The Dream Doer League

YOU always FIND a WAY to DO what you DREAM when you STICK to your STRENGTHS.

Sep 15

How Can You Be Confident in Yourself When You Don’t Like the Way You Look?

Welcome to another edition of Unshakable, Unbreakable, Unstoppable Stories with Bonnie Jean.

I haven’t always had unshakable confidence. In fact, my self-confidence was very shaky when I was growing up. It was the shakiest when it came to how I looked in middle school.

When you don’t have confidence in the way you look, it’s hard to have any kind of confidence in yourself at all. And the way you look is important, especially when you’re in middle school. What you can see on the outside seems more valuable and important than who you are on the inside.

That’s what I believed was true when I was in the seventh grade. And that wrong, negative belief shook my self-confidence big time with just one little picture.

You see, my mom took me and my sisters and brother to get our individual pictures taken at a department store. I was really looking forward to it.

I went through this super awkward looking stage from fourth through sixth grade. But now my teeth were straight. My hair was long and unfrizzy. I was starting to believe I was almost pretty, and I believed my seventh grade picture was going to prove it.

On the day of the picture taking, I wore a green, long-sleeved shirt and pulled my hair back in a barrette. I put on a little make-up and smiled for the camera. I thought for sure it was going to be the best picture I had ever had taken of me.

A few days later, my mom picked up the pictures and brought them home. What I saw made me cry. Literally. Tears streamed down my face when I saw that image of me frozen in time.

I didn’t see a pretty girl. I saw a girl with buck teeth and an ugly smile staring back at me. I decided at that moment that I was so ugly that no boy would ever want to date me. Since no boy would ever want to date me, I would never have a boyfriend. If I never had a boyfriend, I would never get married. If I never got married, I would never have any kids.

That’s why I cried. I was sad that I was too ugly to ever get married and have kids.

My mom saw my tears and tried to tell me it was a good picture. That made me cry even more. If that’s what I really looked like, I was doomed to never ever have a boyfriend.

Then my dad tried to encourage me. But I was too busy crying and telling myself how ugly I was to listen to him and believe anything he had to say.

From then until now, I’ve never had much confidence in the way I looked. But now I know that I don’t have to be beautiful to be confident. Confidence comes from the inside out, not the outside in.

When I learned how to discover my strengths and use my strengths to live my dreams, I learned how to live with unshakable confidence. But you don’t have to wait as long as I did to be confident in who you are.

To Your Dreams,
Bonnie Jean

P.S. Please don’t wait as long as I did to find your unshakable confidence! Life is really much more fun when you set goals and take action to make them happen. No matter how old you are, you can be an unshakable, unbreakable, unstoppable Dream Doer today! To help, I want to give you three FREE gifts, which includes the entire audio book of The Dream Doers and the Summer of Secrets. To claim your FREE gifts, visit TheDreamDoers.com now.

Share and Enjoy:

Sep 08

No Confidence in the Fourth Grade? Me Either!

Confidence Building, Motivating Stories, True Stories No Comments »

Unshakable, Unbreakable, Unstoppable Stories

Making friends in a new school is tough, but it’s doubly tough when you are shy and unsure of yourself. I should know. When I was in the fourth grade, I started a new school.

I was a quiet kid with an active imagination. But when I went to school, I kept my imagination in check, talked only when the teacher called on me and quietly did my work.

My teacher liked me because I was quiet and did my work, but the other kids in the class called me the teacher’s pet. The fact that I had to wear a retainer to straighten my crooked front teeth didn’t help and made me feel self-conscious about the way I looked.

At lunch time, I would walk into the cafeteria with my head down so I wouldn’t see the popular girls pointing at me. I could still hear them, though. I could hear them whispering and giggling and making fun of my clothes or my hair or me.

They made me feel ugly and awkward and out of place. It’s hard to be confident in yourself when you feel that way.

I wanted to be able to walk into the cafeteria with my head held high and not wonder what people were saying about me. I wanted to be able to sit with the popular girls, wear stylish, cool clothes and fit in.

What I didn’t understand was that even though I wasn’t as pretty or popular or stylish as the cool crowd, I didn’t need to be beautiful to be confident. I didn’t have to let my crooked front teeth or my frizzy brown hair keep me from feeling confident about myself. I had the power to believe in myself no matter what I looked like.

What I didn’t realize was that the popular girls had to make fun of people like me so they could feel better about themselves because they had no real self-confidence either.

Still, it’s no fun being the social outcast. I went through my entire fourth grade year without making any friends. In the fifth grade, though, that changed.

A scary moment came early in the year when the teacher told us to trade papers and grade each other’s tests. I looked to my right and my left, but all the kids overlooked me and traded with each other. Then a girl a few desks over handed me her paper. Someone offered to trade with me!

I learned her name, started eating lunch with her and hanging out with her at recess. She was the first friend I made in that school, and we’re still friends today.

She didn’t care what I looked like, but she cared about me. I could be myself around her, and she could be herself around me. When you feel comfortable enough to be yourself around your friends, you start to believe in yourself and gain the confidence you need to do what you dream.

