About a year ago, RaeLea and I met with our boss, who we contract with to provide wellsite geology and mudlogging services on drilling rigs in North Dakota’s oilfield. Kathy had just finished constructing a mammoth new headquarters for her business, and she offered to give us the grand tour before we convened in the conference room.

“Oh, that would be wonderful,” I admitted, “but we know you are very busy.”

Without hesitation, Kathy said, “I’m busy.  You two are busy.  Frank, we’re all busy. Come on, I’ll show you around.”

Kathy Neset is a businesswoman who, over the course of multiple decades of gritty persistence, built up her own burgeoning empire in a male-dominated industry, with a current market share of something like 40% of all drilling rigs in North Dakota.  She was appointed by the Governor to sit on the North Dakota Board of Higher Education, regularly is featured as a presenter at conferences, manages well over 100 employees and contractors, all while remaining active in several different trade and civic groups.

By my humble reckoning, Kathy is a titan of industry in North Dakota.  And yet, in a nonchalant statement she implied that her level of “busy” was not any different than my own.  That really hit home for me.

If I were to write a note over the years each time I have told someone “I’m too busy” when asked to do something, I would have a whole book’s worth of wordcount (my first novel is, incidentally, something I have been “too busy” to finish writing…for about two decades).

I’m trying to break myself of the habit of using “I’m too busy” or “I don’t have enough time” as an excuse for not accomplishing things which are important to me.  “I am too busy to work on that project today” needs to be an extinct statement.

After all, for being perpetually “too busy”, I magically find the time to binge-watch “House of Cards” (and consequently force my wife to endure listening to me quote Frank Underwood with my terrible attempt at a South Carolina accent).

So is it truly a lack of time which prevents me from working on the projects which move me closer to achieving my goals?  Or is uttering “I’m too busy” just another way of admitting that I possess poor time management skills?

I am reminded of a quote I mentioned before on this site, and which I remind myself of every day (because it emblazons the header of my Personal Journal):

Our priorities are what we do, not the things we say we do.

I recently listened to an interview with my self-publishing idol, Hugh Howey, in which the interviewer asked him how he was able to write so prolifically, all while working full-time before his writing career became self-sustaining. His answer:

“Basically by giving up video games and some TV shows and not going to the movies as often and things like that, I was spending my leisure time writing.“

Essentially, Hugh Howey refused to allow himself to be “too busy” to work on his life goal of becoming a published author.  That is so simple and yet so profound.

There is so much I want to accomplish in life, and such a limited time span to get it done. I am not going to lean on that tired excuse anymore.  I am NOT too busy to achieve my goals.

This must have been what it felt like to be God.  To have complete control. To end life on a whim.  I was nine years old when I experienced this power, and I wielded it to dreadful effect.

I don’t think I was evil, even though my actions were certainly cruel.  I was just a thoughtless child. Besides, I am reformed now, and I have made my recompense.  I hope I have done enough to make up for what I did.  [Read more…]

Storytelling isn’t just about entertaining audiences. Good storytelling connects with readers on an emotional level. This connection between the reader and writer can even compel readers to take action.

The pairing of stories with a call-to-action is a well-established truism in the marketing world. The most effective advertisements and marketing campaigns use storytelling to engage the audience with the ultimate intent being an actionable one:  usually, to make a purchase.

I recently bore witness to the development of a clever example of this sort of effective storytelling in a volunteer-created campaign at our local animal shelter. My sister, Beth, has a huge heart and is passionate about animal welfare.  She volunteers her time at the shelter, and she told me about some of the animals that have been languishing for months in confinement without being adopted.

Evidently, black cats have a markedly lower probability of being adopted (people have a difficult time seeing their expressions). Older cats are almost always more difficult to find new homes for (everyone wants kittens).

Beth told me about one of the cats, “Sweetie” who is an older female that had been at the shelter since May. This cat was visibly depressed and withdrawn, possibly a byproduct of a past abuse and thus distrust of humans.  As a big fan of animals myself, this story broke my heart, and I suggested to Beth that she work to tap into that set of emotions by sharing the backstory of these cats.

