Squeeze Out the Cider

The cider press is painful to the apple, but joyful for the juice. Maintaining a work life balance works the same way. You seek a quality work life yet find it often puts the squeeze on you as you attempt to maintain your family and career.

Cider is the liquid essence of all that is good and sweet in an apple. In the same way, you are put through the cider press of life which is always a painful experience while you are undergoing the pressure of the press. However, it is joyful to be on the other side of the press, a transformed soul for the Lord. Take care that you do not spoil and lose your sweetness, but if you do, then even vinegar has its work to do in the purification of God’s people.

What is your joy today? Is it the joy of working? Or parenting? Or studying? The greatest joy and therefore the greatest challenge in life is blessing others. It’s counter intuitive. We naturally think of ourselves, our needs, our wants and our desires. Ayn Rand called this the “virtue of selfishness,” but Jesus said, “Love your neighbor as yourself.”

Self-centered thinking is easy since all you have to do is focus on the person you love most – yourself. It’s not easy to turn that thinking around to bless others.

In my younger years, I focused almost entirely on myself. As I matured, I learned that it was good to love others and to bless them with my gifts. Today, I seek to bless others through my smile where once I never smiled, a kind word where once I was silent, or a friendly hug where once I kept to myself.

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Here’s another blessing for you. Try Snpgrdxz and the Time Monsters. It’s book 1 of my new time travel adventure series available in ebook and paperback formats. Both qualify for my BOGO so be sure to click on the BOGO button above so you can obtain two full-length books for the price of one. The second book is The Case of the Knife-Tossing Networker: 12 Mysteries Requiring Deductive Reasoning. This 154-page PDF ebook is not available on Amazon or other book sales outlets.

Are You an Expert?

Blog Your Way to a Book Series #2

When you publish a book, you automatically qualify as an expert because… well… you wrote the book, didn’t you?

But how do you attain the confidence that you are an expert in the first place? Begin by understanding the two kinds of experts:

Knowledge experts: people who carry most of the needed information around inside their heads as a result of education and experience. Physicians fall into this category as do other professionals like lawyers and accountants. You already have a certain amount of knowledge expertise thanks to your education and business experience so you bring at least some of this kind of expertise to your book. You may even bring a lot of this type of expertise to your book project. But either way, you will want to use the other kind or expertise as well.

Research and Reporting Experts: People who research a topic and then report on their findings are experts. College professors fall into this category. For example, a philosophy professor has researched the world of philosophy to the extent that he or she now has a Ph.D. in the subject. The information the professor shares in their philosophy classes is derived from their research and learning experience. They also bring some of their original thinking to the class, but most of the “facts” are derived from research. You have this kind of expertise whenever you learn something through a Google search or a grad school class. You will use this kind of research and reporting in the process of writing your book.

When you combine your knowledge, experience and research, you build the base of knowledge needed to write your book. You also want to add your own insights, opinions and recommendations to the mix of expertise deployed in a book writing project.

Think about the know-how you have acquired through your education and experience. Make a list of things you know well and then review it to see if it points you in the direction of a topic you’d like to write about. Have fun. And if you would like my coaching help, post a comment below or contact me through my company’s info@ email address at ironlayersecurity.com.

What to Read For

Read Like a Writer Series #2

For your personal reading, try a balance of classical literature and modern. The authors of the classic novels will teach you about stories that hold their appeal over the generations. The current bestselling authors will teach you about the kind of writing that succeeds today. 

The first time you read a story, enjoy it. If you like the story, study the plot to learn how the author builds the story to a climax by ratcheting up the suspense as the story moves forward. 

What problems keep the main character from success? What is the big issue the main character has to deal with in the story? This problem will be so big that it starts early in the story and isn’t solved until the climax. What is the main character’s secret problem – so secret he or she isn’t even aware of it? This problem will be psychological rather than physical. This hidden problem also takes the whole story to develop, reveal and solve.

Study the way the author develops the characters. How do they change as the story progresses? Observe the author’s voice in the story. What is unique or special about the way the author writes? What’s the theme of the story? Did you spot multiple themes?

Read the story several times until you understand how the author created it. Consider what works and what doesn’t work. For the classics, ask if the story would be published by today’s publishers? Consider what makes a classic a “forever” story.

I would be honored if you choose one of my stories for your next reading experience. If you do, please let me know how you enjoyed it by commenting below or on Amazon. I also enjoy hearing from readers at my author’s email address which is paul dot lloyd dot author at gmail dot com. (Thanks for taking time to figure out that email address so I don’t have to worry about the spider bots getting me.)

Be sure to click on the BOGO button above for my latest buy one, get one free book offer.

