READ MY CHEST – I’m a writer who realized many more people will read a T-shirt than will read a book
Especially my books, since they’re long and out of the mainstream. I challenged myself to capture what I have to say on a T-shirt – the essence of brevity. Being so concise is very hard for a person used to writing long books and articles. Who always has more to say…
The end of 2015, I started designing T-shirts using what I’ve written and by “mining my slag heap.” That’s a mining term for going through what’s left after the high-grade ore is taken out. I’m sitting on tons of material. Plus, there’s stuff from many books and blog posts stuck in the pipeline. Most of my T-shirt messages are as unconventional as the rest of my stuff—out in left field.
My name is Faith Lynella
That's the name I publish under. Most of my books are non-fiction. My most significant work examines the visionary process, Naked Visionary – Seize your sparks of inspiration. My most recent book is Pockets of Air – Finding breathing room in an upside-down world.
Both my T-shirts and books are on Amazon.com, where I started selling my books in 1997. (That’s back when Amazon was just starting out – when publishing was all done with printing presses). How much has changed...
My T-shirts deliver a message from the wearer to the reader
All is communicated without a word being spoken. I’m determined to keep their ideas upbeat and likely to elicit a smile and a knowing nod.
Some T-shirts are cryptic, like: Sacred cows graze in your comfort zone.
Translation: Each of us has some sacred cows, familiar and unchallenged habits and beliefs that no longer serve us. They’ve been around forever, so we don’t even notice them any more. But if you want more growth and change in your life, the sacred cows have to go.
Some contradict conventional wisdom: You CAN tell a crappy book from its crappy cover.
Some are funny: Dinosaur-approved human.
Why I love Steem
Finding this website was like a cat falling into a vat of whipped cream! Holy crap! People who want to think for themselves. My kind of people. Steemers are the kind of readers I write for – yet so seldom find. Conventional social media certainly don’t support that. Quite the opposite. So being here at Steem feels like a homecoming. So many free-thinkers. Hooray!
I was born and raised in Alaska by a mother who was a genuine rebel and eccentric. So I have a hard time kowtowing to the normal world. I consider myself a frontier thinker – looking for what’s forming on the horizon. Attuned to what’s out of the norm but displays a germ of insight and creativity. I’m driven by my wide-ranging curiosity and broad reading tastes. So what people post on Steem is very much to my liking.
I jokingly say I change careers the way some women change husbands. But I can’t stick to something that becomes routine - when I’ve squeezed all the juice out of the orange. Some of them were doozies: psychologist, statistician, attorney, personnel director, trainer, inventor, professional cook - you get the picture. All the while, I was looking for the pattern behind events, the crucial cross-connections that are usually missed.
I’ve spent a lot of time in the trenches and paid a lot of dues. So now I write to share what I’ve found. Besides, I firmly believe that nothing in life is wasted. What we learn becomes part of our way of seeing things. So I bring a very eclectic lens to whatever topics I write about.
Steemers have an open approach to what they encounter. I can truly enjoy writing for those who are so fully engaged. This website is designed to be a two-way street, and that opens all kinds of possibilities. I can’t wait to start posting my stuff. And there will be T-shirts too.
BTW – All of my T-shirts can be purchased from Amazon.
- Read my chest: https://www.amazon.com/dp/B01AAVQ98K
- Sacred Cows graze in your comfort zone: https://www.amazon.com/dp/B01A2JTU04
- You CAN tell a crappy book from its crappy cover: https://www.amazon.com/dp/B01A4CBUXO
- Dinosaur-approved human: https://www.amazon.com/dp/B01A0XCO78
The title caught me! You're right about people reading the shirts over a book. I saw that and immediately thought, "This person definitely knows what they're talking about."
Thank you for commenting, Mermayad. Too true. But something very satisfying is also lost when we don't take the time to sink into a great book. Here's another of my T-shirts - T-shirts are books for the Internet Age.