Feb. 10, 2006
Two things first. I hope to be blogging less in the future in the interest of better time management, and I hope to blog shorter, for the same reasons.

Last real blog entry I got on RJ's case about his bestselling aspirations, and I still hold these to be true. But...

We had a neighbor who seemed to be raising their daughter to do nothing. Knowing her from about age 3 to 12, I saw a bright, intelligent, vivacious child whose parents didn't pay enough attention to her and more important to this discussion, seemed to have no expectations for her beyond graduating from high school, finding a man and having babies. Her mother even said something similar to us.

Fine. But let that be her choice. Give your kids all the tools to do anything they want. Set the bar high.

Same goes with your writing, which is the point here. Expectations are often met. And that's particularly true when your expectations are low. Better to have high expectations and not meet them than to have low expectations and nail them dead on. If for no other reason than that we tend to quit once our expectations are met and stop striving for more.

I've been accused of being a realistic, versus a pessimist or an optimist, and that may be accurate. It's a kind of, "hope for the best but expect the worst" sort of mindset. It's improved of late, actually, and I do tend to think things will work out. But I also try to accept things as they are. I'm not particularly karmic, and Joe Konrath often says something along the lines of destiny is for those who don't try to change theirs, or something along those lines, and essentially I agree.

But I also say success can only be defined by you. Which may be my way of saying, work hard, try your best, and accept that some things are outside your control.

Best,
Mark Terry