Ryan Porter’s Make Your Own Lunch

I used to make myself a sandwich for lunch while in elementary school. My mother insists, of course, that this is not true, and that I never (till today, probably) made my own lunch. And yet I distinctly remember making -- and feeling bored with -- my sandwiches of Israeli cream cheese on brown bread. Despite my discontent, I never considered making myself something else, not even a sandwich with chocolate spread or jam, though I am sure that those alternatives were available to me. I made myself the same uninspired sandwich every day, and every day I unhappily ate it for lunch.

Ryan Porter, in his fabulous, funny, and very inspiring “How To” book: Make Your Own Lunch, How to Live an Epically Epic Life of Epicness, reminds us that we make our own lunch, and that we can change that lunch whenever we want and whichever way we'd like. He encourages us to remember what exactly it means to dream and go after our dreams. He challenges us to let go of all other options, forget about plan B, close our ears to relatives’ cautions and warnings, and make a step-by-step plan, keeping our goals, dreams, and passions always before our eyes. He tells us: You don’t like the sandwich you make (or get) for lunch every day? Well then, it is time to make a new sandwich. Or maybe a salad, or even steak and fries.

Ryan Porter’s intended audience is high school students, but for me, at forty, the funny stories of his life and his astute insights worked just as well. I found myself wondering just why is it that I am not following my dreams with the single-minded focus that Porter champions? Why am I always ready with a plan B, and why is my attention engaged almost exclusively by the low likelihood of me becoming a published writer (or a reiki practitioner) in my preferred way?

At forty, I wish to let go of all my preconceived notions of why I cannot make my own lunch: I’m not ready; I don’t know enough; I'm not good enough; my parents would disapprove; my friends would think I’m strange; people will read my book and know that I thought about this; people will disagree with me; my siblings will be ashamed of me; the kids will be mad at me. And many many more. For this second part of my life, I would like to live an epically epic life of epicness, following my dreams and doing just what I want to do, with epic successes and epic fails, instead of just sitting at home afraid to venture.

Ryan Porter presents an idea so simple it is almost incomprehensible: set a goal, get rid of all the other options, and start moving, step by step, toward that goal. Don’t try to swallow that goal whole. Take small bites on the way. And behold: it is yours.

To check out more about Ryan Porter:
Make Your Own Lunch Website
Ryan Porter's Youth Speaker Website
Ryan Porter on Youtube
Make Your Own Lunch on Amazon
Buy a paperback of Make Your Own Lunch from Porter's website

Life with a Light Laugh

I take myself too seriously. I take my writing seriously, my parenting seriously, my exercise routine seriously. I analyze my mistakes in all areas of life seriously. What have I done wrong? Why have I gone wrong? And most important of all: how can I fix it? Heaven forbid that I should make the same mistake twice! And if the fix for a problem has not worked -- I tremble to think of the consequences to my state of mind.

It’s like having a judge next door who works around the clock to give his opinion: what I’ve done well, what I’ve done wrong, and how my solutions are working. This judge is ingrained in me, ever willing to step up and pick up responsibility for evaluating my performance. He never sleeps, never pauses, is ever alert and ready for business.

I like to think that I get along well with my judge. He (yes, he is male) pronounces his opinion as to my laziness, my failures, my inactivity, and I return the favor by becoming depressed and not doing anything whatsoever. If he’s going to be so difficult about every little thing I do or say, why, in all the fairies’ names, should I even bother?

In the past few weeks, however, I started a conversation with the judge. Perhaps if he stopped pushing so hard, there will be room for me to write, grow, laugh. Turns out that the judge is quite willing. I never knew how much he longed for me to have the freedom to do. “I feel so frustrated,” he says. “I just want you to fly, to reach the sky, for your writing to flow.” He looks at me, confused rather than critical, almost ashamed of himself. “I don’t know where it all went wrong,” he says.

Fortunately, at this juncture, my friend Rebecca came for a visit. We decided that since we were having a girlfriend to girlfriend, heart to heart talk, there is no better place for us to sit than the treehouse. The sky slowly darkened as we laughed and shared stories. Moths fluttered about our heads. The grasses crinkled, and I thought deer might be near. I felt happier than I have felt in a long time.

Life is not a one-key door, nor a treasure chest with seven different locks. The keys to life come at random, when we are ready, fitting the keyhole with an unexpected precision and serendipity. And last night, sitting and chatting in the tree house, Rebecca gave me a key that was just right for what I am dealing with now.

“My teacher, Chophel,” Rebecca said, “always says: ‘We are all wrong. We might as well take ourselves lightly.’”

