UPDATE on “The Book” – 7 November, 2015

Lhamo Dorje Cover

Here November arrives, 2015 rushes to a close, and 2016 is sounding like a good year to go to print (how’s that for a spin?).

I’ve decided to self-publish All About Enlightenment, and since that turn eliminates my concerns about a publisher caring whether book content resides online, I’ve also re-published several posts that I had hidden back in September.

Now I’m welcoming input, feedback, from you!

In this post I’ve shared four studies I’ve done for AAE’s cover – do you have a preference?

Before you comment, please note: As I’ve continued to edit and rearrange the book’s content, it’s surreptitiously expanded. We may now be looking at a multitude of volumes – the number 7 comes to mind. So whatever cover approach lands on the top of the pile may need to adapt to variations.

The tenacity of a Table Of Contents amazes me: as I’ve wrangled with it over the past few months, it’s sprouted a will like a dandelion forcing its way through asphalt. We decided to arrange the book along some quite Buddhist lines (maybe I’ll take the time to explain later), and gaps blinked forth like those seeds carried on the wind. The more I added, the more little voices whispered “I need to be here too”.

At this point, All About Enlightenment has sprung from it’s 120 pages in 2010 into a 700-page-and-growing behemoth. More explanation. More illustration. More examples. More connections. At times I’ve felt so overwhelmed I’ve resorted to maintaining sanity by adhering note cards to the dining room wall. And then going out for a drink.

I’m also adding content to Zazzle (if you’re not Zazzle-savvy you’ll have to wait until I’m ready to post links and then you can order t-shirts), and looking back through the hundreds of images on my hard-drive for flip-book candidates to publish on Amazon. There are a few videos I was building frame-by-frame that I hope will become lovely collections of encouraging images.

Thank you for bearing with me along this journey.