Tag: dreams

Where Writing Leaves Off, Music Picks Up

jcladyluv

“Music expresses that which cannot be put into words and cannot remain silent.”
~Victor Hugo 

I just finished reading Ms. L.’s blog post from last night.  I swear sometimes when she writes a post it’s almost like she tuned into something that I was already thinking about and wanted to say but somehow couldn’t actually find the words to say it.  And then I usually read her post and it helps me put what I wanted to say into perspective.  

She talked about the musician side of her and while I must say I don’t have the songwriting capability that she has, I too, have had dreams of being on the stage singing with the whole shebang, lights, cameras, band, and background singers.  Now it’s usually hard for me to toot my own horn most of the time but there are two things that I have no problem acknowledging that I am good at, my writing (of course) and my singing.  

I can still sing, or at least carry a more decent tune than most, but there was once a time when I really (really) used to be able to sing.  I had a really good range and I could hold a note for a really long time.  I might have had a little too much vibrato at times but it could’ve been managed.  

I miss the times when I used to just pull out my stacks of CDs and just hold my own personal concert in my house.  Sometimes there would even be an occasional group of my friends (of course they could sing too) and we would do group songs, duets, and each would take turns being the soloist.  Those were really fun times.  

Singing was my release, almost as much as writing was.  In fact when I wasn’t writing you would more than likely find me singing.  Even when my daughter was a baby I would sing to my daughter and it would literally lull her right to sleep.  I would still get together with that group of friends and we would sing to entertain her and she loved it.  

I never really thought about the possibility of writing songs until recently, partly because I feel my voice wasn’t what it once was and I realize that I might never get to contribute to the music industry the way I had once intended to, on stage.  I’ve even been told all throughout my time of writing poetry that I had some poems that have the potential of making really good songs.  The problem with that would be that, unlike Ms. L., I can not write or read music, so I’m always left with this melody of something in my head that I can’t for the life of me (because I’m getting old and my memory isn’t what it once was) remember later. 

Sometimes I do feel like I am really missing out on something by not getting some piano lessons and perhaps beginning to actually write my own songs to sing.  But I suppose that if it’s meant to be for me to create music, because it is ingrained inside of me, then it will be present within my journey.  

I do, however, miss the days of gathering up my stacks of CDs and cranking my stereo up, and singing for hours on end.  Music has a way of healing my spirit in ways that sometimes (very rarely) writing can’t.  When I can’t find the words to convey what I am feeling, I can always find the song.  It’s as if it picks up where writing leaves off and then allows my writing to weave its way back in.  

“Where words fail, music speaks.”

~Hans Christian Andersen 

 

Jimmetta Carpenter

Writer/Editor

The Diary: Succession of Lies (Now Available)

Writing as “Jaycee Durant”

https://write-2-be.com/

http://unpleasantlyplump.wordpress.com/

http://www.facebook.com/people/Jimmetta-Carpenter/1069480310

http://www.passionatewriterpublishing.com/thediary.htm

www.lulu.com/ladybugpress

I Know It Doesn’t Seem Like I Was Productive Today…

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Every day is not going to be the most productive day like I usually imagine it to be when I get out of bed in the morning.  I imagine that after I take my daughter to school, go do my workout at the gym, come home to shower and get dressed that I would be ready to load myself with a cup (or two) of coffee and get straight to work.  However, it does not always work out that way.  

A part of me becoming more focused on my goals and turning my dreams into reality is to make sure that I am more productive everyday.  Sometimes that calls for me to begin to realize that productivity does not just lie in the work that’s being done in a manner that can be always be seen.  

Even if at the end of a day I don’t have a thousand words on my novel written, or I don’t write two or three query letters to be sent out, or I haven’t started that outline for the next novel that I was supposed to start the other day, or I don’t have the most prolific words for my blog post, it doesn’t mean that work is not being done.  

A lot of times a writer’s work begins in their minds first.  An idea formulates and is planned out in extensive detail within the walls of your mind and it takes life all before you even take pen to paper (or fingers to keyboard).  Research is also a big part of a writer’s world because that aspect of any project is extremely important and can not be avoided.  

