Laina Turner-Molaski

Posts Tagged ‘friendships’

This Saturday I had the pleasure of spending some time talking to Sarah McDonald. A outgoing, 25 year-old who was diagnosed with MS at the age of 18. As a former Nursing student, Sarah calls herself a natural caregiver. Instead of letting MS get her down she says her focus is not on feeling sorry for herself for having this disease but rather on being an advocate for increasing awareness for the disease and helping others. Something that is definitely needed.

Thanks Sarah!
Laina

Thanks everyone for being patient while I was recovering from my bout of strep. And I am such a good mom…I gave it to my kids.What can I say, I like to share.

I had such a good time reading and responding to comments and checking out everyone’s blogs. This was a great event and a big THANKS goes out to our organizer, Lynda Coker, as this wouldn’t have been possible without her passion.

Without further ado (I have always wanted to say that) the winners of a copy of Stilettos & Scoundrels and a $10 Target giftcard are:

Susan at susan56bft@gmail.com

Crysteena at crysteena73@aol.com

Kelly at kellysluckyyou@yahoo.com

Congrats and I will be contacting you today for shipping details!

Thanks everyone for making it a great event.
Laina

I’m referring to the take care of yourself statement I made yesterday. I mean I started my day out to you all saying how that was something you had to first and foremost and yet after about 5 minutes I threw that out the window and started doing for someone else. I supposed I could go on about how altruistic that is and I am such a good person. But the fact is that I’m not. Usually I think “what’s in it for me” and the fact that at this moment in time it would be a big fat ZERO has me pondering.

While I’m thinking about that dilemma I do want to share with you my moderately successful start with book sales. I have been selling a lot out of the back of my car which is kind of fun and a few over the internet. I thought the Kindle would be selling a little more but I prefer actual books so maybe other folks do too?

Are you struggling with what you are doing versus what you want to do? I would love to hear about it.
Laina

PS don’t forget MS awareness week starts next week!

I love March because I feel it is the home stretch to spring. Though I am a bit sad because today my baby girl turned 4 and she is so quickly growing up. How does that happen?
I spent time this weekend thinking about purpose. Purpose in what I am doing and why I am doing it. I know that in many areas of my life I tend to gravitate toward the nearest shiny object and while that has always worked for me for the most part, it’s also kept me so busy with a million balls in the air that I feel with more purpose I can have a little more breathing room to enjoy more down time.
Part of being able to have purpose, and therefore focus on what is really important, is to not lose sight of yourself Ensure you are being fulfilled and not making your purpose about someone else. I think that sometimes can be hard. We have people in our life we want to take care of and want to do things for and it is so easy to do that at the expense of who you are and what you want. But that’s not good for you or the other person. There needs to be that balance.
So here’s to purpose and focus and taking care of you!
Cheers-
Laina

Come to the release for Stilettos & Scoundrels at the Rainmakers Main Event. 20% of all proceeds from this event will go to the Indiana MS Society. The will be a member of the Indiana MS Society in attendance to answer any questions as we get close to the kick off of MS Awareness week March 8th.

If you can’t make it there will be other events or buy the book online at www.lainamolaski.com. Also available on Kindle. 20% of all online purchases prior to March 1st will benefit MS.

Today has been great. Well except I didn’t get as much work done as I should have today but the night is young. I am writing this post from Lindsay Manfredi’s new Mac book and I really am loving this keyboard. It’s backlit and just feels nice. The computer is thin and light. I may become a convert to Apple.

Anyways, today I was supposed to finish the edits to my business book but I have so much on my mind. Have a job offer on the table that to be honest is not something I would normally consider as it’s being someones assistant. However, this is a unique situation and I not only think I could really help this business grow but it’s a very productive place for me to work. It will be a switch, as I am using to having an assistant not being one, and I really don’t like being told what to do. But all that aside…..I’m really considering it. In a crazy way I could call it an investment in my future or conversely a huge waste of my time and effort.

The person I would be working for knows how lucky he would be to have a PhD. and all around fabulous chick like me. One main drawback is I always say don’t work for friends and we are friends. I would hate for something to ruin that.

What to do…what to do.

Happy Valentine’s Day everyone!!!!

Laina

Anyone besides me want to stay in bed today? I enjoy the pretty snow but I would enjoy it better if it was 70 outside.

So I have sold 2 pre-sale copies of Stilettos and Scoundrels I only have 298 more to go this month to pay my mortgage. In case you thought I was joking in my post from last week. I’m not. Now some of you might think I am really nuts, and you would probably be right, but not because of this decision alone. For a lot of personal reasons which I will spare you the details, I don’t much care anymore if the bank takes my house, so really it’s not that much of a gamble to loose. What will be worse than losing the house however, is not selling any books. I need that affirmation that I’m a marginal writer, at least for my first attempt. I promise to get better.

