STARTING OVER WITH NOTHING

You are not failing. You are in the middle.

Between the day you decide to rebuild your life and the day the work finally pays you, there is a stretch with no income, no proof, and no applause. It runs far longer than anyone admits. It is where almost everybody stops.

Not at the beginning. In the ninth month.

Most books about starting again are written from the far side, by people who already made it, looking back at the hard years with the fondness that only safety allows. This one is written for the middle, for the person living in it right now, at eleven at night, doing arithmetic that will not work.

It makes no promise about money. It gives you something more useful: an accurate description of the terrain, so you can tell the difference between failure and the ninth month.

Inside you will find:

• What to do in the first thirty days, in an order that has a reason behind it


• Which bills have teeth and which ones only shout


• How to tell a slow start from a dead end before it costs you another year


• How to find seven usable hours in a week that already has children in it


• How to know you are making progress when there is no income to prove it


• What to say to your family, your creditors, and the people who tell you to be realistic


• Why the moment things turn is quieter than you expect, and how to hold on to it afterwards

Written in short chapters, in plain language, for somebody who is tired, short of time, and has heard enough encouragement already.

If you have lost a job, closed a business, or woken up at forty-four in a life you did not mean to be living, this book was written for you.

You are not on trial. You are in a stretch of time, and stretches of time end.