It’s pretty hard to believe that I’m coming up on another book release. The craziest part is that it’s at Barnes & Noble. I always knew I’d write at least one book because my life has been so damn crazy. What I didn’t expect was to have written five books within four years. And having the chance to have a second release event at Barnes & Noble is a huge deal. Why is it such a huge deal? Because all of my work has been self-published. I don’t have a big New York publishing hou

This is the 200th blog post I’ve written since 2015 when I started my first website. An average post is around 600 words–sometimes less, sometimes more–which means that I’ve written, so far, an average of 120,000 words. Most novels are about 40,000 words. So that means I’ve written about three books worth of blog content. Not to mention the books that I have written that are separate from the blogs; Choice and Triumph(2016), Be a Hero to Your Heart(2017), Two-Step Success(201

When I worked with the insurance company, the president/CEO had a few methods for motivating that I’d say were at best, ineffective. At least ineffective for people like me. The one thing that stands out–and I see where he was trying to go with it but it just didn’t work for me–kind of messed me up. On conference calls and during trainings he would remind all of us that everyone had stuff they’re going through or have gone through. Well, that’s true enough for anyone to get b

In 2015, I started a tutoring business. I called it, The Tutors (clever huh). I had myself and two other people going to client’s houses to tutor math and science. This was also the first time I tried my hand at building a website. My initial plan was to pay someone to do it. Turned out, I couldn’t find anyone that would commit to working on the site so I bought a book on HTML coding and started to do it myself. I made some small moves writing the code but then some friends i

This past weekend I spent Saturday and Sunday meeting with clients in Philadelphia. That’s about four hours away from where I live in Pittsburgh. Along with writing books, blogs, hosting podcasts, and advising college students, I also work in sales. Life insurance actually. It’s something I love to do because of the leadership in the company and the people I have opportunity to associate with. Also, the money doesn’t suck. The flexibility in schedule and travel is a plus and

Leadership is not defined by the position you’re in at your job. Because your name-tag says manager, supervisor, or dean does not exclusively qualify you as a leader. Like I talked about in yesterday’s blog, this is especially true if you’re doing passionless work. Visionless work. It may be someone else’s vision to further the company or institution, but it is far from your own. Also, a great leader is actually a really great follower. Great leaders get themselves around oth

Life is kind of funny. I spent the majority of today working on a new site that is sort of a complement to this site. I’ve been looking for ways to monetize the work that I do with writing blogs and maintaining a website. (Monetize means making money. ) Yes, I write because it’s truly something that explodes in my heart for expression and I love that my writing has positive impact on those that have reached out to me to tell me so. That right there is in fact the reason I hav

Most of us know how diamonds are made. And the analogy is often used when people are walking through something difficult. But when you are around people that are very much worth spending your time around, you see a new way that an old tool can be used. The fact that diamonds are made and created through a primary necessity of incredible pressure is relatable to the crazy pressure that life will sometimes (always) put you under. The pressure through things just not working out

I heard a quote once that said you make within two-thousand dollars of your closest friends. But if you’re like me, human connection outweighs monetary gain. Sure, I plan on owning a Ferrari, but that vision has nothing on the dream to hug as many people as I possibly can. And yes, by hugging I mean connecting on a relational level with others. But I do mean hugging as well! People need to hug and love on each other more! The thing about money is this; it’s a vehicle. Money i

“USC?! Why would you leave Southern California to come back to Pittsburgh?!”… “Life insurance? What’s the deal Craven? You hit your head?”… These are some of the joyous proclamations that I have gotten lately in response to the decisions I’ve been making. Let me first say that I would have been the last person to EVER think I would get homesick if I lived in Los Angeles. That thought, before I lived there for ten months, would have made me laugh. It would have made me laugh b

Right now, I’m one or two sales away from getting myself back on my feet for at least enough time to make one or two more sales that will keep me on my feet to make one or two more sales to continue. It would take more effort and pose more challenging to turn back East and journey home rather than stay here and work at getting just one or two more sales. It does not sit easy within my heart to know that I was this close, only one or two sales, to maintaining my position in th