The other reason I didn’t want to get out of bed today is that I have a bit of a dilemma with my other book. I have a business book that to be honest I didn’t really want to write, I just was somewhat pressured in to it and I did see the point everyone was trying to make. I then came up with the bright idea to have a online companion and an iPhone app. Kind of a nice, tidy package that would make it seem fabulous. Well on Thursday I discovered a fatal (no I am not being dramatic) error in the website design that negated all the time I had spent thus far (time I don’t have) and now I need too find an alternative solution and I’m not sure what that is. I’m also on a tight deadline to figure it out if I want to meet my publishing deadline and without the online “stuff” I am not sure the book standing alone is positioned correctly. Does that even make sense???

So option A- Scrap the entire project. About $1500 wasted, not including my time, but wouldn’t be wasting any more $$ going forward.

Option B – Just do the book and iPhone app and don;t worry about the online companion. Would required some sort of major adjustments to the book but is doable.

Option C – Use my secret ninja powers to find a online solution ASAP (the issue here is I don’t really want to spend the time rebuilding the site from scratch when I need to promote my fiction book to make my house payment).

A little help from my friends would be appreciated:)

Peace-
Laina

PS Today is the start of the 30 day count down to MS week!!!!!!

Do you ever have those moments where you know you have a lot to do but are so overwhelmed that you don’t do anything and instead just sit feeling sorry for yourself? So I decided as I was sitting here wasting time trying to figure out where to start I would at least write this blog. As I don’t consider it work and get quite cranky when I can’t post the way I want to. Like last week. Now I was working on my books so at least something I like took me away. My fiction book is now out of my hands at the publisher. For better or worse it is done. My non-fiction book went to the editor after a 2 week delay. I just wasn’t happy with it. Still am not. But I can’t obsess forever. Now I have to jump on the marketing bandwagon. Maybe that’s why I’m a bit locked up. What if I have put all this work into these books and they don’t sell? I’m not at that moment of truth. I can’t say anymore I’m working on a book. They are almost out there for public consumption. I feel I may be in a place where by not doing anything saves me from potentially failing. Instead I can come up with excuses to hide behind. What the hell am I supposed to do with that? Any advice folks??
Laina

Those who know me know I’m not a big fan of the warm and fuzzy. However, my blog post today is all about the importance of connection and relationships. With my background in HR I talk a lot of Human Capital, essentially the ability to measure return on employees. After attending a fantastic Rainmakers event this morning I started to think about the importance of Emotional Capital, which by my made up definition is the amount of the warm and fuzzy we get from others. Last night and again this morning I received that in abundance.
Sometimes life gets so busy I tend to not think about the people around me and how truly important they are to my well being. At the beginning of the year I had a conversation with someone about how many friends I had and I remember replying that I had a lot of acquaintances but not really friends. The person I was talking to seemed to find that strange and asked me what my definition was of friend. I found I really didn’t have one but I just knew I didn’t have any. Their reply to me was they thought that was sad. That conversation has stuck with me all year and has replayed itself in my head almost daily as I have come to realize that I have a lot of great friends. More than most people and probably more than I deserve because the other thing I have learned is friendship is a two way street. Real friends are tough on you to make you a better person and are with you every step of the way on your journey. Friendship, like any relationship, is not easy.
I saw a quote the other day and forgive me for not remembering the author but it said “Friends are the ones who love you when you don’t love yourself” and nothing could be truer. This past year I have found so many people who love me in spite of the fact I thought of them as acquaintances rather than true friends. These people have spent the year investing in my Emotional Capital in a year when I have been bankrupt. I can’t express how lucky I am that these investors believed in me despite of my beliefs in myself.
As this year quickly starts to wind down remember we all need an investment in our Emotional Capital. My goal for the remainder of the year is daily to thank those people who have made an investment in me with no expectation of return.
Today I want to thank Lorraine Ball who was the inspiration for this post and although we don’t know each other extremely well (yet) has been supportive of everything I have asked of her. Selfishly, from her heart.
Thanks Lorraine!!
Laina

One of my favorite inspirational books is This Is Not the Life I Ordered. It is simply a journaling of the main characters and their life stories and their journey’s and how they persevered and were able to receive strength from each other in order to make it through those times of success and failure. I would encourage you to pick up a copy as it is one of those books that is good to have on the book shelf for those times you need a little pick me up. Let’s take today for example. It’s Monday, and because of a lot of craziness in my life, I definitely needed some inspiration to get me going. Throughout this book are quotes that I enjoy and the one today that caught my eye was from Cicely Tyson. It says “Challenges make you discover things about yourself that you never really knew. They’re what make the instrument stretch- what make you go beyond the norm.” What it said to me today is that instead of letting those challenges get us down we need to look at them as ways to make us better. It’s not always easy but it’s a better alternative than being sad and depressed about what might seem like an insurmountable challenge.

Laina