Here are 5 random pages from my latest book, Finding Your Happiness, click any page for full size image:
From the back cover:
You deserve to be happy and to experience genuine wellbeing.
You deserve to feel positive and joyful.
But you weren’t taught what happiness truly is or how to create a happy life for yourself.
FINDING YOUR HAPPINESS is your practical, uplifting guide to building a life that feels good from the inside out. This book gives you the knowledge, skills and wisdom to live a happier and more fulfilling life.
Inside you will:
Discover the secret to happiness.
Learn to understand yourself on a deeper level.
Identify where you are in life right now and where you want to be.
Develop a plan for happiness.
Take meaningful actions towards a happy life.
Maintain your happiness, whatever is happening in your life.
Navigate adversity and challenges to your happiness successfully.
This book is an invitation to transform your life. To become happy. To step into your exciting future, one that’s filled with happiness and joy.
Happiness is lived in full colour, and this book embraces that spirit. Printed in full colour from cover to cover, it costs more to produce than the average book, and its price reflects that commitment to quality.
In the past few months, despite being ill (see Let Me Explain About The Monetising), I’ve managed to added significantly more content to my website. I’ve also made it much easier for both new and returning visitors to find content that they might like.
New Content
In this post, I’ll share both details of all the new content and how I’ve organised it. For new visitors I have added the Discover page that provides a list of links for new people to learn about me, my creative works and ways they can support me.
After YouTube recently removed my channel and videos, I decided to set up my own video channel page right here on this website. All of my video content can now be watched here: My Video Channel.
Improved Organisation
I’ve always been interested by and written content about a wide range of topics. I love the variety of topics that I write about. But I have come to realise that different content will appeal to different groups of readers/website visitors.
The amount of content I have created, along with how it was organised, made it difficult for readers/visitors to find the content that interests them. So I’ve developed the following Topic Content pages:
Each page contains a paragraph briefly explaining the topic, then a list of: Creative Works, Pages, Blog Categories/Tags and Blog Posts. Each page contains a gallery of Related Images and where available Related Videos. I am hoping that these Topic Content pages, help readers/visitors to easily find content around their interests.
Increased Interactivity
When I have analysed the statistical data around visitors to my website, I noticed that visitors are only spending a short amount of time on my website/blog. So I have made a real effort to make my website more interactive. I already had the newsletter, social media and contact pages. But I’ve also added:
A form where readers/visitors can tell me what’s good about this website/blog, what could be improved and allows them to star rate their overall experience. I am hoping that with a bit of promotion, many readers/visitors will complete this form, giving me a valuable insight to the sort of content they would like in the future.
Future Content
I currently have a list of ideas for future blog posts, pages and other content. I am also intending to start the planning and writing of Z-VIRUS Cure & Restore, which is due for release some time in 2027.
I’m in a number of facebook groups for Writers and Authors. I’m not an active participant in any of these groups due to very limited energy, very limited time and the way that I use social media.
However, whilst in the waiting room for a medical appointment today, I popped on facebook and saw a user asking this question on my feed:
“Any authors ever get to a point where you want to give up? I’m there… what made you keep going?” – A facebook user
My creative experience for each of my books, articles and short stories written has been unique. Even if I’ve had a similar or the same creative process as a previous creative work. For more details around creative writing processes, see my posts: Beginning, Middle & End.
I think the reason every creative experience is different and unique is because of the sheer number of complex and multifaceted variables involved in the process.
I have fond memories of sitting on my grandma’s lap, her telling me stories about Freddie the Frog. She would do the different voices of the characters and even sound effects. I remember my grandma bouncing me up and down on her knees often, making the noise of an ambulance.
As I grew, so did my experience of stories. I was shown or told many different stories, in many different ways, about many different things, by many different people. Some stories would be fiction, whereas others would be non-fiction.
As an adult, I’ve gone to to present some of my own stories or re-tell stories I know to others. I’ve done this through my books, blog posts, articles and short stories.
Yet, I’ve never really considered, explored or examined stories as a concept. Which is why I’ve written this post.
Stories can be shown, told or presented to others in a variety of different ways including:
Oral/verbal telling – either live or pre-recorded. This was the first way of sharing stories and came when humans first developed language, well before the written word.
Through works of art – paintings, tapestries, sculptures, etc.
Written words – Both in print and electronic. This can be books, pamphlets, ebooks, websites, emails, messages, etc.
Images – photography or other still images.
GIFs – Short animated files that have a repeating movement, sound or both.
Songs/music/sound. This could include songs with words, music (with or without words) and sounds or sound effects.
Body movements/gestures/language. Such as dance routines or playing charades.
Video – TV, films, etc.
Rituals, which may involve the making and consumption of food.
Plays/other performances – where the story might be scripted or improvised.
3D cinema experiences.
Some theme park rides.
Through sense of smell.
Computer games – many have stories that the player experiences as they play the different levels/missions within the game.
Stories can have great power, sometimes being transformational to those that experience them. But the impact of stories varies greatly depending on a wide range of factors. This makes it practically impossible for storytellers to predict who, how or even if their story will have any impact on others.
Let me give you a few examples of stories and how they have impacted me to demonstrate what I mean:
Made me admire Ida & Louise Cook greatly. Made me feel better about the world during World War 2. That there were some good people out there and that the history wasn’t just genocide/death.
Made me feel deeply sad for Matthew Shepard, his mother and his family. Made me imagine what his torture must have been like. Reminded me, that as a gay man, I have to be hypervigilant for danger. The world is not always a safe place for gay people. Told Matthew’s story on my blog, at a time when America seems to be going backwards.
Gave me hope that there are some really smart people out there who are motivated by the greater good/good for humanity rather than money and greed. This story gives me hope that diseases that are currently un-curable, might one day be cured.
Technically anyone can present stories to others. Providing that the others want to experience the story and are able to access it in the way that it is being presented.
However, we do tend to prefer stories from people and organisations that we feel we can trust.
When a storyteller wants to share a story with you, useful questions to ask yourself are:
What is the storytellers agenda?
Are they a biased?
How much do I trust them?
What are their credentials? (i.e. qualifications and experience related to the story).
If the story is non-fiction, will they be giving you the correct facts/information?
What is my past experience with this storyteller?
What is your gut feeling telling you about the storyteller and the story they are presenting?
There are who industries set up around storytelling, think for example: any company providing the news, any company that does public relations, marketing or advertising.
But some more interesting storytelling jobs include: TV/Film Director, Comedian, Writer/Author and Actor/Actress.
Finding Your Happiness is my story of how I discovered the knowledge, skills and practices to be happier. How I became the happiest that I have ever been.
I published this book to share the knowledge, skills and practices, because I believe that everybody deserves to be happy.
As an experienced Registered Nurse, I am aware of the many Ways The Human Body Can Go Wrong. So I’ve written this book to share stories with Doctors, medical students, Nurses and Student Nurses about how the human body xan go wrong and what treatments are available.
As a gay man, I wanted to share a list of Influential UK Gay Men, which I did in this FREE article, because have role models with influence really counts.
