Tag: Young Adult Fiction

It’s one thing to build a community of like-minded individuals, but to build momentum, that first community must extend beyond itself to cooperate with other organizations and communities that share similar goals.

The more people that are involved, the faster progress can be made as new ideas and greater energy is added to the mix. Great leaders recognize this truth and are always seeking to partner with other organizations in order to achieve their goals.

At Path To Publishing, we routinely look for partnerships with other organizations and work with them to help them meet their needs just as they help our community meet its needs. One of those partnerships is with the IBPA or the Independent Book Publishers Association, (https://www.ibpa.org).

The IBPA serves to help independent publishers and self-published authors get the help and support they need to produce books of the same quality as traditional publishing houses, while getting many of the same networking advantages.

We are also looking to partner with other writers, book club leaders, educators, pastors, community leaders, business owners and entrepreneurs, as well as parents and grandparents, to help us in our efforts to change the conversation around race relations using our upcoming novel The Price We Pay, being published on our traditional publishing imprint (PTP Press), as a starting point.

We know that by working together with these organizations and individuals, we will be able to extend our reach, expand our opportunities, and bring our vision of a future where children do not have to experience racial divisions to life much sooner than we could on our own.

To discover more about The Price We Pay and our work to open the doors of communication and change the conversation around race relations, visit our crowdfunding campaign page at https://ptppress.com/taking-a-novel-approach-to-change. Those who sign up to #JoinTheConversation will receive an invitation to join our private LEADERS community.

P.S. And if you know any individuals, companies, foundations, or organizations who might make for a solid partner in supporting and pushing our movement forward, please feel free to pass on this email to them or send them our way.

A leader who recruits individuals has followers. Great LEADERS bring those followers together into a tight-knit community that supports and encourages one another. As a unit, they stand strong and continue working together to achieve the vision even when the leader isn’t there to help guide them.

Weak leaders fear people communicating, connecting, and coming together. They fear what people will say about them when they’re not there to control the conversations.

They fear that people will join together to oppose them. They fear communities rising up against them. That’s why they encourage division and focus on differences, hoping to use those as a wedge to keep people apart.

Great leaders recognize and respect that there is strength in numbers. They actively work to bring people together and cultivate unity among those who follow them by celebrating diversity, integrity, and service. They encourage people to be their best and elevate those who strive to serve others rather than those who seek to be served.

When Path To Publishing acquired The Price We Pay for its traditional publishing imprint, PTP Press, we saw in author Nikki T. Anthony’s writing a chance to showcase the differences between how great leaders act and how weak leaders act. That is one of the reasons we are launching a crowdfunding campaign to invite public participation in a movement we hope will change the conversation around race relations.

Our goal is to use that book as a means of creating shared experiences among readers that can foster open and honest conversations about the way that race relations impact the characters. Those discussions can then become a launchpad for open and honest dialogue about how our own personal experiences either differ or match up with the character’s experiences.

We believe these are important discussions to have and are looking for the right LEADERS to step up and join us in engaging in these conversations. We know that when it comes to race relations, the tendency is to talk about one another rather than to one another, but that strategy is why the divisions are growing.

We don’t want another generation to pay the same price we are paying for past failures to step up and do something about the growing racial divides. We want to ensure that everyone has a seat at the table and an opportunity to make their voices heard about this important topic.

To discover more about our work to open the doors of communication and change the conversation around race relations, visit our crowdfunding campaign’s page at https://ptppress.com/taking-a-novel-approach-to-change. Sign up to #JoinTheConversation and join our private LEADERS community.

People don’t care how much you know until they know how much you care.” – Theodore Roosevelt

No leader, no matter how great, can accomplish anything without the support of others. They gain that support by connecting, on a personal level, with those they recruit to join them.

A leader can have the greatest vision the world has ever seen, one which will provide the greatest benefit to all those who support and contribute to it. They can be persuasive in their communication of that vision and consistent in their delivery of it.

However, if their listeners don’t believe that the leader genuinely cares about them and their personal situation, they won’t be moved to take action. This is why a sincere desire to serve others is at the heart of the work of great LEADERS.

Sincere service demonstrates the LEADER’S ability while also showing how much they care. Those two things build trust with the people being served. It’s the proof in the pudding.

It is this connection with a LEADER that drives the loyalty to the vision. That loyalty helps overcome discouragement when things take longer than expected or don’t seem to be working as planned.

