New Year Kindness

Life has been such a journey for me this year and I am thrilled to be approaching New Year’s Eve with this latest review of my book No Damage:

‘Must read for getting inspired in the New Year’

Isn’t it incredible to think we all have the power to inspire others with simply our words and gestures? It really is that simple to help brighten someone’s world and the best bit is we can ALL do it! We can choose to help others with supportive, kind words and a gentle touch every single day. Now there’s a positive resolution for the coming year.

I am humbled today that my words have found their way to a reader in California and inspired her. Just as I am deeply touched that a reader in Brazil messaged me to say how my words are helping him through his marriage crisis. I couldn’t ask for a more wonderful end to my year than to know my story is helping someone.

Are you looking for an inspiring New Year’s read? Maybe No Damage is just what you need. If so, enjoy! ( with a glass of bubbles and a heartfelt ‘cheers’ for 2015).

http://www.amazon.com/gp/aw/d/B00R2ZF14Q

Happy New Year all and may you receive kind words and gestures when you need them the most.

300 gifts to make us smile

What a wonderful end to the festive season. My free book promotion has now ended and I am delighted to report that I gave away 300 copies of No Damage in just two days! This is such a great end to the year for me.

It is both terrifying and freeing to be sharing my words and to have received such a positive response makes it worthwhile. Check out the Amazon reviews at the end of this post!

If you are reading No Damage please do let me know how you found the book and leave an Amazon or GoodReads review. That would help me really spread the word and hopefully inspire and uplift more people. Now wouldn’t that be wonderful?!

Thank you all and may you have a wonderful time heading towards the fresh beginnings of a New Year.

No Damage is on Facebook

What revolution do you want to lead?

It is Day Seven of the Live Your Legend writing challenge. I think I must be the last person to finish this, as it has taken WEEKS to get this far. This is mostly because I have been busy setting up our marine conservation charitable cause Friends for Sharks and continuing with our World Tour plans for 2015. It is such a privilege to be working full time on this and it is leading me down paths of discovery I didn’t even know existed. It has huge highs and lows, I am learning every day and it is incredible. The best bit is that I am doing what I love and people are interested. Dive clubs, schools and aquariums are booking events with us and this morning I received emails from schools in The Cook Islands wanting to work with us. Did I really make this happen?? It is a leap of faith and one I wouldn’t change (even when I lie awake at night unable to sleep due to fear).

Enjoy the Friends for Sharks blog at www.friendsforsharks.com

I have also taken another leap of faith and entered a travel writing competition. I have never branched into travel writing and felt it was time to push myself and try. Admittedly it terrifies me and I don’t think my writing is necessarily of a ‘travel’ style but we shall see. I hope you enjoy the first of my four entries under the competition theme “Gratitude: A Place That Inspires You to Feel Strong and Hopeful.” 

The Watercolour Coast

Just over the prow of the hill lies the Watercolour Coast

For the final day of the writing challenge I am asked…

What revolution do you want to lead?

The more I pursue my path in life, the more I realise that I simply want to inspire and encourage people to reconnect with the oceans and sharks through my work. I want to provide a healthy dose of optimism and love for the natural world around us at a time when I believe we need it most. I want to be the voice that people listen to and walk away afterwards feeling uplifted and empowered to make changes to improve their life and the environment around them. I also want to be the written voice that takes people away from their troubles in life and comforts them with beautiful words of positivity, enthusiasm and storytelling.

On which note, I have almost finished the final edit of my first book. All 123,000 words of it. It is time to take one more leap of faith and begin the process of approaching publishers with my work.

Have a wonderful day, think about what revolution you want to lead….and then DO IT.

Sunrise at Seal Island, Fale Bay, South Africa.

Being thankful and a little bit proud

I am really enjoying the blog challenge I signed up for with Live Your Legend. I receive a daily writing prompt each day and here are the latest two and my thoughts on them. Perhaps you’d like to think about and use those prompts yourself? It is a fascinating exercise. Here are the latest two:

What do people thank you for?

Initially I found that difficult to answer but then I realised that people thank me for inspiring them to follow their dreams, for encouraging them to keep going when they feel like all hope is lost. I have been thanked for reminding others that we all have difficult times and for helping them fell less alone by sharing my own fears, vulnerability and life stories with them. I think it is the comfort that come from emotional connectivity and support that helps. People also thank me for helping them find their courage and resilience to keep going and keep fighting for what they believe their life could be.

Oh an finally…they also thank me for my optimism, enthusiasm and belief that anything is possible if we just give it a try!

What’s one thing you’re proud of?

One thing I am very proud of is simply surviving. I know that may sound bizarre, we all survive on a day to day basis and there is nothing exceptional in that word, but it means everything to me. It may turn you off to read that I am proud of surviving but really, truly I am.

I went through what was, for me, an incredibly tough time in 2008 and it lasted for four long and painful years. Every time I got back up and tried to rebuild my life, the world dealt me another blow and I fell to my knees again. But every single time it happened, I refused to give up. I cried many hot, angry tears and felt a good deal of grief, shame and hopelessness but I got up and survived it all. Plus I built a life afterwards that I adore. I was stubborn and refused to give up on optimism and smiling and that pulled me through every day in which I never wanted to see the sun rise again.