So don’t let the cool kids make you feel uncool. If you’re one of the cool kids, don’t judge people by their appearance. Whether you’re ‘cool’ or ‘uncool,’ you’re special because of who you are, not how many friends you have, what others think of you or how you dress.

Learn to believe in who you are, and that starts by discovering your strengths. When you learn what you’re better at than anyone else, that is the foundation of your unshakable confidence.

To Your Dreams,
Bonnie Jean

P.S. Please don’t wait as long as I did to find your unshakable confidence! Life is really much more fun when you set goals and take action to make them happen. No matter how old you are, you can be an unshakable, unbreakable, unstoppable Dream Doer today! To help, I want to give you three FREE gifts, which includes the entire audio book of The Dream Doers and the Summer of Secrets. To claim your FREE gifts, visit TheDreamDoers.com now.

Share and Enjoy:

Tagged with: how to make friends • no confidence

Sep 01

Why You Can’t Live Your Dreams Without Confidence

Motivating Stories, True Stories No Comments »

Unshakable, Unbreakable, Unstoppable Stories

Bonnie Jean Schaefer here, author of The Dream Doers and the Summer of Secrets.

Altogether, it took me NINE years to write that book and get it published. So you think I’d be thrilled when I saw it reach #13 on the Amazon bestseller list, right?

Not so much. I mean, I was glad that after spending nine years writing, editing, rewriting and editing some more, people were buying my book that I worked so hard on for so many years.

Only that was the problem. People were buying the book. If they bought it, they would probably read it. And the thought of lots of people reading my book freaked me out.

What if they didn’t like it? What if they thought the story was horrible? What if they thought I was a terrible writer? What if they realized I was just pretending to be a writer when no one gave me permission to publish my book?

I wasn’t used to letting people read what I wrote. I was more comfortable writing because I like to write, not writing because I thought people would want to read my story.

The only way I could think of to stop my fears and doubts from coming true was to stop promoting my story. If I didn’t market it, then no one would know about it. If no one knew about it, they wouldn’t buy it. If they didn’t buy it, they wouldn’t read it. And I would be safe.

What I was missing was CONFIDENCE in myself and my writing ability. I didn’t believe I could be a #1 bestselling author, so I didn’t let it happen. I didn’t believe I was a gifted writer, so I stopped letting people read what I wrote.

I was very good at doubting myself, but I wasn’t very good at living with unshakable confidence. Until recently, that is. You see, I’m getting more and more confident in myself every day. (Plus I’m so confident you’ll love my story that I’m giving it away here.)

How have I been able to gain confidence in myself and my dreams? Well, that’s a long story, and I’ll get around to telling you all about it. First, though, I want to take you back to when I was a kid.

When I was growing up, I found it easier to doubt myself than believe in myself. I found it easier to be shy and timid than I did to be the bold, adventurous me I dreamed of being. And when you don’t have confidence in yourself, it’s hard to make friends.

For instance, when I started a new school in the fourth grade, I was so nervous and scared and unsure of myself that it took me until the fifth grade to make my very first friend in that school.

In next week’s post, I’ll share how I went from having no friends to making a friend for life.

To Your Dreams,
Bonnie Jean

P.S. Please don’t wait as long as I did to find your unshakable confidence! Life is really much more fun when you set goals and take action to make them happen. No matter how old you are, you can be an unshakable, unbreakable, unstoppable Dream Doer today! To help, I want to give you three FREE gifts, which includes the entire audio book of The Dream Doers and the Summer of Secrets. To claim your FREE gifts, visit TheDreamDoers.com now.

Share and Enjoy:

Tagged with: building confidence in kids • how to gain confidence

Aug 25

UUU Stories, Episode 2: How NOT to Write a Young Adult Novel

Motivating Stories, True Stories No Comments »

Episode 2 of Unshakable, Unbreakable, Unstoppable Stories with Bonnie Jean

Bonnie Jean Schaefer here, author of The Dream Doers and the Summer of Secrets.

I was a senior in college the day I decided to pursue my big dream of being a writer. I bought this blue notebook at the convenience store across the street from the college and started scribbling book ideas in it. Once I had the characters and storyline set, I began writing the first draft in this very notebook.

A year and a half later, I finished the first complete draft. I printed it out and started reading it, certain it was going to be the best book ever.

It wasn’t. Actually, it was really, really, really, really, really TERRIBLE. So I put it aside, bought another notebook and started rewriting the entire story.

Two years later, I had another draft I was certain was good. So I printed it out and read through it. It was better, and by better I mean it was just really, really terrible.

So I put it aside, bought another notebook and started rewriting the entire story.

Two more years later, I ended up with complete draft number three. This time it was just bad. So I put it aside, bought another notebook and started rewriting the entire story.

One year later, in the fall of 2005, I finally had what I believed was an excellent story. So before I printed out the entire manuscript, I started shopping for an agent…and found one who wanted to read the first 50 pages. I printed them out and kept a copy for myself.

