing idea I had before I fell asleep…the blasted daydream is lost in the swirl of thoughts that I have every second. My little brain has so many thoughts running through it that I can never recall what it was I’d like to write. Hence, why I bought this journal. I need to be able to catch that idea. Seal it in words. To grab that daydream by the horns and nail it into place.

Writing in it was a slow process. It was once I started that I realised why I hated journaling. I’m one of those writers in need of an editor. See, I have dyslexia. It doesn’t effect my speech much. It does, however, play a huge factor in my writing. I always trip up when I spell a word wrong, or the word looks wrong but is spelt right. I mix up my letters all the time when I type, it’s nice when the computer fixes that for me. I find the program on the computer helps me learn language faster. This also helps with repeat words, grammar, and other small writing problems I didn’t learn in school. I gave up on English classes in school since I found that the class wasn’t for me. I knew in my heart I wanted to be a writer, it’s what I enjoyed more than anything. Art class was fun and all, but an adventure through a tale of words was the most exhilarating part of going to school. I heard it time and time again in school that I was never going to make it in life. I let my grades drop. Why should I even try then? I ignored my lessons. I let all the information teachers told me in and out of my ears as if they were commercials on TV. When I dropped out of school to take the homeschool program my tutor, a retired teacher, told me to get tested for dyslexia. She saw how hard it was for me to read, and write, she watched as I jumbled everything up as I read from a page. Once I got tested positive, she worked with me to develop ways to calm the jumping letters. This happened in grade 11. Why hadn’t all my others educators seen this? It wasn’t that I was a problem child, okay maybe I was a tiny bit, I couldn’t make sense of what I was seeing. I thought that everyone saw words that way. I didn’t know that what I saw was wrong. 11 years behind my peers in reading and writing with one more year to learn it all. Even now, at 26, I feel far behind my peers. I won’t let that stop me.

I published Wicked Soul Ascension December 1, 2016. That was the first time I felt as if I were getting somewhere. I got this. I haven’t let the dancing letters stop me.

With this journal in hand, I’m going to conquer the next hurdle that I’ve been facing. Writing freehand. The only help from the computer is the spellchecker. I’ve always been nervous writing freehand. Being 11 years behind with spelling and grammar made me self-conscious. People point out my spelling mistakes all the time saying, “I thought you were a writer.” They’d laugh and go about their day. These phrases used to hit me hard. I’ve chosen to brush this off like I did with the teachers from my school.  For the most part, I have become a fully self-taught writer. I look for information everywhere. My editor helps me where I need. She even gives me homework and has been a huge help. I know I have a long way to go.

This deadly journal is going to be apart of my everyday life. It’s time to kick out that little self-conscious child that nags at me when I have to write freehand. I plan to fill the pages of this journal with all the things I think about. If there are ideas about the story, small things I see, odd thoughts, and even if I see something I’d like to buy in the future I will write them down.

The next step has been taken to become a better me. I’ve come this far, so now it’s time to push myself that much harder. Every step forward, no matter how small, is a step towards being where I wish to be.

C.B. Dixon