I am incredibly proud that, on the back of those four years, I had the courage to move overseas and carve a life for me that contained no guarantees but it did (and still does) contain a chance at fulfilling my dreams of working with sharks and of becoming a writer. It is not yet two years down the line and I have finished my first ever book, which tells my story of those difficult yet inspiring years beforehand. The first two unedited chapters are here if you would like to read them. It is not yet two years down the line and I have just begun to create a charitable cause for sharks and marine conservation with my awesome and incredible partner in crime Nicholas. Out of interest, that cause came about because a serious back injury meant I had to give up my job and career plans for the future this August and find a new way forward whilst I recover. It is not an easy time but again I am surviving, smiling and making something new out of it. As I sit here typing I have an ice pack strapped to my back! So yes, perhaps you can see why I am so proud of myself right now.

Please check out our fun and interesting charitable cause Friends for Sharks Facebook page and our website if you have a moment. I can’t believe we almost have 500 likes already (I am so excited about that) and the website has a fun 3 min promo about our World Tour 2015, which had me in stitches when we were filming and I kept forgetting my lines.

We are busy working full time and unpaid on this cause so that we can give educational talks about our work with sharks and marine conservation to people around the world throughout 2015. I have no idea how successful or not it will be for us, it has many unknowns, but I feel inspired and happy. My hope is that feeling that way and showing others what we are doing will inspire them to also reconnect with nature and follow their dreams in life. Plus we will also be raising money for our two nominated charities along the way. That alone has been worth surviving for!

Inspire Me

The Dingo was Here – Makings of a Hero

EA Squad – Tom’s Story

It’s Holly Bea – It’s all about your attitude

ToeMail – Each day is a gift

Endless Light and Love – There is wisdom in everyone

Right, let’s do this

I am struggling with my writing this week since finishing the first draft of my book…all 123,000 words of it! It has been my baby for the past year and a half, which has incidentally been the biggest 1.5 years of change in my life. It has been incredible and at the moment I am truly missing writing my book. I am feeling nervous as I stand on the edge of the abyss preparing to find a publisher. The usual human fears are popping up about whether anyone will want to read it, if it is worthless, if it is boring blah blah and yet I know that none of things those are true.

It is a flipping brilliant book, it really is, and I created it in the hope it would inspire people. I wanted my book to be a piece of work that someone would pick up during a difficult time in their life, sit down with a cup of tea and read from cover to cover. I wanted that person to read it and say to themselves by the end: if she did it then so can I. That book…she is funny, hilarious at times, heart warming, emotional, heart breaking, ridiculous, unique and just brilliant. Really, a great read. I say that not as the author (that would be terrifically arrogant of me) but as the person that experienced the story happening to themselves and so was the hands through which it was written. I am merely the storyteller and I can say the book needs to be out there and shared. It really, really does and I do not yet have the contacts to make that happen….yet…in the way I would like to do so.
At the moment I am thinking about how to reach the most people possible so that nifty little book can get to work inspiring others. I need to swallow my fear and find the courage to approach agents and publishing houses. Honestly, it scares the inspiration out of me. It does not feel like an easy task right now and I am faltering.

In the spirit of being courageous and making a new change in my life I decided to share the first two chapters. So here they are, warts and all at this link.

Welcome to the first edit of the first two chapters of my book. (Deep breath on my part).

Would you read it? Let’s see if I reach anyone that might just be willing to help or inspire me to give this book a life.

On a different note I also realised it is high time I brought this blog of mine back up to speed. It has taken a back seat lately, I have lost my blog mojo and I really want to let it blossom into the great site it has the potential to be. I have been rooting around to find my inspiration to get going and found a Blog Challenge to join. Here are the basics:

I’m super excited to have joined the free Start-A-Blog Challenge with Scott Dinsmore from Live Your Legend. It comes with a free 7-day course to help build a successful writing habit and a private community of over 1,500 writers, and I’d love any of you friends to join me! You can access the free course and join the challenge here: http://liveyourlegend.net/start-a-blog-challenge-2015/

Over the next seven days I have a number of blog tasks to complete relating to the course, so watch this space. The first question I am prompted to answer is

What really makes you angry about the world?

Quite simply it is when people stop trying. We all have setbacks, failures, shortcomings and fears. ALL OF US. But guess what, here is the great bit, we can all try to overcome them. Every single one of us has the tools, talents, gifts and ability to make a change in our lives for the better every single day – be it large or small. We can either give up or get up and create something good in the day and inspire ourselves (and others in the process) to bring positivity into the world. Few things make me angry and frustrated but one of them is when people give up trying. In fact I’d go so far as to underneath the anger is sadness. It makes me incredibly sad when people no longer feel able to try.

Life is a gift and it should be lived to its fullest by every single one of us, every single day. Onwards team, go try!

Inspire Me

Cristian Mihai – October

Life Paths for Better Endings – Your archetype allies

The Muscleheaded Blog – Dr Seuss Says

Princess of the Light – Wordplay

You Can’t Hide the Spark – The good news about crying