Then two things happened that made me not want to have this agent or any other agent represent me. One was that I just didn’t want to go about getting my book published in the normal way with a regular publisher. You see, I’m not just a writer, I’m an entrepreneur; I wanted to start my own publishing company so I could publish my own books whenever I wanted.

The second reason I couldn’t let this agent represent me was because the story was all wrong. I realized that the book that I just spent six and a half years writing was actually the LAST book in the Dream Doers series.

I wanted to start at the beginning of the series, so I put all that work aside, bought another notebook and some index cards and started writing the story from scratch.

After three and a half years of writing, editing and rewriting, I finally finished a complete draft.

I was teaching high school English at the time, so my students edited the book for me and gave me their feedback. I’ve got to admit that watching them read my story and comment on it made me quite nervous. Much to my relief, though, they liked it and had lots of good things to say about it.

They also had some constructive criticism for me, which I appreciated. I made some big changes to the story based on their feedback, then did what I’ve been dreaming of doing my entire life: I published my book.

In next week’s episode, I’ll share what happened after I published it and why seeing it on the Amazon bestseller list freaked me out so much that I stopped promoting it altogether!

Please don’t wait as long as I did to start living your dreams! Life is really much more fun when you set goals and take action to make them happen. No matter how old you are, you can be an unshakable, unbreakable, unstoppable Dream Doer today!

To help, I want to give you three FREE gifts, which includes the entire audio book of The Dream Doers and the Summer of Secrets. All three gifts are waiting for you at the www.TheDreamDoers.com. Click through and claim them now!

To Your Dreams,
Bonnie Jean

Share and Enjoy:

Tagged with: Live Your Dreams • motivating stories for young adults • perseverance

Aug 18

UUU Stories, Episode 1: How I Became a Dream Doer

Motivating Stories, True Stories No Comments »

Episode 1 of Unshakable, Unbreakable, Unstoppable Stories

Bonnie Jean Schaefer here, bestselling author of The Dream Doers and the Summer of Secrets. I haven’t been a published author very long, but I’ve wanted to be a writer since I was a kid. Only back then, I was a shakable, breakable, stoppable dream don’ter. Which means that even though I had big dreams, I didn’t have the confidence I needed to do anything about them.

From the time I was teeny tiny, I’ve always loved making up stories. What I didn’t love was sharing those stories with anyone only because I was sure other people would think my stories were strange or weird or just plain awful. So I didn’t write many of them down. I would just daydream or use my Barbie dolls to act out my stories.

Now the stories that I did write I hid. I felt like I had to. If someone found my stories, they might think I believed I was a writer. Because I didn’t believe that at all. I had NO confidence in my writing ability. And without that confidence, I had no chance of living my dreams.

My big dream of being a writer didn’t go away when I reached high school, but the hope of that dream ever coming true certainly did.

You see, because I didn’t have any hope of living my big dream, I didn’t do anything about it. Instead, I focused on making good grades in school and doing my best in the three sports I played: volleyball, basketball and softball.

When I got to college, I almost let myself believe in my big dream again and considered picking writing as my major.

Then I told myself that was a silly, ridiculous, never-gonna-come-true-kinda dream. I had no desire to study any other kind of career, though, so I chose to major in Bible.

As a senior in college, I still had no clue what I wanted to do when I graduated. I just knew I couldn’t be who I wanted to be: a writer. At least that’s what I thought until I attended one of my Bible classes on February 12, 1999.

That day, my professor talked about the difference between Dreamers and Doers. Now I don’t remember why she was talking about Dreamers and Doers (‘cause I wasn’t really paying attention to the first part of the lesson), but I do remember what she said about them. She said that Dreamers have vision and dream about what could be done, but Doers take action and make things happen.

I wanted to be a Doer. I wanted to DO something about my dreams and believe my dreams were possible. But I couldn’t. I was just a Dreamer who imagined great things but didn’t have the courage to share these dreams or make them happen.

I almost stopped listening to anything else she had to say until my professor quoted Psalm 37:4: “Delight yourself in the Lord, and He shall give you the desires of your heart.”

I was stunned. God wanted to give me the desires of my heart?

As soon as class ended, I went home and read the first six verses of Psalm 37 over and over and over. They were real. These words were actually in the inspired Word of God.

My greatest desire was to be a writer. So that’s when I realized I could, with God’s help, make that happen.

I could do what I dreamed. I could be a DREAM DOER.

I wish I could tell you that I figured out how to be a Dream Doer right away, but the truth is that it took me years to figure out. During those years, I worked all kinds of jobs while writing this book.

Next week, I’ll share the story of when I started writing this book and how I finally got it published nine years later.

But please don’t wait as long as I did to start living your dreams! Life is really much more fun when you set goals and take action to make them happen.

No matter how old you are, you can be an unshakable, unbreakable, unstoppable Dream Doer today! To help, I want to give you three FREE gifts: a 14-day Dream Doer crash course, the entire audio book of The Dream Doers and the Summer of Secrets and a Dream Doer League Bronze membership. All these gifts are waiting for you at TheDreamDoers.com.

So go to TheDreamDoers.com now and fill out the super short form to claim your gifts.

To your dreams,

Bonnie Jean

Share and Enjoy: