Sometimes We Need to Be A Little Crazy

A friend of mine has a mug like this. When I first saw it, I thought, I have to have one of those! The problem? It’s from a 1986 Hallmark Collection! Zebras with colored stripes! I began painting my watercolor zebras with colored stripes about that same time. I guess the Universe wanted me to have one because I found one immediately on eBay! I keep it on the counter in my kitchen, and I smile every time I look at it. It brings me joy. It reminds me of the journey I've been on for more than 15 years that has brought the Brezas of Carifa Series to life!

And the message on the mug: Have the courage to be a little crazy!  For me, nothing could’ve been crazier than to even think about writing a book! I had no beliefs about whether I could or couldn’t write; I’d never thought about it!

In The Assignment of Alignment,  Book 2 in the Brezas of Carifa Series, Stazuri, the teacher at the learning place, talks about the beliefs we hold and how powerful they are in affecting our lives. Henry Ford summed it up perfectly, “Whether you think you can or you think you can’t, you’re right.” This statement emphasizes that our beliefs can become a self-fulfilling prophecy. 

One of my daughters had expressed an interest in writing in her college days. I had an idea for a story, so I thought I’d jot down my ideas and then pass them to her. She wasn’t even slightly interested! I believed I had a strong idea, but I'd never tried to write anything and was clueless as to how to begin. I started by compiling thoughts I had about the inchoate world of zebras with colored stripes. 

It’s been my experience that making the decision to take on a new and difficult challenge is often the hardest part of beginning something big. Taking on something uncertain, something that demands a lot from us, something that makes us dig deep within our souls, often keeps us from taking that first step. And most of the reasons people have for not taking that first step boil down to fear! Fear is a powerful force that can keep you from doing something you’d like to do. It keeps you in the comfort zone—but stepping outside the boundaries of our comfort zone is where the magic happens!

In The Assignment of Alignment, Londrani comes face-to-face with Folami, a venom-spitting cobra in the Plane of Remembering. Folami represents the fear that most of us carry to one degree or another. Various studies show that from 85% to 99% of the things we fear or worry about never come to pass. 

There are so many times I wanted to let this project go, bury it! It seemed impossible, it seemed so unreachable! Folami crept into my mind and said to me over and over: Why are you doing this? It’s not going to go anywhere! Why are you wasting your time? But those questions made me ask a bigger question: Do you want to take your final breath thinking, “I could’ve done more, why didn’t I fight harder to make my dream happen?” The latter thought is what has brought me to where I am today, four completed, illustrated manuscripts, professionally edited and polished, ready for an agent to become as excited about my island of Carifa, and the brezas that live there, as I am.

Because sometimes, the courage to be “a little crazy” is exactly what a dream requires.