Alter Ego Game Book Quotes

There’s just no owning any success you achieve and stacking it in your win column. The force just won’t let it happen. What happens when imposter syndrome has you in its grip? You become terrified you’ll be found out. Despite all her acclaim and success, this is what Maya Angelou feared. “I have written 11 books, but each time I think, ‘Uh-oh, they’re going to find out now. I’ve run a game on everybody, and they’re going to find me out.’”1 You might be surprised to find out how many accomplished people think to themselves they’ll be “found out,” then ostracized and ridiculed. However, it’s irrational. It would only happen if you actually did have no skill, no ability, or no knowledge, but that isn’t the case for most people. This is the ultimate fear, isn’t it? Being found out and kicked out of our tribe? By nature, we’re tribal. Humans survived through the millennia because we were part of a tribe that hunted, gathered, sheltered, and protected one another from the elements, from predators, and from other tribes. You couldn’t be out hunting and watching the fire simultaneously. You needed other people if you had any hope of surviving through the night. If your tribe finds out you’re a fraud, it triggers that primordial “Uh-oh, they’re going to kick me out! I’m going to be caught in the wilderness alone!” When plagued by imposter syndrome, people don’t take themselves, their abilities, or their accomplishments seriously. If you don’t take yourself seriously on any Field of Play, you most likely won’t be getting the results you want.

Accomplished military veteran-writer Tom Keating’s new book, Elephants, Secrets and Submarines: Stories & Essays (76 pp. Stratford Publishing) is a collection of fifteen short stories. Some are related as memoirs, while the rest are described as fiction. The stories all come together to form the truth of the story Keating has to tell and continues to do so since his acclaimed book, Yesterday’s Soldier. These stories have previously appeared in such places as MicroLit and the Wrath Bearing Tree. The stories begin to come alive immediately in the fascinating names of some of the characters. There’s Mr. Filteau, Mrs. Heffernan, and Mr. Pugliese. Then there’s Paul Chu, Officer Cronin, Sister Helena, and the Hunyadi’s. We read about growing up during a time when you hoped to be invited over by a neighborhood family who actually owned a television set. Early on Keating mentions one of his first jobs, saying, “I loved every minute of it.” There are memories of playing Wiffle ball in the back yard before moving on to actual baseball, of which Keating, a switch hitter, recalls, “I loved the game.” There’s a marvelous story about what happens when a young Keating, while helping clean out the convent’s basement at his Catholic school, uncovers “the treasure.” In one story, a woman you’ll have trouble getting out of your mind, and why would you want to, is the one known as ”The Little Black Rose.” Other stories feature such people as “JoAnn the bar maid,” or Vietnamese hooch-maids, or American nurses serving in Vietnam who look like Doris Day. Once he gets to Vietnam, Keating (or his alter-ego Tim Kearney) discovers he has guilt feelings about being on a large safe base. Despite that, there is intense combat action within these tales. The collection, being chronological in nature, wraps up with visits to the Vietnam Veterans Memorial. These short stories contain worlds within them. They are suggestive of so much more going on than what is described. You can easily find yourself lost, in a good way, within them. They are also stories that hold up well upon rereading. Tom Keating has a really natural, smooth, writing style that makes his stories go down easily. This book is made up of some of the stories that he has to tell. Stories that he seems to take an obvious delight in telling. They’re his stories, but they can also become yours to appreciate and enjoy. I hope you make that happen.