Writing Prompt #4

Prompt: Bridgette fell from the…

4 Minute Timed Writing Result
Bridgette fell from the larger of the two sunflowers. How she happened to be up there, while something of mystery in regards to the why part of it, was easy to explain in terms of the how. Gilplaster’s ladder leaning against the stem of the 40 ft. plant explained that to everyone’s satisfaction except Principal Parsons who insisted the ladder needed dusting for fingerprints before he would believe anything. Bridgette had "ladder polishing" on her job description so naturally her fingerprints were all over the ladder, but this held no sway with Principal Parsons.

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I would be honored if you chose one of my stories for your next reading experience. If you do, please let me know how you enjoyed it by commenting below or on Amazon. I also enjoy hearing from readers at my author’s email address which is paul dot lloyd dot author at gmail dot com. (Thanks for taking time to figure out that email address so I don’t have to worry about the spider bots getting me.)

Be sure to click on the BOGO button above for my latest buy one, get one free book offer.

Fill a Box with Your Thoughts

A quality work life is essential to success, but we need to consider our family and career. This article looks at one aspect of work life balance using the image of a box as a container for your thoughts.

The thoughts are all jumbled in the thought box. They need to be organized. They are a confused, bunch of ideas. Organize your thinking so that there is no confusion. Take out each piece of crumbled up thought and organize it according to a plan.

Some thoughts can be filed one way, some another. Some can be cross-referenced and duplicated. Redundancy is good in thinking because it helps you retain the message.

Start a real thought box. Whenever you think of something, write it down and add it to your thought box. Then with a box full of thoughts you won’t be so thoughtless.

When the thoughts pile up big enough, organize them. The thoughts represent a blessing to you in the form of ideas, opportunities and solutions to problems. The important thing is to not be so thoughtless. Then you too can become a blessing among God’s people.

Have fun watching your thoughts grow. Fill the box with joy. Receive the ideas with gratitude and then share them with others. Go in peace.

Another Thought
Try clicking on my BOGO (Buy One, Get One Free) page above. Purchase one of my novels or short stories and receive The Case of the Knife-Tossing Networker: 12 Mysteries Requiring Deductive Reasoning. This 154-page PDF ebook includes a Special Bonus: The first 9 chapters of Snpgrdxz and the Time Monsters.

No More Football

We are one nation under God. Let’s keep it that way. We can disagree on religion, politics and just about any other topic you can think of. You can divide us into categories based on what we look like, where our ancestors came from, what we believe, what we read, what we watch or in any other way you choose. BUT we are all Americans and we stand united as one nation.

To symbolize our unity as a nation, we have chosen a flag of 50 stars and 13 stripes. It’s red, white and blue. When our precious flag waves it means we are still the “land of the free and the home of the brave.” Anyone who desecrates the American flag or refuses to honor it during the playing of our national anthem disrespects what America stands for.

America is not a perfect place. No country is perfect. It’s right to protest when you believe you have been wronged or when you feel a disenfranchised group needs to raise its voice. But when the flag is raised and our national anthem is played, we should all stand together as one. One of the best examples of this unity in diversity concept has traditionally been our sports events. Two teams, bitter enemies, stand together as Americans to honor the flag and our national anthem before the game begins. There are plenty of opportunities to protest or express your personal beliefs without seeking to break the bond of unity that is our nation.

With the recent decision of professional football players to dishonor the anthem, I have decided to dishonor the sport of professional football by no longer watching the game on television or attending any professional games. You are invited to join me in this protest.

Write That Book!

Blog Your Way to a Book Series #1

Writing a business book is one of the scariest of activities. Yet, becoming an author is often the key to opening the door to promotions and new job offers, launching a new business, taking a local business global, and increasing sales. Along the way, your book project becomes the means for taking your expertise to a new level through research and learning opportunities associated with your book project.

But Paul, book writing is such a huge project!
You can handle it because you’re not going to sit down and write a book. You’re busy and you don’t have the time in today’s fast paced world. What you do have time to accomplish is a blog. With enough planning upfront, you can turn your blog posts into a book. Think what you can do with a 15-minute daily commitment. And if you find you have more time on your hands for the writing process, you can speed the whole thing up and get your book to market faster.

How book is a book?
Books in the traditional book store sense can run to several hundred pages. But with the Internet, people are self-publishing ebooks of a much shorter length. With planning, you can write a series of small books and later combine them into one large book so you don’t have to wait for long before you have your book up on Amazon. And you do it by first writing blog posts.

Hey, Paul, I don’t know what to write about.
You may feel that you are no expert like those national gurus who come around making speeches and selling lots of books and six-figure consulting gigs. Guess what? Those folks didn’t start out as experts either. They became specialists when they combined their knowledge and experience with a boatload of research needed to write a book about their topic. And they don’t think of their book as an educational tool for a grad school class. Instead, they use it like a company brochure or business card to minimize or eliminate their competition.

I’ll write more about what it means to be an expert in the next post in this series. In the meantime, start thinking about your area of expertise. What would make a good book topic for you? And begin having fun by outlining and writing about your book idea. And if you would like my coaching help, post a comment below or contact me through my company’s info@ email address at ironlayersecurity.com.