{"id":258,"date":"2010-03-12T13:15:03","date_gmt":"2010-03-12T13:15:03","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/blog.beliefnet.com\/flirtingwithfaith\/2010\/03\/a-different-kind-of-book-tour.html"},"modified":"2010-03-12T13:15:03","modified_gmt":"2010-03-12T13:15:03","slug":"a-different-kind-of-book-tour","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/flirtingwithfaith\/2010\/03\/a-different-kind-of-book-tour.html","title":{"rendered":"How Did I Get Here?: A Talking Heads Moment at SXSW"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>I am sitting here at a coffee shop in Austin an hour before I am scheduled to check in at the green room for <a href=\"http:\/\/my.sxsw.com\/events\/event\/760\">my South by Southwest presentation<\/a> having a Talking Heads moment.&nbsp;<\/p>\n<div><\/div>\n<blockquote class=\"webkit-indent-blockquote\"><p><span class=\"Apple-style-span\">You may find yourself living in a shotgun shack<\/span><br \/><span class=\"Apple-style-span\">You may find yourself in another part of the world<\/span><br \/><span class=\"Apple-style-span\">You may find yourself behind the wheel of a large automobile<\/span><br \/><span class=\"Apple-style-span\">You may find yourself in a beautiful house, with a beautiful wife<\/span><br \/><span class=\"Apple-style-span\">You may ask yourself: well&#8230; how did I get here? (Brian Eno et al, Once in Lifetime)<\/span><\/p><\/blockquote>\n<blockquote class=\"webkit-indent-blockquote\"><p><font color=\"#000000\" face=\"Verdana, Helvetica, Arial\" size=\"3\"><span class=\"Apple-style-span\" style=\"font-size: 11px\"><br \/><\/span><\/font><\/p><\/blockquote>\n<div>These moments have become ever so common over the past seven years as Martin and I have deepened our pursuit of the life we are meant to live, following our best discerned notion of what God&#8217;s will might be for our lives.<\/div>\n<div><\/div>\n<div>Don&#8217;t get me wrong, I am excited to be here and eager to meet new people and hear new thoughts and ideas. And I could weave a version of the &#8220;this is why I am here and what will happen as a result&#8221; story to justify the time and money I&#8217;m spending to be here. But the truth is, I have no idea why I am here. My book isn&#8217;t out yet, so I have no &#8220;product&#8221; to sell. I didn&#8217;t have cards or flyers made to promote my blog, book or speaking so any &#8220;brand equity&#8221; I might garner is minimal. Demographics are out the window since I have spent the past few days meeting with a group of Southern Baptists, Episcopalians and now young techies and artists which appears to be the antithesis of target marketing.<\/div>\n<div>&nbsp;<\/div>\n<div>All that said, I am confident I am right where I am supposed to be and that something meaningful (even if not profitable) will emerge from all of this. Each bumbling and serendipitous encounter, experience and observation will propel the next and, one day, I will look back and see how (maybe even why) the pieces came together the way they did.&nbsp;This, of course, is what I will be speaking about later today, so I suppose my uncertainty could be a gift.&nbsp;<\/div>\n<div><\/div>\n<div>Guess I&#8217;ll find out in an hour&#8230;.<\/div>\n<div>\n<div><\/div>\n<\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>I am sitting here at a coffee shop in Austin an hour before I am scheduled to check in at the green room for my South by Southwest presentation having a Talking Heads moment.&nbsp; You may find yourself living in a shotgun shackYou may find yourself in another part of the worldYou may find yourself&hellip;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":181,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-258","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-spiritual-growth"],"yoast_head":"<!-- This site is optimized with the Yoast SEO plugin v23.9 - https:\/\/yoast.com\/wordpress\/plugins\/seo\/ -->\n<title>How Did I Get Here?: A Talking Heads Moment at SXSW - Flirting with Faith<\/title>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/flirtingwithfaith\/2010\/03\/a-different-kind-of-book-tour.html\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"How Did I Get Here?: A Talking Heads Moment at SXSW - Flirting with Faith\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"I am sitting here at a coffee shop in Austin an hour before I am scheduled to check in at the green room for my South by Southwest presentation having a Talking Heads moment.&nbsp; You may find yourself living in a shotgun shackYou may find yourself in another part of the worldYou may find yourself&hellip;\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:url\" content=\"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/flirtingwithfaith\/2010\/03\/a-different-kind-of-book-tour.html\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:site_name\" content=\"Flirting with Faith\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:published_time\" content=\"2010-03-12T13:15:03+00:00\" \/>\n<meta name=\"author\" content=\"Joan Ball\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:card\" content=\"summary_large_image\" \/>\n<!-- \/ Yoast SEO plugin. -->","yoast_head_json":{"title":"How Did I Get Here?: A Talking Heads Moment at SXSW - Flirting with Faith","robots":{"index":"index","follow":"follow","max-snippet":"max-snippet:-1","max-image-preview":"max-image-preview:large","max-video-preview":"max-video-preview:-1"},"canonical":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/flirtingwithfaith\/2010\/03\/a-different-kind-of-book-tour.html","og_locale":"en_US","og_type":"article","og_title":"How Did I Get Here?: A Talking Heads Moment at SXSW - Flirting with Faith","og_description":"I am sitting here at a coffee shop in Austin an hour before I am scheduled to check in at the green room for my South by Southwest presentation having a Talking Heads moment.&nbsp; 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