So on days like today, when I start to begin beating myself up for not having a finished query letter to send off, or for not being words closer to completing my novel, I have to remind myself that it doesn’t mean that I wasn’t productive.  I do an enormous amount of my work in my head, and another large part is done in my research efforts.  I can’t allow myself to feel like I’m not getting things done just because I don’t have a finished product.  Some days my mind just needs to do the work within its walls and that’s okay.  

 

Jimmetta Carpenter

Writer/Editor

The Diary: Succession of Lies (Now Available)

Writing as “Jaycee Durant”

https://write-2-be.com/

http://unpleasantlyplump.wordpress.com/

http://www.facebook.com/people/Jimmetta-Carpenter/1069480310

http://www.passionatewriterpublishing.com/thediary.htm

www.lulu.com/ladybugpress

Getting Back in the Swing of Things

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I am not full of thought provoking and inspirational quotes and phrases to say today but I really wanted to make sure that I posted.  I am starting to feel my drive kick back into gear, on some days I would even say high gear.   

I am having more and more productive moments and planning out several projects that I want to work on.  I am finally sending out query letters (although they are not perfect) and I am even beginning to work on my novel again, little by little (every little bit counts).  

I am happy to be gaining momentum on the dreams I have been continuously chasing since I was younger.  I have been trying to keep a positive frame of mind as well as keeping my eyes on the goals that I have set for myself.  

I think if I take my eyes off of those goals I’ll start to slip back into the land of un-productivity once again.  So far this week I am winning the battle of time and I plan to keep it that way. 

 

Jimmetta Carpenter

Writer/Editor

The Diary: Succession of Lies (Now Available)

Writing as “Jaycee Durant”

https://write-2-be.com/

http://unpleasantlyplump.wordpress.com/

http://www.facebook.com/people/Jimmetta-Carpenter/1069480310

http://www.passionatewriterpublishing.com/thediary.htm

www.lulu.com/ladybugpress

Banishing the Age Old Excuse

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“Dreams are renewable.  No matter what our age or condition, there are still untapped possibilities within us and new beauty waiting to be born.”

~Dale E. Turner 

This morning as I was watching the news they started talking about baseball (which is my least favorite sport, next to golf) and I started to go into my usual mode whenever I heard baseball mentioned, ignore mode.  But this time something caught my attention, enough to actually make me sit and listen.  

They were discussing the oldest major league pitcher to have ever played baseball.  Jamie Moyer is a 49 year old pitcher who is now playing with the Colorado Rockies after suffering an elbow injury in 2010 that caused him to lose an entire season of playtime.  The injury required him to have reconstructive surgery (Tommy John Surgery) with an estimated recovery time of at least a year.  

The word throughout the sports world was that his career was most likely over because this was not his first injury.  However, Jamie Moyer had other things in mind then letting go of his career, although his career has already surpassed many of the people he came into the league with and he was now playing with men of the next generation of baseball.  

All he wanted was the chance to prove to all of the people who said he was too old or that he didn’t throw hard enough anymore that he could in fact do this once again.  They gave him his chance and he proved them wrong and now he could potentially be making history as the oldest major league baseball pitcher to ever win a game.  

It got me to thinking about all of the times that I doubted continuing my efforts as a writer because I was starting to feel as though maybe I was getting too old to be starting out in this career.  I mean in my mind I should’ve already done so many great things within my career by now and I have, instead, been stuck going around in circles.  Watching that story on the news this morning taught me something.  The age factor is only in my mind, not anyone else’s.  

Jamie Moyer commented that “as long as you have an opportunity you can succeed, but you have to be willing to put the time and the effort into it.”  Essentially as long as the opportunities keep presenting themselves to me, I don’t have a reason (or rather an excuse) to not go after them.  

People often tell me that I waste a lot of time watching TV and watching the news, but I never listen to that because I know what I get out of it.  I get inspiration and I get motivated.  I hear other people’s stories and experiences and I receive the wisdom and lessons that they try to impart to those that are watching and listening.  

Today, just in those five minutes that I watched that news piece I saw someone who wouldn’t let people tell him he was too old to continue on with his dream.  I saw someone who didn’t use his age as an excuse to just give up.  I heard something that motivated me to give up my last excuse for not going after every single opportunity that comes my way, especially the ones that are a pathway to my dreams.  

