Taking Stock of My “Successes”

A year in the life of a non-fiction writer

My manuscript. Photo Credit: Author

I’ve written a book called Naked in the Now: Juicy Practices for Getting Present

I’ve been sitting here this morning taking stock of my “successes” in meeting my professional goals of getting it and me “out there”

Here’s what I can report:

I didn’t finish publishing my book
I didn’t write a TedX Talk
I didn’t even write many articles or poems about it
I didn’t grow my “platform” much
I didn’t line up speaking engagements
I didn’t do many workshops
I didn’t meet many of my professional goals at all

Instead…

In January after working hard on my book proposal
I flew to Washington
Where I stood by my dad’s bedside
and felt his still warm head,
the breath had left
It was only the third visit
since he’d moved into assisted living during Covid
1 hour in two years until this final visit
Instead of working on my book, I felt the grief and wrote about that in “One Sweet Fatherly Gesture”