To laugh at myself is perhaps the greatest lesson I wish to learn, to take myself lightly. Next time I get all serious, critical, and dramatic about my life, please remind me that I'm all wrong. That it’s just so much better to take a breath, and let it out in a laugh, lightly.

Take a breath and admit that you're all wrong. Laugh about it.  Take yourself lightly.

YES to Opportunity and Magic

A few days prior to the writers’ conference this year, I tried to decide what I want to get out of it. If I had a goal, I reasoned, I would be more likely to leave the conference a wiser woman. I could learn more about the craft of writing children’s books, meet other writers like me, perhaps get lucky and say hello to an editor or an agent, but what do I really want? For the last few months I’ve been writing a romance novel for adults -- what am I seeking in a conference aimed at children’s books?

I do have one novel for teens that is being considered by an agent, and I have been playing around with a sequel to it (playing around equals to about one hundred and fifty pages written before I got the main characters stranded on a magical mountain). That makes me count as a children’s fiction writer still, even if I am concentrating on romance right now.

And craft is craft. Perhaps no one will teach me here to write better rolling around in bed scenes (notice the euphemism?), but I could learn about revision, creativity, and dreams. That settled it for me. I was coming to the conference to be inspired. What better goal than that? And, just to be on the safe side, I chose a secondary goal: to give twenty of my business cards away. The least I could do, since Dar printed about five hundred of them for me.

The conference began yesterday with Charlie Price, author of Desert Angel (and more). After listening to him, my first action once I returned to my room was to buy the novel on kindle. Price spoke about his creative process and how he watches the movie of the story unroll as he writes. I could see his movie myself on the page once I started reading. Price's writing is visual, raw and real. I felt connected to Angel, the main character, from the first paragraph, and I’m sure this is a book that I will write about again. I was lucky to sit next to Charlie Price’s wife at dinner and talk books and work ethics with her. That was great.

After dinner I expected great inspiration. I had heard Dan Yaccarino speak before (and I wrote about his YES presentation). But this time he surprised me. After speaking for about an hour about his success, which he attributes to his saying YES to every opportunity that came his way, Yaccarino added: “For every project you see here there are ten that didn’t make it.” I was amazed and inspired by how Yaccarino keeps challenging himself, working hard, trying new things, never afraid of being ridiculed or making mistakes. Truly inspiring.

So inspiring, in fact, that I’m writing to you this morning before I even had breakfast, so I’m going to do it now. Wishing all of us a wonderfully inspiring and enriching Saturdday!

Inspiration

This morning I came by an Ella Fitzgerald quote which read: “It isn't where you came from; it's where you are going that counts.” The quote accompanied a photograph of fog misting through a forest scene with a path climbing up and disappearing into the picture. I considered the photo and the quote for a few moments. Something felt not quite right seeing them side by side. Then I realized. To me, that photo said: it is not the destination but the way that counts.

Ella Fitzgerald says that where we come from does not count, but I remember where I sat as I wrote the very first stirrings of The Princess’ Guide. Princess Anna Mara came to life just outside the doors of Ostrovsky High in Ra’anana, Israel. I wrote her story for my friends to read if they were bored during their next class. I remember my enjoyment as I wrote it, my laughter, the magic.

“It’s where you are going that counts,” Ella Fitzgerald says. But I wonder, how true is that? I used to feel that every choice I made created ripples which obliterated everything around me but that one direction I chose. Every choice was epic, unyielding, unalterable. But lately I begin to think, what if the choices I make are not as life-shaking as I imagine. What if deciding on road A does not take me that far from where I’d have gone on road B in the end? What if the destination is more or less the same, but it is the way there that counts?

I guess I am in a philosophic mood today. After all, I’m going to turn 40 in a few days and become middle aged, as my son announced. I’m allowed to be a bit more introspective than usual. It is raining outside, a soft pitter patter of rain that gently wets the ground, and the scene outside my window is not so far removed from the photo above Ella Fitzgerald’s quote. This is where I am now, on those stairs, in that mysterious forest. I’d like to believe that my way goes up that path in the photograph and not down, but perhaps up and down are both illusions, existing only in my own mind.

And at this moment in time, as I stand there on my path in my forest, I wonder if it even matters what my destination is or which direction I first came from. The only thing that matters is that I’m here now, in this beautiful place, getting a little wet, it’s true, but breathing in the fresh air that the rain cleaned with fresh oxygen exhaled by those ferns below. Can you tell I’m happy where I’m at right now? At least for today, I am.

My wishes for my birthday month: to write a few pages daily in the romance novel. To walk in the forest a few times each week. To take deep breaths. To accept what I am given with love and appreciation. To smile and laugh every day.

Do you have any March wishes?