Reality Is ...

...like beauty. It's in the eye of the beholder. This article is prompted by a recent comment from a publishing colleague - someone I and others hold in high regard, who is bright, articulate, and well-schooled in the traditional publishing industry. The colleague has a perspective about what a client-in-common's likelihood is for success, based on my colleague's professional experiences and beliefs, which are dramatically different than mine. We are both right and we both have valuable contributions to offer the client-in-common. I have minimal experience and knowledge (and interest) in traditional publishing. My colleague has minimal experience and knowledge in what's known as Special Sales or bulk sales or promotional sales of books and other information products. We each have our own reality and we are both right. The client will thrive by incorporating both my input and my colleague's and will lose out by fully embracing only one approach over the other.

You may have colleagues, friends, or family who are quite vocal about the path they think would be best for you with your business overall and your product development in specific. They have their own set of experiences and beliefs about life in general, business and you in particular. Those beliefs are tempered by many things, more than space in this article allows.

For your purposes, however, it would be useful to consider how that person's insights and actions have contributed to your success so far.

• Have they been a cheerleader of your booklet and other product development ideas or have they been quick to squelch your enthusiasm?

• Did they ask questions that opened up more ideas for your booklet or were they closed and opinionated about the very idea of a booklet?

• What useful information did they offer from their own logic or experience instead of turning a deaf ear because it wasn't fitting neatly into a known box?

• How comfortable are you in blazing new trails with your booklet and your knowledge, all on your own, without any input or confirmation from anyone else?

These are just a few things to ask yourself when you feel like you are swimming upstream with people in your life whose reality is different from yours.

Be as gracious and polite with them as you are inclined to be. And do what you know is best for you to do. My reality is selling over a million copies of a booklet, in several languages and formats, without ever writing a proposal for a publication, going anywhere near a bookstore, doing a book tour, getting an ISBN number, or paying a penny on advertising. That's what has worked for many of my clients, based on a reality I (and others) teach. Create your own reality. I dare and encourage you.