There’s video evidence…

In the last few blog posts and newsletters I mentioned a Poetry Reading at Start-Yard in Birkenhead. The Poetry Reading took place last week. I had set myself some basic goals or aspirations for this event. I’ve learnt over the years that setting really ambitious goals is unhelpful. It sets me up to be disappointed. When we set massive stretch goals we end up feeling let down even when we achieve great things. It’s important to have two sets of goals – a baseline and a stretch goal. Achieving the baseline is then something to celebrate. I will share more on this whole idea in the next few weeks as I share an exciting (for me at least!) new project – a small book about small experiments.

For the Poetry Reading, the goals I set were:

1. To deliver the two x twenty minute sets without messing up.
2. To sell at least two books.
3. To get an audience of at least thirty people.
4. To be approached to do another poetry reading.

You may feel that the third goal was out of our control but we did work hard to get people to the event, doing our own promotion in addition to that of the venue and event organisers. The results on the night were as follows:

1. I didn’t mess up! My friend Odran filmed it, so there is evidence if you would like to take a look. More on that in a minute.
2. I sold twelve books. That was really good. I had figured out how to take card payments through my phone which made the whole process effortless.
3. Forty people came!
4. I was asked to read at another event on 1st June called MakeFest Wirral.

That’s a great outcome. The whole thing was filmed as I mentioned. That means two films, one for each of the twenty minute sets. If you have the time to look at those here are the links:

And, recognising that we live in a short timespan world where a ’taster’ or two can be helpful, here’s three extracts for you to sample first. They are no more than a couple of minutes in length.

Hope you enjoy the films and as always I welcome feedback.