Skip to main content

Never Give Up

Hi everyone.


Sorry it's been a while since I last posted. Where has this year gone? I know that September is often referred to as the new January but I didn't mean to miss out on half the year! 

I won't deny that it has been a frustrating few months and I guess I'm not alone in feeling that. Since the start of the pandemic, everything seems to be taking far longer to achieve and no one seems to be really on top of things any more. Add to that the anxiety and uncertainty about the future and it does feel at times like it would be a lot easier to just curl up on the sofa and watch Netflix until about 2027.

But when it is something you really feel you just have to keep going with, the amount of strength and energy you need to galvanise yourself can be really exhausting and debilitating. Self-care tends to go out of the window but actually, as I know only too well, that is when you really need it the most.

And when things do take a turn for the better, it is one of the most wonderful feelings in the world. On the day that my energy company finally decided that after a seven month battle with them, I didn't owe them over £1800 but instead they owed me over £1100, it felt like I'd won the lottery. 

Then, when after a six month wait, I was finally given the go-ahead to contact the potential copyright holders whose permission I need to be able to publish the book of letters to my grandmother by her close friend Ethel North, it was another momentous moment. 

So right now, if you are feeling like giving up on something that deep down you really don't want to, then my advice would be to just hang on a little bit longer. You never know just how close you might be to finally succeeding in your goal. After all, as someone much wiser than me once said, "Success is on the other side of failure." 


Take care,

Melissa x   

  


Comments

Popular posts from this blog

Portfolio Career

I have been telling everyone recently that I now have a "portfolio career". Most people don't know what I mean by this (someone even said they'd have to "Google" it!) but it's really just a fancy way of saying that you have fingers in several different pies. I have been a "professional" writer since 1995 although I have always been a writer of some sort, ever since I was at school. During this time, I have stuck pretty religiously to writing and only occasionally had flights of fancy about getting a "proper" job. (And I still do. Only this time last week, I found myself offering to manage a jazz band!!) However, for various reasons, I've recently been seriously exploring other freelancing options that I can do alongside writing and have now decided to "rebrand" myself as a writer, a crafter and a musician. I also plan to carry on working on community newsletters and do something in the spiritual healing/growth area a...

Shortlisted in the Writer's Toolkit Flash Fiction Competition

Hi everyone. A good writing week this week, despite the distractions of the cricket and the tennis, possibly because my portfolio career has been suspended, pending further enquiries (don't tell my patrons!) and I've been at my desk every night. Long may it continue! I said in my last post that I was recently shortlisted (top ten) in the Writer's Toolkit flash fiction competition. The competition brief was to write a short story of 150 words or less on the theme of 'Secrets'. My story actually came out at exactly 150 words because at the last minute, after I'd sealed the envelope, I suddenly panicked and decided that the wording of the rules could mean that the story had to be exactly 150 words. Mine was 149 if I remember correctly and it was surprisingly difficult to add that extra word! Apparently the competition attracted 182 entries (which I must admit was quite a surprise) and entries came from several European countries as well as the UK. I was particu...

Setting Quotas

Does anyone else set quotas for how much work they send out every week, month etc or is that just me? I decided a while back that I was probably never going to send anything out if I didn't set a quota and for various reasons I decided that six items a month was right for me. Like lots of ideas, it is probably good in theory and so far I have managed to keep to my quota. Unfortunately, the theory seems to fall down when I find myself (usually on the last day of the month!) desperately scratching around trying to find somewhere to send something in an effort to meet my quota. A few weeks ago, while in this predicament, I came across Healthy  magazine in a well-known health food store. I noticed that they offered fifty pounds worth of vouchers to spend in store for the writer of the star letter. Desperate to fulfill my quota and hopeful of winning the top prize, I duly sent off a letter. The email was returned by the "postmaster" for some reason, so ...