Announcements:

• EARLY access to the Early Bird registration is now, so if want early access for sold out tickets, become a patron this month.

• I'm in a new anthology by Tsunami Press with my essay "Eye Contact." You can preorder at http://www.tsunamibooks.org/shop/pre-order-tsunami-press-first-anthology Due out the beginning of October 2023.

• Preorder of Season of the Shadow up now. (Erick's new title.) Nov 16th.

• Erick speaking at Pike's Peak Writing Conference in Colorado Springs in April 2024.

Patron announcement:

UPDATE:

• Valerie:

• home from Florida yesterday: saw my mom and my sister and bro-in-law and all the nieces and nephews.

• speaking at another conference in a week: Write in the Harbor.

• woodcrafters.org class on November 16th.

• Nanowrimo in November (Erick is too!)

• Erick:

• prepping to send out ARCS

• finish the closing of the house sale

• going to Florida tomorrow to see family

Just finished: The Stranger Upstairs by Lisa M. Matlin

I'M READING: beta read and client work, plus:

Catching the Big Fish by David Lynch

Indelible by Laurie Buchanan

Harness: A Systemic Approach: Guaranteed to Revolutionize Your Coaching by Tess Cope

Up Next: What's a Poor Girl to Do?: Prostitution in Mid-Nineteenth Century America by Elizabeth A. Topping

Soiled Doves: Prostitution in the the Early West by Anne Seagraves

Frog Music by Emma Donoghue

The Ocean at the End of the Lane by Neil Gaiman

• Erick's Reading:

Jo Nesbo's The Night House

S.A. Cosby's All the Sinners Bleed (Blacktop Wasteland)

The Singer's Gun Emily St John Mandel

Children of Ruin Adrian Tchaikovsky

• Show Notes:

• Making decisions in your business all day long, every day.

• High level: how to spend my ad budget, what should I write next?

• Lower level: when to think about things, what to wear to a conference, when to check emails

How to make decisions:

Is there even a "problem" here? (What problem does this impulse suppposedly address?)

Identify the goal first.

Shut it off or put it in the queue.

Hierarchy of steps, assigning decisions.

Separate questions from ones I answer and ones I ask someone else.

Minimize trouble. Three columns: I know how to do this and I'm not going to pay for, don't have skill for this and I'm going to pay for it, I'm okay with this but could someone else do it better? (Am I going to hire, or learn, how am I going to handle this?)

Obstacles to making decisions: overwhelm, FOMO, paralysis analysis, not having enough info, tired, thinking time, biological needs, over-emphasizing the things we enjoy and am good at (as opposed to the other stuff), distraction, perfectionism.

Failure is not trying.

Having a clear objective. What is most important thing here? (Because we outgrow goals eventually.)