Learn to Achieve Your Dreams in One Easy Step

If you would actually buy this book, please paypal $10 to: info@monkeyandseal.com

Many people are interested in finding the one magic bullet that will suddenly catapult them into fame overnight. Some people decide to try to make the next viral video and somehow monetize that. Others might be working on the next big e-book, or the next Batman, or the next facebook.

We all want the good life. We want to be able to not worry about our finances, our love life, our careers, our families. Often times it's easy to misinterpret things like The Secret to mean that all we have to do is think about something that'll solve all our problems (lotto tickets anyone?) and magically it shall happen.

Work is hard. Doing the hard work that'll take you from being an amateur to a professional is not easy, nor can you complete it quickly. Hopefully the path to become an artist who can live off their craft is fun and exciting, but often times business things (taxes, inventory, remembering to submit to annuals in time or to apply for that big craft fair, etc) can bog you down. Between marketing, networking, updating your blog and website, when do you even have time to make your art? It's true: the path to getting paid to make art is not necessarily a quick and easy thing.

But who wants to be patient? We want stuff NOW. Why do you think we pay for overnight delivery? Why do we still go to the store as opposed to just ordering everything online? Because we want it right now, in our hot little hands. And thus we want the "get-rich-and-famous" overnight formula.

So, after years and years of hard work, Monkey has come across the perfect solution to making all your dreams come true, in one, simple, easy step. Ready for it? Here it comes.

The secret to achieving your dream, in one simple step is: Change your dream to something you've already accomplished.

Easy peasy lemon breezy.

It's no get-rich-quick scheme (I guess for that, you can always mug people walking around a richy-rich area and hope they have cash), but it will make achieving your dreams easier.

So if you want to reach your dreams as they are now, unfortunately, the easiest way to get there is to bust your little behind and work as hard as you can. Sure, there's lot of other tactics and other tricks and stuff (lots of what we've talked about before), but the easiest one is to just do the work. It's not exactly the most glamorous idea, or something you've never heard before, but it's the truth.

I was reading an issue of Juxtapoz (not sure what month it was), but the artist was being asked "how does it fell to be an overnight success?" The artist responded with something like "Well, if you consider 15 years of work 'overnight...'). Basically, you may have to be patient.

So we know its not easy to constantly work and work and work and keep on practicing and practicing and practicing, but it's what is needed. You want the real magic bullet that will make all the work go away? Learn to make the work fun. If you enjoy yourself, then it's not really work. Find the challenge or the value in doing the mundane. Need to learn animal anatomy for a project? Delve into the material and find something about it that interests you. Anything can be fun if you just let it be fun. The biggest obstacle keeping you from your success is you, so learn how to enjoy the work you've got and it'll be done before you know it.

Also, please don't mug people. It's not cool.

Do You Know How to Get a Book Published? Want to Learn?

So as of, uh, just about right now, Chris Guillebeau has just launched his newest guide, The Unconventional Guide to Publishing.

So to be upfront about all this, yes, we are affiliates (meaning that we get paid a % of the money if you click on the links in this post and end up buying something), but there is a non-affiliate link at the bottom of the page.

Frankly, we know a lot of authors out there, as well as people who are working to being paid authors, so we figured we'd talk a bit about what this guide is all about.

So it's authored by a guy named David Fugate who is a badass of a literary agent.  He's sold over 1000 books to publishers of all sizes over the past 20 years (meaning he averages about 50 books per year...not too shabby). So what is the guide?

The Unconventional Guide to Publishing is the beacon of light in the dense, hard-to-find-answers world of book publishing.  It was conceived of at a conference when people kept asking him the same questions over and over, and he realized that these questions were asked again and again of him for the past 20 years that he's been a literary agent.

What will you learn in this badass, 45,000 word mammoth of a guide?  Stuff like how to:
-Develop a compelling concept
-Land an agent/find information about agents
-Learn what editors are looking for
-Determine how much $$ should you expect for an advance
-Write a book proposal
-Hustle and get your book out there, and why you still have to do it even with a traditional publishing deal
-Actually write the book
-Negotiate a publishing deal

You'll also learn how foreign translations work, what "reserves for returns" are, and other cryptic stuff that budding authors should know.  There are also tons of bonus features, like sample contracts and proposals, audio recordings and transcripts of interviews with authors, There are three different packages (Hemingway, Fitzgerald, and Austin - clever!) which have different amounts of stuff and different price points.

A note about this.  Monkey bought Chris' Empire Building Kit in 2010 at the lowest price point (then it was $97, now it's $147), and it was pretty damn awesome.  Totally worth the $97, and it would be easily worth $147 as well.  So basically, if you can only afford the most basic package, it's still worth it.

So there's also going to be a product launch special(!!) that'll go on until midnight, PST, on Friday, January 13th.  Nutso!  Not only is there a 25% discount on the $129 tier (dropping the TOP tier down to $97), and extended Q&A conference all with David Fugate, but there's also a review of your community-buidling plan with Chris Guillebeau.  Both David and Chris don't offer consulting services, so if you can afford 'em, it's time to get 'em.

So if you're still asking "is this guide right for me," we recommend you going over HERE to check it out for yourself.  Is it right for everyone?  No.  If you're the type who isn't going to take notes while reading this, and isn't the type to take some inspired action steps, you probably shouldn't pick this up.  If you're not really interested in getting your book in the hands of a major publisher, then this probably isn't for you.  If the price of the book is going to cause you to miss rent, this is also probably not for you.

HOWEVER, if you are someone who wants to get serious with their writing (or hell, if you're a visual artist and you want to pitch a book of images), and is willing to make an investment in themselves, then by all means, this book is for you.

If you want to check it all out and deprive us of our share (that's okay, we understand), you can click this non-affiliate link here.