I will only be too old when I can’t write anymore and my fingers can’t translate the words from my mind onto paper (or computer screen).  As long as I have ideas in my head and the ability to convey them, I will never be too old.  Hell even in my senior years (I mean really old-80’s old), I can still dictate my thoughts into a tape recorder and (if the arthritis has really set in) have someone else type up my work.  Age really is just a number, not a dream killer! 

 

Jimmetta Carpenter

Writer/Editor

The Diary: Succession of Lies (Now Available)

Writing as “Jaycee Durant”

https://write-2-be.com/

http://unpleasantlyplump.wordpress.com/

http://www.facebook.com/people/Jimmetta-Carpenter/1069480310

http://www.passionatewriterpublishing.com/thediary.htm

www.lulu.com/ladybugpress

Visualizing You Are Already Where You Want To Be

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“Attract what you want by assuming the feeling of the wish fulfilled.”

~Neville Goddard 

I was watching Dr. Wayne Dyer on PBS last night and his program, Wishes Fulfilled.  I got a lot out of the three hour motivational program (and dvr’d it so that I can go back and get more out of it later).  He said things that I in some ways already knew and realized but sometimes hearing them from someone else, from another perspective, changes the way you receive the information.  When his program opens he has a statement on the projector screen for the viewing audience that states “If you would like to accomplish something, you must first expect it of yourself.”  Makes sense right?  

I know that if you succumb to the negativity that builds up around you, you are going to eventually project that same negativity into every facet of your life.  This week is about me getting my fire back that I once had and somehow lost.  It’s also about getting back to that person who didn’t always let the negativity surrounding her overtake her.  It’s about getting rid of that mentality of being so fearful of everything that she never enjoys what good could be happening in the present moment. 

I thought that I would be in a certain place at this point of my life and because I’m not there yet I’m doubting every decision I make, every decision I don’t make, every opportunity that I take, and especially the ones that I don’t take.  People always say to go with your gut when making crucial life decisions, but lately I’ve realized that my gut instincts aren’t what they once were because of that damn fear.  It’s keeping me from seeing myself in the state that I want to be in and I know that if I don’t begin to see myself in that place, I might never get to that place.  

Dr. Wayne Dyer said that people who say that they will believe something when they see it have it all wrong.  He said that you will only see it when you believe it, and he’s right.  I mean after all, if you can’t believe in and see it for yourself then how is anyone else going to be able to see it?  

So instead of continuing to wish that I was more of a success, and agonizing over why I’m not, I need to act as if I am at the level of success that I want to be at.  I should imagine that I am already in that place where my company is not only up and running, but it’s going strong.  I can see it now!  

 

Jimmetta Carpenter

Writer/Editor

The Diary: Succession of Lies (Now Available)

Writing as “Jaycee Durant”

https://write-2-be.com/

http://unpleasantlyplump.wordpress.com/

http://www.facebook.com/people/Jimmetta-Carpenter/1069480310

http://www.passionatewriterpublishing.com/thediary.htm

www.lulu.com/ladybugpress

Have You Danced With Your Fears Yet?

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“Let fear be a counselor and not a jailer.”

~Anthony Robbins 

I know that I seem to talk about fear on this blog a lot but I feel that it is so prevalent right now and fear can be so paralyzing when you have no outlet for it.  This is my outlet.  

I realized last night that I am so much more crippled by fear then I could see.  I was watching Oprah’s life class last night on her network and she just so happened to be talking about living fearlessly.  Her guest, motivational speaker Tony Robbins, talked about dancing with your fear (facing them) and that fear is really about changing your story and your state of mind.  

He talked about everyone having a story that they keep telling themselves, whether it is that you are worthless or that you are just always going to fail or many other negative things we tell ourselves.  He recited a quote that if you tell yourself a lie enough times then you start to believe it, so if your story that you’ve been telling yourself for years is that you are never going to succeed or be anything, eventually you will begin to actually believe it.  His theory is that if you change your story, make it more of an affirmation of what you are going to do and who you are going to be, then you change your state of mind and you will begin to believe it.  