It turns out, the animal shelter was coincidentally kicking around trying just such a technique.  (I’m admittedly naive, as I’ve since recognized that this storytelling technique has been used to great effect by other animal shelters, for years).

Being a talented writer and graphic artist, Beth took that seed of an idea and cultivated a set of simple but effective ads.  She used a mix of her trademark wit and personification of the “unwanted pets” to really wrench the hearts of potential adoptees.

Here are a few examples (click them for a larger version):

As I mentioned, some of these animals had been at the shelter for months, with diminishing hopes of finding a loving home.  The reaction to these “personal interest” micro-stories was swift. Within a handful of days of posting the above ads, all of these animals found homes.

It’s no wonder that storytelling is used by marketers of organizations big or small, commercial or nonprofit:  it works!

Note: This is an article that we wrote a while back for a website dedicated to personal evolution. We decided to shut down that website so we could focus our efforts here, creating modern fantasy fiction.

It was just a couple years into my website development career when I began to recognize that my clients could be sorted into two camps:  those who prioritized pragmatism, and those who prioritized perfection.

The more pragmatic clients embraced quick turnaround.  They knew that their websites were living creatures that should never remain stagnant. These clients expected to make frequent updates to their sites, and so they tended to worry less about “pixel perfect” work and aimed instead to get their message online quickly and accurately, so they could use their resources to serve their own customers better. Pragmatists tend to be better decision makers, and thus more effective business leaders.

For the perfectionist clients, I noticed that they tended to fixate on the most mundane details. They spent hours discussing which style of bullet points to use, line spacing, and tweaking the color pallet and images for their website.  They believed that their pursuit of perfection was a badge of pride. I felt that it was a symptom of wastefulness, focusing on the trivial while losing focus on the big picture.  No visitors to their website would ever even notice those details–customers want accurate, easy-to-find information that is presented in an intuitive manner.  

It is just shy of blasphemy to suggest that the pursuit of perfection is an obstacle to success–but that is exactly what I believe!

This seems to hold true for all manner of creators:  whether they write, build furniture, create art, or develop websites.  It seems natural for people to applaud perfection, but to pursue perfection is to squander resources.

Satisfaction Today is Better than Perfection Tomorrow.

Sometimes you have to be willing to admit that “good enough” really is good enough!  This isn’t a matter of accepting mediocrity.  It is a matter of finding that sensible point where continued effort will yield diminishing returns–and then mustering the willpower to STOP.

It is my observation that we often use the Pursuit of Perfection as an excuse for indecisiveness which can lead to paralysis. Instead of launching a project and moving on to the next item on the list, we become stuck in place.

Even though I know this to be true, sometimes I find that I am guilty of this same mentality of pursuing perfection.  I will spend hours editing a simple blog post that might get seen by no more than a few dozen loyal readers.  Sure, I want to present my ideas with clarity and I take pride in my work, but at some point it becomes a huge impediment to progress–to actually publishing the damn article.

Pursuing perfection means compromising quality over the long run.

The pursuit of perfection means raising the bar and thus the barrier to entry. It means decreasing quantity of output.  Ironically, the pursuit of perfection means decreasing quality too. The single best way I can become a better writer is to write more.  

I am no literary genius, but I won’t even have a chance to find out what I am capable of if I fixate on achieving that elusive, mythical objective of Perfection.  

I am betting you probably have a project which you have gotten bogged down with because you have been trying to make it perfect. If so, I challenge you to step back from the project and ask yourself if that extra, small gain is worth the time investment.  Most likely the best answer will be, “this is good enough!”  Put a bow on it, and move on to your next task.

I take pride in being a nonconformist, in bucking tradition to blaze my own trail. I believe it to be the hallmark of a man that he should endeavor to leave his own mark on the world. Even so, Time has a funny habit of reminding me that the apple doesn’t fall very far from the tree.

I grew up around farming. My parents and uncles farm and ranch on the same acres in southwest North Dakota that were homesteaded by my Great Grandparents after they emigrated from Czechoslovakia in the early 1900’s.

