The start of any journey, especially one of goal achievement, is never an easy one. My name is Yahaya Baruwa, I am the bestselling author of the Struggles of a Dreamer trilogy. I have written this article to share a small part of my story with you and to add value to your life by drawing from my 10 years of experience as a novelist and entrepreneur.
In 2009, at 21 years old I set out to write an inspirational novel with the mission to inspire one million people (like you and me) with the courage to do what they are afraid to do, today, that they may be at peace with themselves tomorrow.
It took over a year to write the book (a story that was inspired by a brief with my father) and another year to publish the book —Struggles of a Dreamer: The Battle between a Dream and Tradition was released on Saturday January 22, 2011.
Having started my own publishing company to publish and market my book, progress at the start was slow. With limited resources, I began by selling my novel door-to-door visiting the homes of my neighbours to start.
For the first few weeks, I was met with little success —I sold no more than 3-4 copies in a period of 4-5 hours. But despite the hot summer sun, missed leisure time and moments of embarrassment, I persisted. In time, I became increasingly efficient at telling my story and became less afraid —as result my book-sales increased. I went from selling only a few copies to selling 25-30 copies per day, door-to-door.
I was quick to out-grow this bookselling method and transitioned to selling my novels with Canada’s largest bookstore, Indigo-Chapters. To date I have done nearly one-thousand in-store book-signing events with the company and have become one of it’s top selling independent novelists in the country with more than 43,000 copies of my first novel Struggles of a Dreamer sold in-store.
Lesson #1 — Get Started.
- No one ever had all they needed at the start of their journey. Trust that you will have everything you need as you get on your way. This mindset will enable you to get going with the limited resources that you do have. Have faith in the process.
Lesson #2 —Prayer changes.
- I believe in the power of prayer and from experience I can definitely testify that it works. You will encounter countless situations that will cause you to doubt your mission, efforts and innate abilities —as a result you will likely feel stuck. Take a deep breath, calm down, pray about it and then proceed (even if you have to take one tiny step at a time). The courage and progress you need will follow thereafter. I learned this lesson first-hand when I had to figured out a way to print and sell 15,000 copies of my novel (instead of the usual 3,000 copies I was printing and selling). Today, I only print 15,000 or more copies per print-run.
Lesson #3 —Mind your business.
- It is easy to be distracted today and worse it is even easier to get caught in the trap of comparison. Minding your own business — your family, work, spirit, health and finance — will cause you to appreciate what you already have. Hence, with a sincere sense of gratitude for these things more increase will come your way. I sold my book door-to-door, the process was made especially hard because I would compare myself to authors who were having greater successes. However, I needed to stay on my own journey in order to set a firm foundation for my own kinds of successes that would soon follow.
Lesson #4 —Persistence makes the difference.
- I had to start out selling 3-4 copies of my book per day to be able to sell 25-30 copies daily. To-date I have sold nearly 50,000 copies (including sales of second novel) and it was all possible through my willingness to persist after every rejection. I have failed a lot in my career so far and this is why I am successful. When you fail, you grow —hence in every failure there-in lies the opportunity for your success.
Lesson #5 —Be nice to everyone.
- This is a very important habit to cultivate. You’d be amazed how much people respect those who are pleasant to interact with. The fact is humans only prefer to deal with other humans who they like and it is much easier to be liked when you are genuine and nice. You become more successful as a result.
Lesson #6 —Be yourself.
- This will make your journey easier and will allow you to share your talent genuinely.
Lesson #7 —Gratitude.
- Be grateful for the good, the bad and the ugly situations — these are all the necessary ingredients for your success story (no great movie ever existed without a “bad-guy!”)
In conclusion, no two journeys are ever alike yet the desire for success is universal. Be genuine in all that you do, work very hard, persist and give your best every time and the success you seek will follow. My novel, Struggles of a Dreamer, will add value to your journey and life —I invite you to start reading the book for free to see if it is for you —get started now with the first 25 pages here
Struggles of a Dreamer
Thank you for reading.
Yahaya Baruwa,
The best-selling author of the Struggles of a Dreamer Trilogy 3
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