I’ve been waiting for a dream like you…

I had a weird dream last night. It’s not the first time. As I come up on the one year anniversary of my divorce from Corporate America, I dreamed I was back at the company. What I liked about being back at work? Steady paycheck. Comfort in the routine. The people.

Most importantly the people.

What I hated about the dream?

Routine. Trapped. Held hostage for nine hours a day by an idiot boss.

The steady paycheck wasn’t enough to offset the loathing I felt having to suffer through days filled with pointless meetings where we met for meeting’s sake. We weren’t allowed to have fun, because laughter was considered “not working.”

Ridiculous.

I wish I wouldn’t have waited. I wish I would have started this journey in 2009, just like I planned. Or kept on the path in 1999 like I was.

But you know what they say about plans. Man plans and God laughs.

There is always a price for waiting. You have to determine if you are willing to pay it. Millions of Americans are working at corporate jobs they hate, where they can be fired or laid off with zero notice. They have no safety net to catch them if they fall. They are miserable and mortgaging a future where they plan to do the things they love once they retire.

It’s not a real life, or perhaps its more real life and I’m the delusional one.

So often people are in abusive relationships with the company they work for. Bosses demean, bosses criticize, bosses “enforce policy” which outlines gray structures in black and white lines.

Have you ever thought, “I don’t get paid enough for this.”

Have you ever thought, “If I win the lottery, I’ll quit.”

Then you need to make a plan to divorce your job. Start by saving some money from each paycheck. Start your own business on the side while you still have the security of a bi-weekly income. Quit watching television for 5 hours a week, and build your own business instead.

The price for waiting for me is pretty steep.

I have file cabinets full of unrealized manuscripts, short stories and screenplays just waiting for me to type up and publish. Plus every day I come up with a new story idea for my SHADOWBOXER series, which I’m hard at work to develop and promote on Amazon.

Last night, I saw a press release for a story.

NAVY SEALS: NEW ORLEANS or something along those lines. The tag line was Navy Seals are sent to New Orleans to fight a zombie outbreak. I sighed and shook my head.

It’s not QUITE my idea. Mine was “An Army Reserve Unit fights a vampire outbreak after Katrina flooding unearths a nest of the undead.”

But if I finished the story right after Katrina hit, it would be published and up on Amazon now. Instead, it’s sitting in a drawer, along with a couple of hundred others, just waiting for me to make time to write it up, edit, grab a cover and promote.

Along with my Zombie story about a Special Forces Team sent in to quell a Zombie outbreak on a river in Alabama. (Deliverance meets World War Z) and another Z outbreak set in Montana where folks gather to hide in a compound while Z’s attack.

The price for waiting is someone else will make an idea just like yours.

They’re not stealing the idea, because we’re all exposed to the same media, the same music, the same news and we’re all trying to conquer the same market of proven media consumers.

At least in my business.

So the longer you wait, the more disappointed you’re going to be because other people will be working on “your” ideas. Maybe you want to invent something. There is a guy in his garage tinkering with the exact same thing right now.

Maybe you want to code an app. There’s a little girl writing code right now after school, and she wants to take you down.

Facebook is such a huge part of our lives right now, no one remembers that it was a poor contender to My Space for a couple of years, and fought off a slew of social sites trying to derail it’s growth.

If Zuckerberg had waited, even for a moment, there might not be 752 million users today. Every 5 seconds someone creates a new FB profile.

Which brings me back to your idea.

Make something and sell it. Write a book. Write a song. Make a homemade quilt, or knit some beanies.

Whatever you think your idea is, you can not afford to wait to make it happen.

If your dream is to build a conglomerate ant farm that revolutionizes backyard agriculture, start blogging about it, find people interested and start talking to them about how they can help.

I’m amazed at how many people have told me they want to write a book, or start a business as a dream, and when I offer to help, backpedal right back into their cubicle.

Stop waiting to make your dream happen.

The longer you wait, the more life will pass by, and you will become numb, and existing for a day when you can retire and start living.

That makes zero sense. Don’t wait.

Do one thing today to make your dream start. Here, I’ll make it easy for you. Comment below on what your dream/business is, and I’ll tell you what the simple first step should be.

Stop waiting.

Start doing.

Happy Earth Day World

It’s Earth Day. The one day a year most of us think about the impact we have on the planet. Actually we don’t really think about it, just consider it when the morning DJ’s mention it on the radio, and Facebook reminds us with a catchy graphic, and then we promptly forget as we’re caught up in the day to day.

Most companies don’t celebrate Earth Day. They don’t implement programs to immediately reduce waste or decrease carbon emmissions. They don’t make car pooling manditory or offer discounts on public transit. They don’t encourage employees to make changes in their lifestyle or educate them on the environment.

In short, companies care just enough for PR purposes, and the majority of people will wish they were more environmentally friendly, but no one will take action on it. Earth Day is the most recognizable annual celebration of the movement. This one day, people do something to protect the future of the world.

The next day, they forget.

That’s the problem with most movements and dreams.

We’re so excited when we concieve of them, we can’t wait to get started. Then once the excitement’s gone, we fall right back in to old habits and routines. The dream dies.

With the Earth, if the movement dies two things can happen.

One, the environment shifts so much from damage (bees gone, insects gone, food poisoned by corporations, water scarce) we face a sixth mass extinction like the dinosaurs and it’s the eventual end of the human race in two or three generations.

Two: The ants called humans rolling around on this big blue marble we call home don’t have as big of an effect as we imagine since to the Earth we don’t matter, it belches up a volcano or earthquake and releases more junk into the air than humans can produce in twenty lifetimes.

But for one day we celebrate the movement and try to educate others so at least one of those outcomes doesn’t come to pass.

What if there was a third option? Or fourth?

Like most dreams, the movement can shift and change course to adjust for obstacles we encounter and didn’t anticipate. Yet if you, and just you, change your routines and habits that contribute to improving the environment, and you convince one of your friends to do the same, we can make a real lasting change.

So what can you do:

If you smoke, stop throwing cigarette butts on the ground. It’s the number one source of litter, they don’t decay and they pollute the groundwater with tar, nicotine and carcinogens. You may think one little cigarette butt won’t do any damage, but multiply it by 300 million smokers (or more) at a pack of 20 cigarettes a day and you see the staggering amount of destruction. Stop tossing butts on the ground.

Skip the plastic water bottle. There’s a pile of plastic bottles floating in a vortex in the middle of the Pacific ocean as large as the state of Texas. You can’t conceive it because the size is too large. In ten years, there will be more plastic bottles in the ocean than fish.

Grab a Yeti cup or an aluminum water bottle, or even your own hard plastic water bottle to refill during the day. Make a dozen to keep in the fridge instead of water bottles, and pack them in a cooler when you need them for a game.

Turn your air conditioner up to seventy two. If you are hot, wear less clothes.

Eat less red meat. I know the steak crowd goes nuts when you suggest this with cries of “You can pry my fork and knife out of my cold dead hands.” It’s always funny to me how that’s the only option to hard line extremists. “Pry my gun from my cold dead hands, pry my cigs from my cold dead hands, pry my whatever from my cold dead hands.”

So you’re telling me you would rather die than do one small thing to save the world? Or save a child?

Meat (beef and lamb) are the two biggest contributors to methane gas production, which causes the greenhouse effect and raises the earth’s temperature.

I’m not asking to you to stop eating beef. But you should consider how you buy your meat. If you can source it local, do so. Cut down to half your beef consumption and make up for it with fresh veggies you grow in your own garden.

Start with two days per week. Make them meatless. Expand your culinary pallet to include something different outside of beef or lamb. Maybe eat an eggplant. Or a huge green salad. When you do eat meat, cut your portion size in half.

There is also an added benefit of going meatless. You’ll drop some lb’s which means you won’t feel as hot so you can raise the air conditioner temp up to seventy two.

Drive slower. The faster you drive, the more gas you burn. It’s simple.

I could keep listing a couple of dozen more ways for you to help the environment every day, instead of just one day a year, but it’s better if you consider what you can do and make the changes.

They don’t have to be huge changes, just small things you shift that form into habits.

Then share with one other person and ask them to share.

One person won’t make much of an impact, but multiply that by everybody doing just one little thing, and you’ve got a movement that will literally change the face of the earth.

Live like every day is Earth Day.

5 More things you can do:

Plant a tree- we need them to breath

Plant a garden in your yard – eat fresh vegatables instead of those trucked in

Put a block in the back of your toilet tank to use less water

Seriously consider car pooling at least twice per week, especially if your car gets less than 17 miles per gallon (I’m talking to you big giant SUV drivers)

Send an email to your mayor to suggest city wide environmental improvements such as natural gas bus fleet, police fleet, government fleet- low flow toilets in government and public buildings, a zero plastic bottle initiative in city parks, a tree planting campaign in vacant lots

What are some other small changes we can make that will have a big impact by this time next year?

Prince is dead. Long live the Prince.

It’s starting to be an all too common occurrence of celebrities I grew up with dying. It’s bound to happen. I’m in my mid-40’s, and the actors and singers I grew up with are all 15-20 years older than I am. It’s just life. You get old and die.

But it doesn’t lessen the small pang of heartache or the sense of saddness it brings when we lose someone famous.

Why?

We don’t KNOW them, know them. The majority of us don’t have celebrity friends, and they’re not in our close circles. We may have met them in passing once, or even worked with them (in a few of my friend’s cases), but they aren’t close to us.

Except maybe they are. Prince’s album Purple Rain was huge when I was in 9th grade at Dial Junior High School. It was a toss up as to which Prince song we would sing at lunch or who was going to do the entire Eddie Murphy Delirious routine. I remember one girl, though her name escapes me, who wore a purple jacket and was “in love” with Prince.

I remember my dad getting worked up when I blasted Dirty Diana, I remember singing Little Red Corvette and wondering at the pictures of the jockeys who were there before me. I still wonder if the water was warm enough? And I always know that if it’s Saturday night, then that makes it alright.

Maybe we get so sad because we HAVE grown up with them. In our evolving digital age, we make relationships through internet connections, we follow along with the lives of our family and friends on Facebook, and we transfer those feelings to celebrities that we keep up with.

I suspect it’s going to feel worse in the future. The advent of VR moving into gaming consoles by Christmas to create an explosion of virtual reality in the home place is going to allow direct interaction with characters created by celebrities. I foresee a very near future where I can don a headset and play guitar with Prince on a stage, or go line for line with Doris Roberts, or maybe wrestle Chyna.

Live celebrities will lend their image to VR worlds and through interaction we will grow to know and love them even more. So that when they die, as all of us must, we will grieve harder.

I have about 52 years left on this earth. I know I’m going to lose a lot of celebrities in that time frame. I’m going to lose a lot of friends too.

Maybe we should all just take a moment to reach out and say hi. I’m thinking about you. Every time we lose someone it reminds us of just how frail we are and how fast it goes by. Prince’s music brought us together, even if it was just in spirit.

So in the spirit of Prince, party like it’s 1999. If it’s warm, don’t wear much more. You don’t have to be rich, you don’t have to be cool. Let’s all gather together to get through this thing called life. Love more now. Take a chance on your dream.

We’re all excited, but we don’t know why.

Are you your own boogeyman?

               

Do you let internal small childish fears about rejection direct your life or you listen to the voice inside of you that tells you to try. To give. To keep building and making something new.

Most people will cheer you on. Most people will want you to succeed. Anyone who does not want you to succeed does not belong in your life.

Everyone is an expert at failure. Everyone can point out how “this won’t work,” or “that won’t work” or my personal favorite, “you suck.”

And they are right. For them, these haters, these non-friends, these ID 10 T’s are absolutely correct. To them you do suck.

And why would you want to have that in your life? Cut them out.

Find the people who will support you. I found it in running. I tried 4 100 mile races over the last 12 months and my running friends didn’t care that I was only able to finish 2. They said things like, “You still ran 50 (or 60 Miles).” “Good job.” “Great effort.”

Sometimes success is in the trying.

I’ve been working/trying to start a new business. I’ve had a couple of good months, and I’m still learning and trying.

But I’m scared. I have been scared. And I realized that the fear comes from a place of being rejected. Feeling rejected. It’s a childish feeling about writing that I’ve carried since college, when a Professor told me I sucked.

See, I wrote the story about some guys fighting over coffee. His response was “I drink coffee and I can’t ever see it being that important.” This was pre-Friends, pre-Starbucks, pre-coffee becoming a national phenomenon. So I listened to him, and not to the voice inside of me.

When I moved to LA to pitch scripts to Hollywood, I was told NO more times than I was rejected for dates in high school. It just became another word. The approach was “if this producer doesn’t like it, then the next one will.” And I wrote my ass off. I just opened up a box and found seventeen completed scripts I forgot about. Can you imagine that, writing so much that you forgot what you wrote? I found a half finished novel and almost a dozen outlines. I found that short story, the one that made me afraid to try to become a literary figure.

I stacked those piles of paper up and figured something out. I’m probably not going to be a major literary figure in my lifetime. But I’m a pretty good hack. I mean that in the best way. I write fun, interesting stories that are like beach reads, or candy for the eyes.

I’m going to be okay with that. I’ll sing the Beatles song, paperback writer, and crank out dime novels based on the scripts I wrote, and the outlines I have.

Since September, I’ve published 30 projects on Amazon. 4 novels in the Sci Fi genre, 2 of 13 in my Shadowboxer series and some of the scripts I’ve written. That’s an average of one book per week, which is an ACTION ITEM on the PLAN for my publishing company.

I’m staring an author’s page, and if you are a reader, I’d like your support. Watch for it here, and then like it to get updates. I’ll do a free promo for each book as it comes out, so download it and leave a review. If you like one, you might want to buy another.

Am I still afraid of being rejected? Yep. But I’m also afraid of trying to run some major distances this year after a couple of disappointing races and injuries last year. I’m afraid of failing at this new career.

I’ve been working on turning off my “give a damn” button. But I do give a damn. A damn about trying something new, about pushing my preconceived limits, about believing in a dream. I give a damn about the freedom to travel, and build a brand, and stand for something that is important to me. I give a damn about writing fun fiction about spies, and zombies, and a couple about magic (not all in the same book though!) and even a few non-fiction books that talk about what I’ve learned along the way.

So here I am folks, Chris Lowry the author. Bruises and all.

Want to go on some adventures with me?

 

 

 

 

 

What are you writing right now?

What are you writing? they asked. It seemed like a simple enough question to answer. The interview was going well, the coffee had just enough creamer to verge on the edge of sweetness and enough caffeine to jolt a high octane response.
I’m working on 3 series right now I said, plus a non-fiction series in addition to blog posts, blog post commenting, and opinion pieces wherever I can get them published.

Does that sound like a lot?

The three series are fiction and designed to build my audience. The non-fiction series is about marketing the fiction books, lesson’s I’ve learned so I can teach and train other authors the pitfalls and mistakes I’ve made to shorten their learning curve. The Blog posts are my own, about the writing life, and the blog comments are all over the place, wherever I find a blog that strikes a thought.

I link them all back to my website, when I can, and make some mention of how to add value to anyone who reads it. I’m not sure if I’m the only one reading blog post comments hoping to glean a little bit of intel from them, but I do know that on JA Konrath’s blog and eNovelnetwork blog’s, I’ve clicked on links that provide me information and tips, so there is that.

Why work on three series instead of one?

I joke that I have ADHD, but it’s more than that. I’ve been a writer for over twenty years, with drawers and file cabinets full of stories. Over the past six years, I’ve been playing with my Shadowboxer series.

        

It started as a story about a retired spy living in Florida, but when I uncovered some older scripts I’d written about a hit man in Los Angeles, I could see how to tie them all in together. This opened up a group of stories I wanted to tell, and so far, there are rolling out there. I have 13 outlined, and five up on Amazon.

Sometimes though, I don’t want to play in geopolitical shenanigans. When I write, I try to inhabit the head of my character, and while Brill Wingfield can be funny, he’s also an emotionless killer. Part of his journey is to learn how to feel again. When I’m writing about him and what he has to deal with, I can get very cold and calculating, which is totally not my personality.

So I’ll jump over to work on the Marshal of Magic series started in Witchmas. This was a writing experiment gone swimmingly brilliant. I was playing around with titles, and smart ass heroes and thought about a cop type figure, very very powerful, but mostly due to luck. He’s tasked with being a Marshal to police the world of magic. It’s funny, and sometimes bumbling and designed so that anyone reading it just has fun and giggles.
I set the first one in Memphis, but each adventure is set in a new city as he scrambles around the country trying to correct the horror’s he’s unleashed on the country by mistake.

I’m doing something new and neat with it, I think.

I’m posting on Wattpad as I write it. Go read it here.

What I hope to do is find the audience who likes the story line enough to follow along and comment as it’s written, and then keep up with the Marshall as I transfer him over to Amazon and KU Unlimited. I’ve got the first book almost complete, so I’m posting chapter by chapter on Wattpad, and will publish it free on all platforms in May. The third through twelfth book are all outlined, so I’ll just keep writing and posting, writing and posting so readers can discover it.

The third series is a Zombie Apocalypse novel I started years ago. A dad hunts for his kids in a post Z world. He’s got tunnel vision on finding them, but keeps getting pulled in to saving the group of people who cling to his leadership.

I’ll follow the same first book free formula in it, and hopefully readers will enjoy the fast pace and problem solving the Dad uses to travel across the country in the hopes of finding his children.

The non-fiction series is for anyone who’s ever wanted to write; if you’ve heard the expression learn from another’s mistakes then new writer’s can learn from my many mistakes and experiments to becoming an employed author.

That’s it.

That’s what I’m writing right now.
You can check out works for free to see if you like my style, and you can always let me know what you think.

What about you? Do you like reading multiple series? Are you a writer with more than one story to tell?

How Science Fiction shapes Reality

Ever wonder what a Moonshot is? It’s a goal so HUGE it makes folks think you’re crazy. Like 1,000 songs in your pocket (ipod), or a movie shot on a phone (iphone, Galaxy) in your day to day life, or Ending World Hunger, Solving the Homeless problem (larger goals.) All of them have or can be done, it’s only impossible until someone does it.

Yesterday I read some news that was freaking awesome. In our lifetime (the next 2 decades, we’re shooting a robotic space fleet to Alpha Centauri for exploration and discovery. A literal Moonshot. Brought to you by Stephen Hawking, a Russian Billionaire and Mark Zuckerberg. (maybe your FB profile can go into outer space?)

This week, Elon Musk’s team landed a rocket on a platform in the ocean after a successful launch, bringing us one step closer to commercial space travel.

Why am I so excited that we’re focused on the stars when we have real world problems to deal with? (hunger, the coming water wars, overtaxation, terrorism, etc)
I grew up under the success of the Space program. The shuttles were built and launched in my early life. Earth has limted resources but unlimited potential, much like the humans who run around on it. We look to the stars and aspire to more than we are. If you aren’t moved by the heavens, you need to get out of the city and out from under the light pollution to actually see what you are missing. Go to the wild places and stare up at the sky if you want to stir the soul.

The imagination of science fiction writers is coming to fruition. You may not be Zuckerberg, you may not have Russian oil money to fund your dream, but you can build a model rocket in the backyard. You can learn to code, learn to program and build a robot with parts from a store. You can inspire your kids to read, to learn and to dream. Heck, you can even teach your children that as humans, we can accomplish so much more by working together than we ever could by focusing on tearing each other down.

There is one thing you can do today to begin your own Moonshot goal. Daydream. Stare off into space (not literally, since it’s daylight you know.) and dream about one thing. One Big Thing you would solve if you could. What bugs you? What irks you? What do you wish would disappear forever?

How would YOU solve that problem?

Then take One action to solve it. Just one tiny little action to solve the thing that bugs you. Then, tell one friend, your closest friend and ask them to do the action too.

If they agree, you’ve just increased your resources by 100%. Now ask one more person.

One person against the world is a kook. Two people against the world is crazy. But THREE people is a movement.

A movement can make a Moonshot happen.

Maybe your Moonshot seems too big to conquer with just three people. Maybe you feel like you’re limited in what you can do. That’s okay. Most Moonshots can’t be accomplished overnight. It starts with little things. Like an idea.

An idea to send a fleet of robot spacecraft to explore strange new worlds, to seek out new life and new civilizations and to boldly go where no one has gone before.

It’s an incredible world we live in full of limitless potential. Especially if you want to dream big. Go forth and daydream today for tomorrow we act.

