Rob’s new meditation class started on January 10, the first of six. It’s held in a yoga studio, which is more conducive to meditation than the studio at our gym. There were ten of us, a multi-cultural group, and the energy felt positive.
Rob started off with breathing exercises and a deep relaxation and visualization. I was tired from our trip from Orlando and entered a relaxed state easily. At some point, I no longer heard Rob’s voice. Suddenly, a tremendous anteater loped up to me, a beautiful creature with black and white fur and a very long snout. He got right in my face, like he wanted to play, and it startled me. I leaned back to get a better look at him, then he turned away and trotted off.
I realized he had a rope around his neck that slapped the ground as he moved, and that he was following a goat, which also had a leash or a rope around its neck. I had the impression the two were escapees from a zoo or from someone’s backyard, and that they were on a quest of some kind. The goat was definitely the leader and they were enjoying their new found freedom.
In 7 Secrets of Synchronicity, there’s a chapter on animals as messengers and oracles. I’ve never experienced anything concerning anteaters or goats, so when I got home, I started Googling. Anteaters have a variety of meanings: an ability to find lost objects, curiosity, “rooting around” to find solutions, business relationships, finances, a celebration of completeness or wholeness, important to harness your energies, difficult business arrangements.
I felt no negativity connected to this anteater. He was friendly, cute, furry. I think the black and white color of his fur is significant in some way; maybe it points to an issue that is black or white. The rooting around aspect of the anteater resonates for me. I tend to root around for answers and insights until I find what I need. The “difficult business relationship” mentioned on one site also felt right. A publisher has owed us money for five months and has provided any number of excuses – check lost, check reissued but sent to the wrong department, check on the way.
When I Googled goat, a lot of Biblical links came up and most of them were negative – the goat as symbolic of the devil, evil and so on. But when I went to shamanic or animal totem sites, I found several definitions that resonate. Goats are sure-footed and always get to where they want to go, one step at a time. When they encounter obstacles, they find a way around them until they reach the patch of delicious grass, the summit. I have a Capricorn moon and Capricorn’s animal is the goat.
The fact that both animals were “escapees,” on some sort of quest, suggests freedom to pursue a quest or a goal. I had entered the meditation with a question: how can I boost the sales of my novels? I think I got my answer.
Great story and comments!
I’ve been checking through your pages. One of those pesky details crawling like ants on your “Trish’s Novels” page is the links with each novel need to be a one click connection to a point of purchase.
Consider your audience is like the anteater, they are sniffing around with their nose on the ground and that nose wants to be within the pages of a good book. But there’s lots of ants so if one disappears under the sand, the anteater is not going to keep digging. If it’s too much work to find your book, zap, they’ve got an ant that’s on the surface. Your audience is trying to find you and they are big and warm and fluffy and happy to follow the goat to the pinnacle but they want a book available at first sniff.
Another recommendation I have regarding your novels is to brand them by genre. An example is to group them as suspense, with time travel elements. The scuttle through romance world is readers want good time travel novels and it doesn’t have to be a romance as long as the ending is satisfying – which means the character(s) the reader cares about the most through the story is alive and in a better personal situation. You can also target your marketing to romance readers, even though you don’t write romances, because every book of yours that I’ve read has a great relationship sprinkled through the pages.
Those are two things you can control: tagging your novels by genre and making your links a direct point of purchase click.
Be ready for when one of your books is selected as a FREE READ thru amazon or B&N. I know a few authors who had one of their books skyrocket thou kindles to readers and all of her backlist jumped substantially in sales and have continued to remain steady or climb for over a year now.
Great ideas, Terri. I should have done this to begin with! The genre ID is a good idea. Many thanks!!
An idea for any out-of-print books is to contact that new amazon publishing division to see if they have the resources to get the rights and reissue them. Samhaim Publishing also has a new division dedicated to bringing OOP’s to new life as ebooks. There’s probably others doing the same.
I did one out of print astrology book through smashwords. Will look into samhaim publishing, Terri. Thanks!
What a great story (and interpretation from Math). Good luck with your ‘boosting’.
love this story, trish! i mean, how much plainer could it be! and i think cj hit the nail on the head with her take! fabulous story – and interpretation! now, i need to find a quiet corner and meditate!
The past 2 classes haven’t yielded much. The guy next to me falls asleep and snores – and that takes me right out of the meditative state!
ohhhhhh…….i guess so!
Just a suggestion about your meditation vision, Trish. Ants are symbols of little details, too. The ant-eater could have symboilized something eating away at tiny details in your work, ie, taking your attention away from details, although not necessarily in a negative manner. And the mountain goat of course, as you say, is the Cap symbol….striving always to reach the heights, to get to the top of the mountain, to access the pinnacle (of success) and is very ambitious. Your goat was leading the way:
ambition to get your book finished; anteater following: nibbling at tiny details you may be missing or haven’t yet accessed? Capricorn is slow and steady but always gets the job done efficiently. Also, Caps tend to be loners as they climb that mountain to its peak, where they stand and look down at the world from their lofty height of success. I would certainly interpret this as a wonderfully prophetic vision, pertinent to your literary endeavors!! Great post, great story.
Your interpretation feels right, Math. Thanks!