Oprah posed the question to her audience and those watching at home, “what is the story you’ve been telling yourself all these years?”  I thought about it and when I talked to Ms. L. I realized what it was.  Not only am I afraid that if I try to really accomplish my dreams it is just going to eventually fail, but I am also afraid of the other end of the spectrum.  That I will actually succeed and begin to make that climb up the ladder and that I might do one little thing to mess it all up and end up right back where I started, at the bottom.  I’m afraid of the not knowing and of the changes that will come.  I’m afraid that I will prove to all of the people who said I would never be anything, that they were right.  

Tony Robbins also said something else that rung true to me after he said it.  He stated that sometimes we want those fears because it protects us from having to step into the unknown.  I was never a completely fearless person, I always tended to be moderately cautious, but I never used to be that person that was so intensely afraid of change and all of the unknown things that are out there that I would sabotage my own self but somehow I have become that person.  

So how do I get back to that person who not only accepted change, but welcomed it?  How do I become that brave artist again that didn’t care (at least as far as my writing went) about what anyone had to say?  

I suppose that “dancing with my fear” is a start.  If I don’t face them head on and stop pretending that they do indeed exist then I am never going to remove those fears from my subconscious and my life.  Fear can really be crippling and it can have the power to kill your dreams, if you let it.  But I’m not going to let it.  Thank you for letting me express my fears here to all of you.  Knowing I can be vulnerable here helps a lot in the furthering of my dreams.   

 

Jimmetta Carpenter

Writer/Editor

The Diary: Succession of Lies (Now Available)

Writing as “Jaycee Durant”

https://write-2-be.com/

http://unpleasantlyplump.wordpress.com/

http://www.facebook.com/people/Jimmetta-Carpenter/1069480310

http://www.passionatewriterpublishing.com/thediary.htm

www.lulu.com/ladybugpress

Even an Icon Like Oprah Can Have Fear

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“The thing you fear most has no power. Your fear of it is what has the power. Facing the truth really will set you free.”

~Oprah Winfrey 

This morning Oprah was on the CBS This Morning show and she was promoting her network, OWN.  She talked about a lot of different things but one thing that struck me was when she admitted that if she knew then (when starting the network) what she knows now she probably wouldn’t have done it (or at least not at the time that she did it).  She acknowledged that when she launched her network she was not ready.  In fact that was one of the lessons that she took away from her process of starting the network, that you shouldn’t launch something just because you already gave a date to everyone else if you are not ready to.  

That was both shocking and admirable to me and just made me want to model my business sense (that I am still trying to mold) after the road she has already paved for the women coming after her even more.  She spoke of the critics in the press who have criticized her brave but somewhat dismal start to her cable network, and one headline, “Oprah not quite standing on her OWN”, that she tries not to let dictate whether she is in fact succeeding or failing at her new endeavor.  In her words, “it’s just press”.  She said that because you fail at something (which her network is in no way failing) doesn’t mean that you are a failure.  

It made me start to think about that good old fear of failure that I can’t seem to shake for the life of me.  Why am I so afraid to fail?  It’s not as if my failing at any given thing would mean that it’s the end of the road for me and my dreams.  In my heart I know this but my head (or perhaps that little devilish angel sitting on my shoulder) keeps telling me that if I fail even one more time at something then that’s it, I’m just destined to be a failure.  If only I could shake that demon trying to creep its way into my subconscious every time I think I’m going to get somewhere.  But maybe that’s just it.  Maybe it creeps in because I am getting somewhere.  

My best friend, Ms. L. always says that when everything starts to begin to go wrong that she knows she must be doing something right.  She says that it just means that the devil is working overtime to stop the progress she is making.  And look at Ms. L., she just launched her magazine, PIEhole (of which I have an article in) and it’s taken off better than I think even she expected it to (although I knew it would).  Although she never acknowledged being afraid as often as she probably was, she never let that fear stop her.  

Hell, if Oprah can have the courage to admit that she was afraid of something (because it seems that she just does this stuff so fearlessly) but that she pressed on anyway, then why couldn’t that be my story down the line as well?  I know that I would never want to be doing anything else and I truly feel as though God instilled in me this specific purpose and I owe it to him, if not myself, to see that purpose through.  As Oprah also said in her interview, “There’s never going to be a time to quit.  I will die in the midst of doing what I love to do and that is using my voice and using my life to try to inspire other people to live the best of theirs.” 