It tempers the disappointment that followers face when reality diverges from their expectations and there are frustrations over repeated failures. It lends them the strength to continue working when exhaustion creeps up and the list of to-dos begins to pile up. It helps them keep going when the distance between where the group is and where the vision is taking them seems impossibly far apart from one another.

A sincere desire to serve our communities and improve the lives of those we touch is at the heart of everything Path To Publishing does. We see the gaps in leadership, the communities that aren’t being served by the way things are currently being done, and we are seeking to close that gap using a novel by debut author Nikki T. Anthony entitled The Price We Pay, which is being published on Path To Publishing’s traditional publishing imprint, PTP Press.

Our goal is to prevent future generations from having to pay the price we are all paying for failing to step up and do something about racial conflicts while there is still time to stop the growing divides and build unity with one another.

That’s why we’re crowdfunding the movement and inviting public participation in our plans to change the conversation around race relations. We’re also working to cultivate LEADERS amongst those who contribute to our crowdfunding campaign and join our community. That work begins with funding the publication of our novel.

To discover more aboutour campaignand the work we are doing to open the doors of communication and change the conversation around race relations, visit our crowdfunding campaign’s page at https://ptppress.com/taking-a-novel-approach-to-change. Once you’re there, sign up to #JoinTheConversation and join our LEADERS community.

You can also visit www.ptppress.com to learn more about Path To Publishing’s traditional publishing imprint.

Changing the conversation around race relations requires effective leadership, which begins with clarity around the vision. That vision then fuels the goals of the movement and directs the work being done to change the conversation.

For that reason, the leader must be able to clearly and effectively communicate:

• Their vision of what life will be like if their mission is accomplished
• The necessity driving that vision and the urgency of taking action now
• The benefits awaiting those who contribute to turning that vision into a reality
• The steps that must be taken in order to achieve the vision and accomplish the mission

For people to follow a leader, they have to know where they are going and what the benefits are of getting there. They also need to understand the risks they take in choosing to allow themselves to be left behind or of delaying their response to this call to action.

They must also see the benefits of putting in the work required for the vision to become a reality. Finally, they need to know what is expected of them and how to do it in order for them to take the actions that will help turn the vision into a reality.

If the leader doesn’t know these things or isn’t clear about them, it leaves would-be followers without the motivation or direction needed to get on board with that leader’s plans. This is why CLARITY is the first step for all great LEADERS.

Once CLARITY is achieved, CONSISTENCY is needed. Consistency in taking action, consistency in communicating about the vision, and consistency in the expectations for those who join the LEADERS in executing it are all important. It’s what shows confidence, prevents confusion, and encourages others to commit to getting on board with what the leader is trying to achieve.

That’s why we are prepared to offer LEADERS who contribute to our crowdfunding campaign with:

• The right messaging to use in communicating our vision of changing the conversation around race relations for the better through our Study Guide
• Training in Magnetic Thought Leadership so that they know how we expect them to treat those they lead into our movement
• A community of like-minded individuals who will help hold them accountable in their goals and provide support and encouragement to continue making a difference

The money raised through the campaign will be used to fund the publication of PTP Press’s (traditional publishing imprint of Path To Publishing) upcoming novel, The Price We Pay, and to furthering our agenda. We plan to leverage the novel, along with the above-mentioned resources, to help change the conversation around race relations using the novel to create common experiences to use in their discussions.

It is our goal that the next generation does not have to pay the price we are paying, from riots to church burnings and murders, for failing to step up and do something positive to end the racial divides.

To discover more about The Price We Pay and our novel plan to open the doors of communication and change the conversation around race relations beginning with a book, visit https://ptppress.com/taking-a-novel-approach-to-change and sign up to become one of our LEADERS and #JoinTheConversation.

You can also visit www.ptppress.com to learn more about Path To Publishing’s traditional publishing imprint.

Being able to engage in difficult conversations is the hallmark of great LEADERS. Great LEADERS possess clarity around their vision and mission. They know how to communicate those things to others in a way that makes the benefits of supporting the vision clear.

But they don’t stop there. They are prepared for the opposition. They know that not everyone is going to agree that their plan is the right one. They know that some people will stand against them.

Some people will stand against us because they’re comfortable with how things are or because they are profiting from it. When these people take notice enough of what we’re doing and try to stop us, we know we’re headed on the right path. We aren’t likely to be able to win their support, but we can convert their negative energy into a sign that we’re doing something right and let it encourage rather than discourage us.

