Happy MLK Day everyone!!! Things are still going strong, but once again, I find myself in a tough situation where the assignment for the day is something that I've already done, on the regular, since creating this blog. I think I have a workaround, but I'll get to that later in this post when I get to discussing today's assignment.

Before I can do that, I must first share the results of yesterday's assignment which seems to be designed to get me to think about acknowledging, appreciating, and nurturing the thing in my life that make me happy, outside of my attempts to reach my ultimate goal. In other words, not to let life pass me by while being too focused on achievements.

At least that's how the lesson made it sound. As for the assignment, I was supposed to make two lists, one, listing five things in my life that I am grateful for, and the other, listing five ways in which I already am a success. This is what I managed to come up with.

Five Things That I Am Grateful For:

1. My mom - without her support, I wouldn't be able to delve as deep into my efforts towards chasing my dreams.

2. My friends - though I rarely, if not never, talk to any of my old friends anymore I will always be grateful for their companionship back when the days were good.

3. My family - like with my friends, it may not show through my shut-in ways of avoidance, but I am grateful for each and every one of them.

4. My little dog - though she's not technically mine, I'm grateful for the little mutt because she has never left my side since I moved into my mom's garage following my mid-life meltdown.

5. Podcasts - though I might be more inclined to get out and talk to others minus these vicarious conversations, it is what it is, and I'm grateful for these digital broadcast because they're probably what's keeping me sane.

Five Ways I'm Already Successful:

1. I'm alive - this is probably a more significant accomplishment that many might not know or believe considering how damaging I've been to myself while navigating this self-destructive existence.

2. I still write - considering the fact that I've been failing at my favorite craft for over twenty-years, though I do get discouraged and will often think that I will never taste success, I've never lost my enthusiasm towards the process.

3. My writing has improved by leaps and bounds - being a dyslexic teen in the '90s; I really struggled with English in school because I don't think the teachers were aware of my learning disability. Because of this, I spent my entire adult life teaching myself how to write, and if you see my earlier works, it wouldn't take long to see evidence that I've been successful in my efforts to learn.

4. This Blog - though I might not be successful at getting my work out to the world, I am unquestionably successful at getting my projects done and not just talking about what I plan to do someday.

5. My portfolio - again, though I am not a financial success and am horrible at getting my work out to the world, I am still pretty successful at prolifically putting out work that I'm proud of even if it never sees the light of day. I now have over twenty-five feature-length screenplays under my belt as well as countless shorts (stories and scripts) and now six first-draft novels.

Sadly, this assignment was way more difficult than it would have been if I would have attempted it about five years ago when I was at the peak of the most optimistic phase of my life, right before the bottom fell out. At that time, this assignment would have been a breeze, and my descriptions would have been much more confident with way less justifying.

Now it's time to switch to talk about today's assignment, which is another tough one since it's asking me to try something new. What's makes this task so difficult is the fact that during my 365 Days of Resolution Challenge, I was trying new things almost every single day for two years. Between that, and being too broke to explore anything that requires supplies or any sort of equipment, it's hard to think of something to start in order to report on tomorrow, but I think that I have an idea.

Of course, you're going to have to wait until tomorrow for me to check in with my daily update to see what I manage to come up with. I promise that I'll try to make this next one fun, as opposed to the bummer posts I've been posting over the past couple of days. Until then, it's now that time where I say, good day and good luck to you and all of your projects.

Talk to you soon.

Sincerely,

The Wicker Breaker

P.S. Below are links to my novel, which I plan to promote as part of Operation Achieve Anything, as well as a link to where you can buy the book that is providing the structure to this project in case you would like to purchase it in order to play along.