Sep 30, 2011

Feedback and Reviews = Sequels of Epic Proportions

Workin on the sequel ... yep ...

Just want to throw something out there, kay? Sweet!


I SUPERDUPERFRAGILISTICALLY LOVE IT!

Fall Girl is probably my favorite out of all the books I've written, but I have this HUGE advantage with writing this sequel ... FEEDBACK!

Reviews are rough, especially when they are picking apart something you've worked on for the past year! Some reviews make you smile and some reviews make you want to cry. It's all part of a writers world. But I'm not going to lie, it's the ones that make my all flustered that happen to be my favorites.

(Masochist? Who? Me? Noooooo)

What I'm saying is, these reviews which break apart me book and tell me, "It would have been great, but ..." these are the ones that guide me while writing this sequel. I now know what I need more of and what I need less of (apparently F bombs made the less of list ... which is really funny because I rarely use the word myself. Go figure) and what I did just right.

I look at these reviews as if they are my own personal Goldilocks. It's all the same book/porridge (except my book tastes way better than porridge ... bleck!) no matter who is reading it, but everyone (My Goldilocks) views it a little differently depending on what how (as in what chair/bed/etc.) the are reading it. My book has been all three ...

Too Cold - Not enough about Blake, Not enough about bipolar, Not enough realistic situations ...

Too Hot - Too much teenage melodrama, Too much swearing, Too much cutsie cheesiness ...

JUST RIGHT - This is the majority of my reviews (thankfully) These are the reviews that make me tear up in a whole different way. They are by far the ones that make me feel as though I've done my job, but they also tell me HOW I did that job right.

 So I have these three types of reviews ... some are wanting more, some are wanting less and some think it's perfect the way it is. Each of these types helps me grow and brings my sequel to a whole new level.

That level?

EPICNESS!



So which chair did you sit in my dear Goldilocks'? Did you like my porridge? Was my bed fluffy enough for you? Was the chair you sat in just right?

If you've got feedback, I want to hear it!

Sep 18, 2011

Practically Imperfect in Every Way

When I started this blog ... WAY back in the day ... when I didn't even have to lie about being 29 ... I wanted to make sure the name of the blog fit who I am.

The name of this blog is the epitome of who I am! "Desperately SEARCHING for my Inner Mary Poppins"

I'm always struggling to be the perfect everything. Perfect Mom. Perfect Wife. Perfect Friend. Perfect Student. Perfect Anything Else that I Can Be ... And that's a pretty big friggen struggle!

I thing searching for that perfection has set me up for some grave expectations that I am not able to live up to. Sometimes I feel like I'm expected to be happy and positive. I'm expected to have my shit together. I'm expected to be ambitious. I'm expected to hold people up when they are falling. I'm expected to be a great leader.

And maybe I'm not ... but it sure feels like it sometimes.

That fact of the matter is, though I am those things some of the time, other times I am not. And in the past two years of trying so desperately hard to live up to those expectations, I've found myself quite burnt out.

So here's the deal world, I'm not friggen perfect! Sure I do have issues with trying to be ... but isn't perfect really an unattainable state anyhow?

I write books and publish them on a whim and end up super embarrassed and humiliated because of the editing errors.

I start websites that sometimes leave me feeling overwhelming and lost.

I got a 70% on my history quiz.

I gained 15 lbs this year.

I start things and sometimes it takes me forever to finish them ... sometimes I don't finish them (embarrassing confession there)

I drop off the face of the earth for weeks to months at a time,  and sometimes there's not even a reason for doing it.

And those are only a few things.

I've decided to change the tagline to this website due to this lack of perfection ...

Desperately Searching for My Inner Mary Poppins  by Marybeth Poppins, Practically Imperfect in Every Way!

Does it ever feel like you are fighting to live up to the pressures of perfection and fighting to meet everyone else's expectations? Or am I the only idiot who for some ridiculous reason believe that someday she will save the world?