 

Jimmetta Carpenter

Writer/Editor

The Diary: Succession of Lies (Now Available)

Writing as “Jaycee Durant”

https://write-2-be.com/

http://unpleasantlyplump.wordpress.com/

http://www.facebook.com/people/Jimmetta-Carpenter/1069480310

http://www.passionatewriterpublishing.com/thediary.htm

www.lulu.com/ladybugpress

Reigniting an Old Flame

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“Putting off an easy thing makes it hard.  Putting off a hard thing makes it impossible.” 

~George Claude Lorimer 

I listened to Ms. L. the other day as she talked about the series of articles that she just had published in her city’s local newspaper and the projects that she has coming up (let me add, paying projects), and how she is really starting to make some pretty good income with her writing just as she wanted to do with her business.  Just as we both had hoped to do with our businesses.  She is beginning to flourish and I am really proud of her.  But honestly I am a tad bit jealous as well (but not in the bad way).  It’s not that I don’t want her to succeed but I just wish that I was flourishing just as much as her, alongside her. 

When I listen to her and hear her talk about her daily activities and just how productive she has been I see the same fire lit under her and the same drive inside of her that I used to have.  She’s always on the go and pulling all-nighters and I can remember when I used to be the same way.  My drive was so intense that I barely slept and I would skip meals just so that I could work on my writing.  I have no idea when that fire in me started to die down.  I didn’t mean for it to.  

I know that I haven’t loss my passion for writing or for any of the things that I hope to do with my writing and my media company that I am currently trying to build up.  I have a multitude of plans and my brain is constantly turning with more and more ideas by the hour, sometimes by the minute.  But yet when it comes to actually executing those ideas and plans, after I’ve done all of the normal things that need to be done during my day, I sit down and the act of execution on those plans falls by the waist-side.  I get tired and at times I accidentally fall asleep without ever tackling any of the things on my to-do list.  

I don’t mean to be such a full blown procrastinator and I certainly don’t mean to have a head (and notebook) full of plans and ideas and never accomplishing even a tenth of them.  I wish I had an explanation (at least a good one) for falling down on the job of making my dreams happen and I wish I understood why my drive and my fire isn’t naturally there the way it used to be, but I don’t.  All I know is that this week I plan to get it together because I will only have myself to blame if I fail and no one else can make this happen for me.  

I suppose I will just have to do what people do when they go to start their stove and they hear the clicking sound but yet the fire doesn’t immediately come on like it used to.  They don’t just stop cooking their food, they go light a match or a lighter and get the fire started again themselves.  I know that I still love what I do and I know I still have the passion for it and now I am just going to find a way to reignite the fire so that my dreams don’t burn out too.  If any of you out there are feeling like the biggest procrastinator in the world, you are not alone and it does not have to stay that way.  The flame can always be reignited, even if it has to be done manually.  

 

Jimmetta Carpenter

Writer/Editor

The Diary: Succession of Lies (Now Available)

Writing as “Jaycee Durant”

https://write-2-be.com/

http://unpleasantlyplump.wordpress.com/

http://www.facebook.com/people/Jimmetta-Carpenter/1069480310

http://www.passionatewriterpublishing.com/thediary.htm

www.lulu.com/ladybugpress

Seeing Yourself Through Someone Else’s Eyes

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“Sometimes you can’t see yourself clearly until you see yourself through the eyes of others.”

~Ellen DeGeneres 

It is really nice when you have someone that believes in you enough for the both of you.  I discovered that I had someone else in my corner today, someone that’s always been in my corner but I guess I just didn’t really see it.  My friend (we’ll just call him Mr. C.) was very motivating for me today.  He spoke about me and my dreams the way that I had expressed them to him and made me reenergized about them again.  I was starting to believe that it was just too late for me to take my brand and my name and become the success that I had always dreamed of being.  Today when I saw myself through his eyes, the way he said he saw things, I felt like I had already accomplished so much.  

