Axiom Anniversary!

Wow…it’s been a year! Yes, that’s right, trust me I understand. I’m having trouble believing it myself. It has been a full year since I became a published Author when Axiom hit the shelves on May 29th 2024!

If I were to actually keep score, 2025 marks ten years since I picked up a pen in pursuit of this dream. In 2015, I completed my enlistment in the Navy and started work as civilian IT contractor. During the first few months I experienced a freedom long forgotten during my enlistment period. And soon, after a few months of getting into a routine of driving to work and sitting at a desk; the joy attached to that feeling free of Under way’s, duty days, inspections, General Quarters, PRT’s, sleeping in a metal box with a curtain as privacy, using shower shoes for four years straight (because you never know what the last person did in there), advancement exams, and leave chits (thank God for PTO), an emptiness began to overtake that freedom.

What am I going to do next? Became the question.

To move from one person’s purpose to another’s before I explored my own was a fear of mine. Which is why I left the Navy after one enlistment. I had a Senior Chief ask me if I could compete in the civilian sector before I got out. At the time, I was pissed by the nature behind the attempt to keep me in the Military was for me to doubt myself. Doubt who I was before I got in the military. Doubt the person who I believed the Military refined me into. In the moment, it was the actualization of one of the first lessons my father taught to me – When others see a Shepard boy, God sees a king. So, I took that Senior Chief’s question as a challenge and took it.

As I sat at my desk and prayed (Yes, I believe in The Most High who governs everything from a cosmic to atomic level) and I heard a whisper telling me to write. Before I get ahead of myself, I must let it be known, I have journaled and been an avid reader with active imagination all my life. Journaling is what kept me sane during my time in the military. That’s when I realized journaling wasn’t just a habit, it was therapeutic. I had jotted down story ideas but never really took the attempt to write one. Now, back to the whisper.

I don’t want this post to be as long as my journey (the beginning anyway) so I’ll skip over 10 years of hardships, heartbreaks, embarrassments, loss of friends, and health scares and settle on one word: Faith.

I had to believe in who I knew I was. I started taking notes, plotting ideas, reading the greats (mostly Stephen King lol) growing and fine tuning my voice. I started working on that Novel that became 27 chapters too long, so I had to stop and start again. That’s where Axiom: A Cardinal-Wood Story comes from. I had to have faith I could carve a story out from the depths of my soul, and I did.

There was a time, for about two years, from 2022 – 2024, I had to learn no one cared about my purpose as much as I did. The family members and friends that I shared the manuscript with at the time after they had asked me for years, how’s the writing going or when are you going to share what you’re working on? Didn’t have time to read it when I gave it to them (some still haven’t) and that’s just how it needed to happen. There’s a thin line between support and validation and the source of either can be crippling. I had to dig deep and find the faith I had in myself; the resolve I knew was placed in me. That no matter what, I was going to release a masterpiece. And I had to trust my divine support and validator, The Most High, who of course knows pressure can turn a coal into a diamond.

So here I am, one year after being a published Author. Over 400 copies sold and an International Impact Book Awards for Inspirational/Life Changing stories to top it off. I’ve done 5 signings at different Barnes & Noble’s in the DMV area with more planned. And I’ve done multiple signings at the local Libraries. All thanks to a whisper from The Most High.

Now imagine if I would have listened to my doubts instead or relied on my limited view on life. This journey would have never begun.