” And so does Stephen Hawking. Yesterday, the physicist-slash-super-genius, Russian billionaire Yuri Milner, and Facebook boss Mark Zuckerberg unwrapped plans to send a fleet of tiny spacecraft to Alpha Centauri (cough, nearest star system, cough). The mission: to collect images, data, maybe even signs of life, and beam them back to Earth. They’re putting up hundreds of millions to get the project going, but expect to spend billions. The plan: build these robotic spacecrafts to travel super fast. And then send them into space, powered by laser beams from Earth. In 20 years – give or take – the robo-fleet will roll up to Alpha Centauri and check out what’s going on there. Sidebar: it took NASA almost 10 years to send a spacecraft to Pluto. Alpha Centauri is much, much farther away. So that sound you hear is some scientists stifling their laughter. And other scientists going ‘zedis lapedis, this is so crazy it just might work.’”

Let me send you a FREE COPY of the SCIENCE FICTION NOVEL

MOON MEN

Chasing Moonshot Dreams

I woke up with the urge to pontificate a little today. I’ve been chasing a MOONSHOT goal for the past year and I’ve learned a few things I’d like to share.

Don’t Wait to Chase your dreams.

I’m an author. If you like to read action adventure or urban fantasy or light science fiction, click over to my new FB page and LIKE. Share with your friends who like to read. Click the sign up button and I’ll send you a free copy of CONSCRIPTED, so you can see if you like my style.

Know the Outcome first or start with the end in Mind. If you know exactly what you want to accomplish, and focus on reaching that milestone, the clarity will help you reach the goal faster.

I recommend writing down specifically what you want. Be clear and precise.

Then take massive action to get to it. Massive action doesn’t mean do it all in one day. That will overwhelm your system. Aim for a 1% improvement each day. That’s the key to a successful moonshot. Just 1% each day will build the momentum to the massive action you need to reach the goal.

But what if your actions don’t work? Adjust. We’ve all heard the saying “What’s the definition of crazy? Doing the same thing over and over again and expecting different results.” If what you are doing is NOT working, is NOT helping you reach your goal, then stop. Do something different.

There is no excuse today for not living a life designed for you.

The internet is an amazing tool and almost every now has a phone with more access to information and knowledge in an instant than the giants of learning had in their entire lifetime.

No matter what your dream, you can take action to make it happen.

Want to play guitar? Memorize four chords and practice until you know them and can play them. Those same four chords will let play hundreds of pop and classic songs.

Want to speak another language? Print out the 200 most common words in that language and memorize them. Add in the “pronouns” and in less time than it takes to memorize a song, you can speak in another language.

Want to quit your job that you hate? Start a part time business on the side.

Want to write a book? Block off an hour each day and write the darn thing. You’ll be done in two months if you write 1,000 words a day. (just a little longer than the length of this post)
Or partner with someone who has a publishing company and ask if they can help you.

How about buy a new house? Make more money? Drive a new car? Those are outcomes. Write them down, then write the steps you need to take to reach that goal, and work toward it every day.

Run a marathon or ultramarathon? Travel to Bora Bora? Be in the best relationship with someone who loves you? Raise amazing children who want to save the world? Be a better friend?

I could go on and on listing out hundreds of big and small goals, but I’d be pulling from my list. What’s on your list? What’s your desired outcome?

Start today. Take a notebook and turn to the first page. Write down the goal. Now list the name of one person who is where you want to be, and write their name down. Call them or text. Ask them, “Hey so and so, I set a new goal today to do X. You are there and so I wanted to get some advice.”

Trust me. It’s gonna be tough. Like learning to ride a bike tough. But if you gave up the first time you fell on a bike, you’d never learn. Or how about walking? What if your parent said to you the first time you tottered up and tripped, “Don’t do that honey. It’s dangerous. You’ll hurt yourself. Maybe you shouldn’t be a walker.”

They don’t say that. They pick you up, kiss the boo boo and make you walk again, until most of us are good at it. Some of us have a goal to walk really really fast from Los Angeles to New York in the next couple of years.

No matter how big your goal, you can take action today, right now to pursue it. Don’t stop. Don’t listen to anyone who tells you to stop. And ignore all the rules that say you can’t do it, or it shouldn’t be done that way. Because maybe it can. It just hasn’t been done yet.

What’s your goal?

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