Angelia Vernon Menchan

Angelia Vernon Menchan is an author, publisher and public speaker who owns two publishing companies, MAMM Productions and Honorable Menchan Media. Mrs. Menchan is also a Budget Officer and former Job Corps Counselor. To date she has published twenty-three books of her own work, both fiction and non-fiction and more than eighty ebook novellas on amazon.com. You can access her bibliography on www.amazon.com search words: Angelia Vernon Menchan




Contact information:
Website: http://acvermen.blogspot.com
Email: acvermen@yahoo.com
Phone numbers: 904 714 2272 904 303 2679

Wednesday, October 10, 2007

Comfort Zones

Comfort zones, we all have them...
We know what we like to eat...
To read...
To write...
And we do it in those ways because it is comfortable,
However to grow, sometimes we have to move from our zones...
Most of my work life has been spent in comfort zones...
I have had a variety of careers,
But that all pretty much existed in arenas where I knew,
I would do well...
Figures and Logic,
That is where I worked and what worked for me,
Maybe the corporation was different,
But if numbers and logic were involved,
I was good...
I also did not take on things I knew I didn't do well,
If I tried it and it didn't work,
I didn't do it again,
Writing a book took me way out of my comfort zone...
I had written many things,
Had even won a scholarship based on a written work,
But it wasn't the same,
Writing a book meant that I was taking a risk,
Putting myself out there on the line,
With the expectation that people would purchase,
Read and hopefully enjoy what I had written,
And since reading is so subjective,
I knew that the way my mind worked,
I was not going to write in a way that was prescribed,
The beauty of it all,
Was I was so innocent,
I wrote that first book,
Unleashing on the world without anyone's input,
And had sold a respectable number of copies before I was really,
Involved in the literary scene,
So once I was and I discovered how much I didn't know,
Enough readers had spoken, positively, encouragingly and constructively,
Allowing me to know that I could do this,
I just needed to work on some 'thangs.'
Also I came to writing from a place of some economic comfort,
I knew that if I didn't sell a book,
I could go back to a pretty nice life...
So I started out with a big plan,
To write a trilogy,
Book II was my baby,
'Cinnamon's Universe', it took me fourteen months from the publication of
'Black's Obsession'to put it out there, though it was done before my short stories,
Just held on to it,
Once I had done book II, Book III, Brown's Possession, came so quick it startled me,
Now I know why,
I had become comfortable again,
I needed to do something different,
I had told that story and needed to step once again,
Out of the zones and take a chance on what I had meant to do in the first place...
I needed to stretch,
And sprint, launch, spring out of my comfort zone,
Because I knew, there is never a time,
When Growth is not a good thing...

angelia

10 comments:

Poetic Genesis said...

yes! comfort zones...we love them...i have to admit that novel writing has been the thing to take me out of mine as well

but i love it

each one is a new challenge to me and it's helped me compose better poetry as well

great post!

Angelia Vernon Menchan said...

Thanks Genesis,
We have to know when to move something and change something,

Blessings,
angelia

Gwyneth Bolton said...

I also did not take on things I knew I didn't do well, If I tried it and it didn't work, I didn't do it again

LOL. This is me dead on from the time I was a kid. I still don't play video games or anything like that because I went to the arcade once with a cousin and couldn't get a hang of Ms. Pacman, at least not enough to win and score high. So I decided I wouldn't play video games. LOL. Maybe I'll think about trying stuff that takes me out of my comfort zone. But that side of my personality that hates to be bad at something, or to fail at something will have a hard time with that... Great post!

Gwyneth

Angelia Vernon Menchan said...

Gwyneth,
my sister I am telling you it is hard, I still dont drive a manual transmission car, never was any good at it...laughing at myself...

Love and Blessings,
angelia

Jennifer C. said...

My journey away from my comfort zone, began when I walked away from a job, because of moral issues. Then I went a step further out doing spoken word. People who know me knows that I chat my behind off, but not in front of strangers, let alone a room full. But I did it any way

Hands shaking...and all

Angelia Vernon Menchan said...

Sometimes, hand shaking and all is the best way...it frees you in some way, when it's over...

smooches

Yasmin said...

I love your rambling...not a day goes by that I don't read them and see some of me in you.
xoxo

yasmin

Angelia Vernon Menchan said...

Yas,
I told you I was your older, taller, goofier twin sister...

smooches,
angelia

Anonymous said...

Okay Sistah Dee! You did it again. You opened my eyes to some truths; a truth I wasn't yet able to understand. LOL

This is the reason why I am having such a hard time writing my first novel . . .focusing and continuing to press forward is so hard for me and usually I am good at dedicating myself to a project but this baby is making me crazy.

It's cause it is soooo out of my comfort zone...the book reviews; the short stories and essays, an entire career of writing editorial and publicity for a living was my comfort zone. I did it and I did it well.

This novel? Aw hell! LOL

Gonna accept it as a challenge from this day forward...gonna step outside of my comfort zone and write this novel; publish it and enjoy what I know is my destiny as a published novelist.

Watch me fight my way out of this box! LOL

Thanks much, Sistah Deep!

Idrissa

Angelia Vernon Menchan said...

Idrissa,

you know the deepest one has got you...

smooches
angelia