I'm not particularly good at promoting
myself.
There. I said it.
This is probably a little ridiculous,
considering how much time I've spent over the years promoting other people's
stuff.
I've built websites for people. I've
managed Facebook pages. I've made artwork, graphics and videos. I've helped
people figure out how to present what they're doing to the world. I've written
things for them. I've helped them sell their stuff.
And I don't mind doing any of that.
In fact, I enjoy it. I hope to continue
to do so!
Give me somebody else's project and I'm
perfectly happy to stand behind it waving a flag and yelling, “Look at this!
Isn't this cool?”
Give me something I created myself and
suddenly I'm standing behind a curtain going, “Well...I mean...it's probably
nothing.”
I don’t think
that is an uncommon thing, either. Take my sister for example. She is an
AMAZING artist. She creates works unlike anything you will see anywhere else. I’ve
said to her: “Poopy Pants” (yes, that’s
what I called her when we were little and she might kill me if I use her real
name) Anyway, I said “This stuff should be in a gallery or on-line where people
can buy it!” Her replay was always: “I don’t like marketing my stuff. I just
want to paint.” I get it.
There's something uncomfortable about
saying, “Hey, I made this. I think it's pretty good. You should buy it.”
Somewhere in my head is a little band
of Minions that immediately starts asking questions.
Who do you think you
are?
What if nobody likes
it?
What if people think
you're full of yourself?
What if it's not
actually good enough?
That last one is probably the real one.
I'm much more comfortable helping
somebody else believe in what they've created than I am believing in something
I've created myself.
Which brings me to my latest adventure.
Apparently, I've created a thing called
The Desert Gypsy Creations.
I use the word adventure
deliberately because calling it a business makes it sound much more organized
than it actually feels. “Business” also sounds too…sterile? Boring? Rigid?
This wasn't some carefully constructed
entrepreneurial plan.
There was no five-year business plan.
There wasn't even a particularly
well-developed one-year plan.
It started because I wrote a book.
Actually, this is my second book in print. The first was one I wrote over 17
years ago. I sold a few. Had a book signing. Discovered I was way too introverted
for those and called it good.
I continued to write. Blogging suited
me well. Then – one thing evolved into the next and I wrote a book that is more
like a manual, really.
And then I had to figure out what the
hell to do with this “manual/book.”
The book is called Introducing
Cowboy Mounted Shooting: An Introductory Guide to the Sport of Cowboy Mounted
Shooting.
I wrote it because I kept seeing new
shooters trying to wrap their heads around a sport that has its own language,
its own patterns, its own rules and its own peculiar little collection of
things that make perfect sense once you understand them and absolutely no sense
whatsoever when you're standing outside the arena watching somebody tear around
on a horse shooting balloons.
So I wrote the book I wished somebody
had handed me when I first got into mounted shooting.
And then, because apparently writing a
book wasn't enough of an adventure, I decided I needed a way to actually sell
the thing.
That's when The Desert Gypsy
Creations started taking shape.
I didn’t have to think long on the
name. I had already called my ranch here in Arizona “El Rancho Gitana del
Desierto. (The Desert Gypsy Ranch)
It was simply a name that felt like me.
I've always made things.
Words. Pictures. Graphics. Videos.
Projects. Ideas. Sometimes things that probably didn't need to be made at all
but got made anyway because I wondered if I could do it.
So Creations seemed appropriate.
And Desert Gypsy?
Well...that's a longer story.
And apparently Facebook has opinions
about it.
I originally tried to use The Desert
Gypsy Creations on Facebook.
Facebook said no.
So I tried Desert Gypsy Creations.
Facebook said no again.
Eventually, through the highly
scientific process of changing one word and seeing what happened, I discovered the
hang up for FB was the word Gypsy.
Change it to Gitana and suddenly
everything was fine.
So, according to Facebook, Desert
Gitana Creations is perfectly acceptable while Desert Gypsy Creations
apparently requires an intervention in diversity and inclusion.
I found this particularly entertaining
because gitana is simply the Spanish word for gypsy.
Apparently the robots don’t speak
Spanish.
I don't pretend to understand it.
So if you see Desert Gitana
Creations on Facebook, that's why.
The actual name of the thing I've
created is still The Desert Gypsy Creations.
And somewhere in all of this, I
realized that this little collection of things I'm creating doesn't really need
to fit into one neat category.
There will be the book.
There will probably be more books.
There is artwork.
There is music.
There are various other unrelated projects.
I am currently restoring an old 1989 Jeep XJ I affectionately call Dino. I
think that belongs in the creations category, don’t you?
There are probably going to be other
things that I haven't thought of yet because I have a terrible habit of
wandering down interesting roads just to see where they go.
And that's really what this is.
Another road.
Another adventure.
Another one of those “Well, I've
never done that before, so let's see what happens” moments.
Which brings me back to the
uncomfortable part.
Actually telling
people about it.
I can promote somebody else's work all
day long.
I can look at something they've created
and immediately see what is interesting about it. I can figure out how to show
it to people. I can make the graphics. I can build the page. I can write the
words.
But when it's mine?
That's harder.
Maybe because when you're promoting
somebody else's work, rejection isn't really about you.
When you're promoting your own work, it
feels a whole lot more personal.
If somebody doesn't like something I
made, well...they didn't just reject a product.
They rejected a little piece of myself
that I dragged out into public and set on the table.
That's a different animal.
And I'm still learning how to do it.
So this post is me practicing.
Not standing on a virtual street corner
yelling “BUY MY BOOK!”
Just saying:
I made something.
I put a lot of thought into it.
I think it might be useful to somebody.
And I'm going to give myself permission
to let people know it exists.
So,
about the book...
Introducing Cowboy
Mounted Shooting: An Introductory Guide to the Sport of Cowboy Mounted Shooting is exactly what the title says.
It's an introduction to the sport,
written primarily with the new shooter in mind.
It covers the language of the sport,
how to get started, what gear is required and other vital resources you will
need. It is intended to make your first trip to a mounted-shooting event look
considerably less intimidating.
It's not intended to replace getting on
a horse, finding a good instructor and learning how to safely shoot.
Nothing replaces that.
But there are a whole lot of things you
can learn from a book before you ever point a horse toward a starting line.
And now there is an actual physical
copy of that book sitting on my desk.
Which still feels a little strange.
This adventure has gotten real.
If you'd like to take a look, you can find
the book through The Desert Gypsy Creations.
https://the-desert-gypsy-creations.square.site/
https://www.facebook.com/profile.php?id=61595001210081
And there it is.
My latest adventure.
I have absolutely no idea where it's
going.
But then again, I've never been
particularly good at knowing where I'm going.
I've always been much better at
wandering around until I find something interesting.
That's probably how I ended up here in
the first place.