He reminded me of all of the plans that I had laid out to him around the time that we first met and pinpointed all of the goals that I had actually managed to accomplish thus far.  I don’t really know why I hadn’t realized that I am not exactly at the starting point, but rather somewhere ahead of the halfway point.  I know that Ms. L. is going to read this and say ‘I told you all of that stuff already’ and it’s not that I didn’t hear her but hearing it from someone who I didn’t realize was paying attention somehow has a different affect.  I knew that Mr. C. had confidence in me and that he thought I was capable of many things, but I never saw just how fiercely he believed in me.  

It’s always interesting to see yourself through someone else’s eyes because a lot of the times you find that you are only seeing what hasn’t been done when they are looking at the bigger picture.  They are looking at what your goals were to begin with, and what strides you have already made towards those goals, and they see the potential of you finishing those goals.  I don’t know why it sometimes seems so hard for me to look at myself and my life the way that others seem to see it but I am starting to get the message now. 

If I keep stopping at every bench mark on my roadmap of success and picking apart everything that I had already done and diminishing it into being nothing then that’s what it will amount to, nothing.  Holding up someone else’s mirror to your life is very revealing and meaningful because you can’t always see what someone else sees.  Sometimes it takes the vision of someone else to make clear to you that you are on the right path.

 

Jimmetta Carpenter

Writer/Editor

The Diary: Succession of Lies (Now Available)

Writing as “Jaycee Durant”

https://write-2-be.com/

http://unpleasantlyplump.wordpress.com/

http://www.facebook.com/people/Jimmetta-Carpenter/1069480310

http://www.passionatewriterpublishing.com/thediary.htm

www.lulu.com/ladybugpress

If You Want it Bad Enough, You Have to Work Hard to Get It

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“The artist is nothing without the gift, but the gift is nothing without work.” 

~Emile Zola 

When I was at the gym this morning I overheard a basketball coach giving two of the young boys that he coaches a lecture on practicing their skills.  He was telling them that they can’t just expect to become pro-basketball players without actually putting in the work to get there.  He was saying to his assistant coach that children just expect to wake up and automatically become what they want to be without putting in the time, the effort and the hard work it takes to get there.  I listened on as he spoke to them and I saw the young boys in there beginning to practice as he was lecturing them so clearly some of what he was saying was starting to sink in.  

As I continued to listen on I thought about the fact that it isn’t always just children who forget that things that are worth having, you have to work hard for.  Sometimes we adults forget that too.  We sometimes rely so heavily on the natural talent that we have to do whatever gifts we were blessed with that we forget that even with natural talent, there is skill involved and those skills have to be continuously exercised.  If we don’t practice our skill set, that talent can eventually fade away.  

We can’t continue to take our skills for granted and believe that no matter what they will always be there for us to use when we get around to putting in the hard work that it takes to make them work for us.  Basketball players don’t just wake up able to play basketball.  Sure they may have had the natural talent to shoot a ball in a hoop when they were younger but there would have been no chance of them making it to the NBA without continuously practicing that skill.  Had they not put in the hard work those skills would have just faded away. 

I’ve heard it said so many times by writers or singers or actors or athletes that it comes natural to them, and yet they still profess how much hard work their natural talent takes.  They take workshops to keep their words fresh, they have vocal coaches to keep their voice in tact, or they take ongoing acting classes to keep their acting skills on point, or they practice on a regular basis to keep their reflexes sharp.  Yes they may have this natural ability but they work hard at maintaining those abilities so that they don’t lose them.  

The same goes for anyone else out there trying to become successful at whatever it is that comes natural to them.  We all have something that we were born to do.  Now we just have to put in the hard work at practicing those skills to develop the success that we know we want.  So take some time to think whether or not you are really putting in the practice at making your skills work for you.  If you know you could be doing more then start now.  Practice equals progression! 

Jimmetta Carpenter

Writer/Editor

The Diary: Succession of Lies (Now Available)

Writing as “Jaycee Durant”

https://write-2-be.com/

http://unpleasantlyplump.wordpress.com/

http://www.facebook.com/people/Jimmetta-Carpenter/1069480310

http://www.passionatewriterpublishing.com/thediary.htm

www.lulu.com/ladybugpress