When we weren’t in school (or making a hobby out of genocide), my sisters and I spent our non-leisure time performing the usual chores to be found in plenty on a working farm: assisting the adults by tending to the chickens, pigs, calves and milk cows, maintaining the property by mowing and painting, and assisting in the shop and fields in various capacities ranging from running errands to driving trucks and tractors.

While I loved the lifestyle, I observed first-hand how difficult it is to make a living as a farmer. Careful crop planning and management of input costs such as seed, fertilizer, fuel, and time could be nullified by Mother Nature’s whim: drought, hail storms, rains arriving too late or frosts arriving too early, grasshopper infestation, weed infestation, and numerous other maladies.

The cattle side of operations had its own share of challenges.  Calves could be eaten by coyotes or come down with pneumonia or hoof rot. Bulls and cows can get hit by lightning as they stand out in an open pasture during a sudden, freak storm (it happens more often than you might think).

Even if the crops reached harvest or the cattle reached maturity, the volatility of commodity markets were the final boss to conquer. No amount of good management can eliminate the forces of global commodity markets:  fair weather in Ukraine may increase global supply of wheat, lowering prices. The national economy may be in recession, thus reducing families’ grocery budgets and demand for steak and hamburger.

Of course, no matter what the yield or profits may be, the bank which provided my father and uncles with operating loans would still expect payments to be made on time.

My point is: no matter how careful a farmer or rancher may be, his or her best efforts can get trumped by forces such as weather or markets, which are completely outside of his or her control.

Farming requires faith.

When I was a teenager, I recognized that while I possessed my Dad’s entrepreneurial spirit, I did not inherit his faith. I could not fathom putting in the effort that he did, to so often see his chance at profit wiped away by a storm or eaten by insects.

So I went to university where I studied Business Management.  I founded a web development firm from scratch, and I built up a respectable client base over the course of 14 years. When the oil boom arrived in our backyard, I segued into working as a contractor on a drilling rig (which is where I met RaeLea, and where we both continue to work). It’s quite a bit different from farming and ranching!

Both careers have been challenging and satisfying, but my persistent passion has always been storytelling and writing. This website was founded in part as a way to exercise (and maybe exorcise) my love of storytelling in written form.

I write in my spare time because it’s extremely difficult to earn a living as a writer. There are of course authors made famous by their breakaway best-selling novels, but they are outliers, not the norm.

As a writer, I punch at the keyboard every day. Sometimes the well runs dry and I cannot summon inspiration. Often, I write tens of thousands of words, only to grow disillusioned with the concept and set it back on the virtual shelf.  I know that even when I write a story that I think may be worth sharing with others, there’s a good chance that many of my readers will find the story boring.

To succeed as a writer, I need to put in the hours, whether the concept pans out or not. I need to invest energy into studying technique and putting those ideas into practice. I have to commit to years of effort to bring a novel to life.

I must do all this, with full knowledge that my stories might never sell, might never reach break-even (and statistically speaking, probably won’t).

Despite the tribulations, despite the probability of critical and commercial failure, I still write.  I have stories in my head, and they need to get out into the world.

I could not think of two trades more different from one another than farming and writing, and yet, I see now that they have a lot in common:

• They both require a long apprenticeship
• They both depend on persistent, unwavering work ethic
• The payoff for both is mostly in the hands of external forces
• Both require a certain faith (or stubbornness).

I think I may finally understand why my father persists with his fields and livestock so stubbornly every year, despite the adversaries which are stacked against him. I understand, because I feel a similar calling to tell stories, to write.

Dad could never stop planting, even if he wanted to, because farming is embedded in the composition of who he is. He has a compulsion to grow things, to make something where there previously was nothing.

Isn’t that what storytelling is?  Writing is taking the seed of an idea and cultivating it until it becomes something which can reach maturity and be harvested to share with others. Maybe the readers will “buy” it, or maybe they won’t. A writer does not let such a challenge stop him.

By embracing my persistent passion for writing, I think I understand the stubbornness my younger self had labeled as the “faith” my father has. Though our interests may differ, I see now that I must have inherited that trait after all.