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Several have asked about my silence this month.  What have I been up to?  Where have I been?  Why am I so quiet?

Quite frankly, I’ve been pursuing a dream.  I’ve often been described as a “gifted” storyteller.  To me, there is nothing special in that.  I come from a long line of storytellers.  There is nothing that I love so well as to make a story come alive for a child (or any age audience for that matter.)  I love to tell a story!  But, I’ve always harbored this secret dream – this naughty little desire.  I didn’t want to just tell the story.  I’ve always wanted to be a writer and write the story!  

Those of you who know me well may say, well duh!  We all knew that already.  What do you mean you want to be a writer?  You’re already a writer.  To some extent, that’s true.  I’ve written (and had published) countless training manuals, presentations, reports.  I’ve even written and had training materials for lawyers published.  This is all well and good but these are nice, dry (although very well written!) boring, technical materials.  I want to write stories like the ones I like to tell – stories with passion and fire that will spark the imagination of others.  Believe me, that is easier said than done!  Telling a story is one thing but writing it down, is an entirely different matter!!!

All that aside, since I’ve had a little time on my hands, I’ve used it to pursue my dreams.  I’ve formed a publishing company.  (No, I haven’t learned everything I need to know yet but is amazing what I’ve learned so far!)  I’ll be releasing my first children’s book, A Valentine for Miranda, in September under the Alamofire Publishing imprint.  I just finished writing my second children’s book, A Home for Blackie, and sent it to the illustrator today.  I’m hoping to be able to release it by Christmas.   I already have plans for 3 other books and am working on the outlines for those. 

Will I make any money?  I can’t say. Will I become a best-selling author and be “successful?”  Who knows?  To be truthful, making money isn’t the point.  Don’t get me wrong.  I like money and I definitely could use the income stream right now.  But money alone is not the point of this endeavor.  The point was feeding my soul.  The point was giving myself permission to dream.  The point was giving myself  permission to explore this desire.  The point was allowing myself to be more of who I really am and to express that self in a new creative medium.   To that end, I am already successful because I’ve followed my passion and my dream. 

I would say that one of the great unexpected “gifts” of being laid off has been the joy that I’ve found in the writing – not only in the children’s stories but in writing for this forum and Empowher as well.  I’ve now been “published” by others which was another secret heart’s desire which I’ve seen fulfilled.  I doubt that this would have happened if I’d still been employed.  I’d have been too busy working 80 hours a week to give myself permission to do anything but sleep!  For this gift of the time to reinvent myself, I am grateful.  

To those of you in similar circumstances, I just want to continue to encourage you to never give up on your dreams and to never quit looking for the ”possibilities” and “opportunities” in life.  I’ve found that possibilities often become reality and rise out of the ashes of truly impossible situations.   

Keep Dreaming…. Mary

Live long.  Live well.  Live happy.  The most important thing is to LIVE!

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Tags: Layoffs, reinventing yourself, reinventing yourself after a layoff, Second Careers, Unemployment

This entry was posted on Tuesday, July 28th, 2009 at 10:26 pm and is filed under Layoffs, Older Workers, Second Careers. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.