Some people will stand against us because they have lost hope that things can change and they’re afraid we’re only going to make things worse for them. By listening to them, we can discover what it is they need to see from us so they can regain hope and have confidence in our plan. We may not win them over right away, but if we keep moving forward without them, we can let our results speak for themselves.

Some people will stand against us because they believe they have a better plan. By listening to them, we may gain some insights into things we could do better. We may also learn from them.

Some people will stand against us because they like the plan but believe we’re not on the right path to succeed. If we listen to them, we’ll learn where they think our weaknesses are and can spot potential problems before they have a chance to derail us and fix them. They may also have ideas we hadn’t thought of that can enhance our plans and make our results even better.

Some people will stand against us because they misunderstand our intentions or misinterpret our meaning. These are the easiest people to win over. All it takes is listening long enough to figure out where the misunderstanding is or where they are misinterpreting our actions and educating them as to the reality.

No matter who stands against us, if we’re willing to listen, we will find that the tools we need to succeed are being given to us just as much by our opposition as by our supporters. Rather than weakening the movement, the opposition can only make us stronger, more united, and more effective.

Conversion doesn’t always mean that we’ll succeed in converting other people to our way of thinking. That is a process that can take a long time and sometimes doesn’t happen at all. Rather, it’s about converting the negative energy thrown your direction into positive momentum that ensures your success.

At Path To Publishing, we are open to the difficult conversations that will come from launching our movement and kicking off our crowdfunding campaign. We know that our goal involves nothing short of changing the conversation focusing on race relations, and that’s bound to meet resistance. We know that not everyone will agree with our methods or see the benefits. We welcome the conversations that will come from our opposition as well as from our supporters, fans, and followers.

To discover more about our campaign and our novel approach to changing the conversation around race relations, visit our crowdfunding campaign page at https://ptppress.com/taking-a-novel-approach-to-change. Sign up to become one of our LEADERS and #JoinTheConversation.

Great LEADERS are magnetic. Rather than pushing an agenda on people, they leverage their knowledge of their ideal audience and its desires to attract supporters to them and to their vision.

Being magnetic, though, does not mean that everyone will be attracted to the leader’s message and the vision it carries. It means that the right people will be attracted to it even as the wrong people are repelled by it.

This is why it is so important for great LEADERS to be trained in handling conflict and conversions. LEADERS need to be able to either convert other people to their point of view or convert the negative energy of their opposition into positive momentum for themselves.

They will gain a benefit from their opposition even if the opposition’s intention is harmful. In this way, no matter what comes, they maintain their forward momentum toward the achievement of their vision and its realization.

It’s one of the main reasons we are including Magnetic Thought Leadership Training as part of our offering to those who contribute to the crowdfunding campaign for our upcoming novel being published on our traditional publishing imprint, The Price We Pay. We know that those who join us in our efforts to change the conversation around race relations are going to meet opposition.

We know that opposition, if not handled correctly, can lead to discouragement, burnout, and giving up. It can even lead to depression and other mental health problems. We want to prepare them for the opposition by equipping them to turn every negative thing they might encounter into something that benefits them and makes them stronger.

That way, our LEADERS become unstoppable, because when the LEADERS are unstoppable, the movement will be, too.

To discover more about our book, The Price We Pay, and our work to open the doors of communication by changing the conversation around race relations, visit our crowdfunding campaign page at https://ptppress.com/taking-a-novel-approach-to-change.

Become one of the LEADERS by signing up to #JoinTheConversation alongside a community of like-minded individuals who will offer support and encouragement along the way.

You can also visit www.ptppress.com to learn more about PTP Press, which is Path To Publishing’s traditional publishing imprint.

At Path To Publishing, our goal is to cultivate LEADERS who excel at difficult conversations because they:

• Listen to understand the other side’s point of view before responding
• Empathize with the other persons’ positions, trying to see the world through their eyes
• Ask relevant questions to help them clarify the other persons’ meanings and intentions
• Determine the best way to respond based on what is understood about how the other person views things
• Express their own views with clarity while remaining respectful
• Respect the other person and their views even when they disagree with them
• Share a personal story to help illustrate why they believe what they believe with a goal of seeking to serve the other person, not to be served

Toward that end, we are crowdfunding a movement using a novel approach to changing the conversation around race relations in order to generate public awareness and support for our efforts. The money raised will be used to fund PTP Press’s (the traditional publishing imprint of Path To Publishing) upcoming release, The Price We Pay.

