What Do You Do When It All Goes Sideways?
Step 1 - Don't Freak Out. Step 2 - Also, Don't Freak Out.
Last night, my publisher (Three Ravens Publishing) and I launched a Kickstarter campaign for my new raucous space-comedy sci-fi novel, SPACE PEW PEW.
The problem is, launch day was supposed to be August 1st.
That’s tomorrow.
I spent a month doing countdown posts, preparing, and getting ready for launch day, and due to a little snafu, my friend Hillbilly (He’s in charge of the Kickstarters at
), hit “LAUNCH” when the thing was set to publish immediately instead of Thursday!There’s a really important lesson in these events though …
(I made this graphic to give him some crap about it and promote the early launch.)
You see, not everything goes your way all the time. And sometimes, the very best laid plans - meticulously thought-out ahead of time - go totally sideways.
How you handle those situations speaks volumes about your mental state.
You can get angry as if the world is coming apart at the seams, or you can roll with the change in plans (not easy for many of us, myself included) because once it’s changed, there might not be any changing it back.
In this case, we were on the phone together when it happened, and beyond a sudden “Oh shit!” moment, we were able to laugh about it, and figure out how to make it all work.
Sometimes you’re going to get knocked down. Things won’t go your way. Dwelling on what went wrong only serves to delay the much-needed recovery from the circumstance. So, skip all the nonsense, and recover.
There is power in perspective - knowing what exists that you can and cannot control allows you to focus your effort and energy on the things that truly matter, that shape your course, and that help you to succeed with whatever project you’ve got going on. Day didn’t go your way? Okay. Accept it, and how do we move forward.
That’s exactly what we did last night. Make a joke out of the flub, and sure enough, we started seeing posts like this:
Aaaaand this one …
Aaaaaand THIS one …
And this one too …
Pretty awesome, right?
Whatever that setback was last night, it was minor. And being able to take that moment and wrap it into something that was impossibly ON BRAND for the ridiculousness that is SPACE PEW PEW is part of what makes this a wildly fun ride.
So, breathe, my friend. Sit back and look at that setback with objective eyes, realize that the moment has already happened, and that the only thing fully in your control is where to steer as you keep moving forward on the track!
And if you’re up for supporting this awesome Kickstarter (we smashed our funding goal in about FIVE HOURS in the middle of the night!), there’s great stuff to be had, and you’ll be supporting an awesome endeavor from a great publisher and a very grateful author!
I appreciate you!
-David