When we were in high school waiting all week for a party on the weekend seemed like an eternity. Do you remember setting your five year goals thinking you were setting your life long goals on your career and figured if you could get to the end of the five years you would all be set? Have you ever thought when I reach a certain time in life that you will then travel or buy that new car? Most of us think in terms of short term goals or chapters of our life. Often that is as far as we can see in the future and don’t look at our lives as a whole.

If you are a comic fan then you will understand that a comic book is a period of time. It may look like 32 pages of a book but it could be a week of time, a month of fighting, or day of the battle. A comic book is certain period.

A graphic novel is much like a comic book but for a much longer period in time. We could not fit all of Superman’s life into a comic book, but we can extend a graphic novel to fit his whole life. The trick is to look at your life as though you are reading a graphic novel and not just a short period of time such as in a comic book. Your life is made up of comic book issues, check out this scenario:

If we use my life as an example. I don’t remember much before the age of ten, but we will call this issue one. At age ten I started drawing and drew until age sixteen, issue two. From seventeen to thirty-six was another issue ending in a divorce after eighteen years of driving transport trucks. From thirty six to forty three I was in management ending in 2006 so that would be issue four. Becoming an entrepreneur in business for the last ten years brings us to issue five and we are now beginning issue six. So you can see that our lives are divided into issues of a comic book or chapters of life. If you had told that ten year old little boy that he would be in business for himself today he would have told you that you were crazy.

The question becomes do you look at your life as a graphic novel or a comic book? You may not be able to see how everything works out as life has a way of throwing things at us to keep us on our toes. The easiest way is to continue to make goals as far out as you can, but be open to new opportunities and changes. When I look back over my life saying yes and working hard opened many opportunities for me. Where you are now is a chapter of a book or an issue of a comic book. Remember your life is graphic novel!

About the Author

Bruce Outridge is an entrepreneur from Ontario Canada spending his life as a truck driver before becoming a media entrepreneur. Today his work focuses on cartooning, podcasting, radio, television, and author. You can learn more about him at www.bruceoutridge.com