As part of that crowdfunding campaign, we are equipping our contributors to be LEADERS by offering four essential resources that will help them step up and make a difference:

• Magnetic Thought Leadership Training to equip them to lead these conversations in a way that creates an inviting, respectful space where all voices are recognized and seen as being of equal value.
• Lessons in how to hold difficult conversations that are productive and meaningful where both sides feel respected and heard, yet challenged and encouraged to find room for compromise.
• A Study Guide to navigating the challenges of discussing sensitive topics in an inter-racial community.
• A community of like-minded individuals who are ready and willing to lend their support and encouragement along the way.

To discover more about the movement and our efforts to stop the growing divide between the races, visit our crowdfunding campaign page at https://ptppress.com/taking-a-novel-approach-to-change. Sign up to #JoinTheConversation and step up to become one of the LEADERS.

The human brain is wired for stories. Research published in 2008 based on fMRI studies of the human brain as it processes stories suggests that the brain remembers and processes a well-told story as if the events in that story happened to the individual reading it in real life. This makes stories an ideal tool for initiating difficult conversations.

One of the things that happens when a person is reading or listening to a story is that the normal belief-based operating system that runs our brains suspends its core beliefs in order to adopt the beliefs of the main character or the primary narrator, at least for the duration of the story. The reader looks at the world through the eyes of the protagonist while experiencing their thoughts and feeling their emotions.

This sets the reader up to be ready to engage in conversation with others about the experiences that took place in the book. Because those experiences are tied to the main character’s life, and not to the reader’s personal experiences, it subtracts some of the emotional baggage normally associated with expressing their thoughts and feelings about situations involving topics like gender, money, race, religion, or sexuality.

When done in a group setting such as a book club, these discussions are based on a shared experience within the book that everyone participating can use as a framework for conversations about those topics. The events, characters, actions, and their outcomes form a common language that they can use to describe how they see and how they feel about things.

We are looking for existing book clubs whose members enjoy a challenge to step up and help us open the door to the difficult conversations by introducing the upcoming novel being published on our traditional publishing imprint, The Price We Pay, to its members.

We’ll offer participating clubs the following resources needed for their members to become LEADERS who reap the benefits of these difficult conversations:

• Magnetic Thought Leadership Training to equip them to lead these conversations in a way that creates an inviting, respectful space where all voices are recognized and seen as being of equal value.
• Lessons in how to hold difficult conversations that are productive and meaningful, where both sides feel respected and heard, yet challenged and encouraged to find room for compromise.
• A Study Guide to navigating the challenges of discussing sensitive topics in an inter-racial community.
• A community of like-minded individuals who are ready and willing to lend their support and encouragement along the way.

To discover more about the book and the movement behind the book — our novel approach to changing the conversation about race relations — visit our crowdfunding campaign page at https://ptppress.com/taking-a-novel-approach-to-change. #JoinTheConversation

You can also visit www.ptppress.com to learn more about PTP Press, which is Path To Publishing’s traditional publishing imprint.

…and Why a Novel Approach Is Needed

A study conducted by the University of Scranton on people’s ability to make lasting change, as measured by their ability to stick to a New Year’s Resolution, found that only 19% of people who resolved to change stuck to it after two years.

That study highlights the challenge faced in changing the conversation around race relations: Human beings do not find it easy to make lasting, authentic changes even when we know it is in our best interest to do so.

The odds of people succeeding in making a change are against them because of five main factors:

1) Their inability to see possibilities beyond the current point of view.

It’s hard for people to imagine life any other way than the way they’ve currently experienced it, and that difficulty makes it hard for them to keep making sacrifices for something that they aren’t sure will ever happen or is even possible.

2) Their entrenched beliefs and biases based on past experiences running unchallenged and unchecked.

Most people aren’t even aware of the beliefs and biases they hold that lead to the thoughts, feelings, and decisions they make about how to handle interactions with other people. Many of these beliefs and biases were adopted by them at much younger ages and are not something they are conscious of doing.

3) Their established habits of thoughts, feelings, and behaviors.

Habits are hard to break for a reason: the brain finds this behavior to be the easiest and most efficient method of getting a need met, and the neural pathways of having chosen this behavior repeatedly over a long period of time are deeply entrenched in the brain.

Opening new pathways and doing things in a new way require conscious thought and energy, while doing things the old way doesn’t. The effort and energy required to turn a new habit into a subconscious decision is something the brain resists.

An analogy of this process, something that every sporting coach knows, is the creation of “muscle memory.” It takes ten thousand repetitions before it sinks in and becomes a reflex. This works not just for muscles, but for “learned” behaviors as well.

4) Peer pressure from existing relationships and surrounding communities.

Making a dramatic change in thoughts, feelings, and behaviors is difficult enough, but when the person trying to change meets resistance from the people with whom they have existing relationships, such as family and friends or their surrounding community, that change becomes exponentially more difficult.

The person trying to change is often seen as rejecting those existing relationships or their surrounding community. It takes extraordinary strength to stand up and face down the risks of rejection, judgement, and even potential harm that may come from making a dramatic change.

Consider the public acceptance of smoking. In the fifties and sixties, smoking was more than acceptable — it seemed to be endemic to our society. Then, following public pressure and legislative limitations to where people can smoke in public, active addiction to tobacco dropped from nearly fifty percent in the sixties to under fifteen percent today.

Movies and TV show rating warnings about risk factors now include smoking along with sexual activity, violence, and strong language. In addition, smoking on the screen is either limited to historical films or when it’s in “today’s setting,” it’s almost exclusively limited to “bad guys.” This change took sixty years from the Surgeon General’s first warning, but it has become a society-wide behavior and attitude change.

5) Failure, Frustration, Discouragement, Disappointment, and Impatience.

Human beings would like for change to be a linear progression, going from point A to point Z without any stops in between. However, that’s not how change works. Change requires the development of a new set of habits to be formed and a new set of mental, emotional, and possibly even physical muscles to be developed to support those habits. As with a toddler learning to walk, there is a lot of failure that takes place before the change is successful and the transformation becomes permanent.

Human beings are not patient creatures. They are not patient with each other and certainly not with themselves. The expectation that change should be immediate and a straight line leads to disappointment when that doesn’t pan out in reality. Discouragement over repeated failures at the attempt to change can lead to frustration and, eventually, to the person giving up altogether and abandoning the effort to change as being impossible for them or impossible for the other person.

At Path To Publishing, we recognize that changing the conversation over racial inequity and the impact of that inequity upon children won’t happen overnight. It also won’t help without the support of a community.

That’s why we’ve chosen to crowdfund our movement in order to spread the word and invite public participation in this. We’re also working to develop a supportive community around the vision of creating a more diverse, inclusive, and equitable society for all, one that provides room for people to make these changes and practice new habits in an environment that focuses on progress rather than demanding immediate success.

We’re also going to offer Magnetic Thought Leadership Training to help each person who contributes discover and put to good use their personal power to influence others and enact change. We’ll also be offering a study guide to help our contributors navigate the challenges of holding inter-racial conversations around sensitive topics.

Discover more about our crowdfunding campaign and our efforts to start a movement designed to bridge the gap between the races at https://ptppress.com/taking-a-novel-approach-to-change. #JoinTheConversation, and thank you in advance for supporting the movement.

It’s a fact that racial divisions are growing in America, with more than 59% of Black Americans expressing a lack of hope that racial relations can ever improve.

There are plenty of reasons to complain about this and more than enough blame to go around, but while those things are easier, they in no way solve the problem.

Path To Publishing and PTP Press are devoted to cultivating bold LEADERS who have the skills, knowledge, and courage it takes to tackle challenges like this head on — not by fighting with their fists but by engaging in the difficult conversations that open the door to lasting change.

Inspired by the way that our team’s relationships changed for the better as we confronted one another about our own internal biases and beliefs while discussing Nikki T. Anthony’s book, The Price We Pay, we knew we had in our hands the kind of book that could spark a movement and begin bridging the gaps between the races.

Respectful conversations like this are not easy to have. It takes the right kind of leadership and guidance, along with the support of a community of like-minded individuals, to succeed in producing authentic, lasting change. Without those, the conversations can break down into accusations and anger, leaving both sides feeling defensive and misunderstood, which ends up causing divisions to grow worse, not better.

That’s why we’re making sure that contributors to our crowdfunding campaign will be given access to specialized Magnetic Thought Leadership Training along with study guides to facilitate inter-racial conversations about sensitive topics, leveraging the book as the starting point. They will also be invited to join the growing LEADERS community we’re building of people committed to helping change the conversation for the better.

Discover more about our new book by visiting our crowdfunding campaign page at https://ptppress.com/taking-a-novel-approach-to-change. Sign up to #JoinTheConversation and support the movement. Change is possible, but only when people commit to taking action.