How many times have you put something off because you’re not ready, you need more time, or you don’t feel comfortable doing it?  I’ve completed 10 Ironman Triathlons and over 40 10-day non-stop Eco-Challenge Adventure Races through the most remote places on earth, and here’s a secret:  I didn’t feel ‘ready’ for any of them.  There was always more I could have done to train, something I needed more time to prepare, or I wished I could delay the start until I felt stronger.  I would most likely never have undertaken those “risks” if there wasn’t a specific date on the calendar and someone with a megaphone saying “go!” But I wouldn’t give back those experiences for anything on earth,  because it is in those moments, when we are forced to rise to a challenge, that we add another brick to the foundation of our character, confidence and strength. So how do you stop “wishing” you had more guts and inspire yourself to ditch the vanilla life for a big, satisfying scoop of Rocky Road less Traveled?

Step Into Character

Nobody knows what’s going on inside your head but you.  Try to see yourself the way your colleagues, friends, and family see you–confident, smart, beautiful, talented–and be that person.  I’m a huge introvert, and I’m a speaker for a living. How? Right before I go on stage, I think about the person that everyone in the audience is expecting to meet (vs little scared me!), and the moment they invite me onto the stage, I become her.

Do It Anyway

How you feel is far less important than what you do.  Feeling scared, nervous and uncomfortable when you’re rapelling off that symbolic cliff is just a given.  The only difference between you and the woman who is living her dream is that she felt the fear and ‘did it anyway’.   In fact, I’ve come to embrace fear as the vigilant guardian and trusted friend that gives me a “heads up” to be at my best.

Focus on How It Will Feel to Succeed

When you’re driving your car or riding your bike, where is your focus? On where you want to go, right? Where we get into the most trouble is when we start focusing on where we don’t want to go (the ditch, the puddle, the loose gravel, etc)–because that’s inevitably where we will end up! So why, when we’re analyzing our risks, do we get so obsessed with what we don’t want to have happen instead of envisioning what success will look like? Top athletes are masters of visualization.  They envision themselves winning and suffuse the feeling of that success into their mind and heart with the hope of achieving peak performance.  You can do that, too! What will it look like, feel like, smell like, and who will be there cheering when you achieve that goal? Use that image to guide you on your mission as well as inspire you through the rough patches along the way.

I see you at that finish line, victorious! Don’t you?  The beautiful, talented, smart, driven woman who lets fear whisper in her ear but lets courage rule her heart?  Yep.  That’s you!

Robyn Benincasa has made an art form of extreme performance by competing and winning at the highest levels of sport and business. In her fifteen-year career as a professional adventure racer, she has biked through jungles in Borneo, climbed Himalayan giants in Nepal, trekked across lava fields in Fiji, rafted rapids in Chile—and racked up multiple world championship titles along the way. In her spare time, she is a firefighter and a sought-after keynote speaker on the subject of teamwork and leadership. Visit her website or follow her on Facebook and Twitter.

A group of us, including our lovely prizewinner Melanie, arrived at the studio in high spirits. We were welcomed by Robert,  the fabulous photographer, as well as a very handsome and friendly model named Ross. We watched the crew create the set (the bow of a boat) while Creative Director Tony gave us the lowdown on the day ahead, and a bit of an overview of the evolution of the Harlequin cover (we’ve  come a long way, baby!).  We tried not to be distracted while Ross did pushups in the corner.

And then the action began! We watched from the sidelines as they shot about 500 photos of Ross and Jen (his lucky leading lady).  I must mention, there was a wind machine involved as well as a spritzer (one lucky woman had the job of spritzing Ross and dabbing his brow). We tried not to giggle when the director said things like, “she needs to move down on the wood.”

Then it was our turn!  Melanie needed no second invitation before she leapt into Ross’s arms for her own photo shoot. And I can’t say that I was very reluctant either…

Melanie and Ross (Photo credit: Robert Goshgarian)

Me and my new friend Ross (Photo credit Robert Goshgarian)

It’s a tough job…

HARLEQUIN EBOOKS
For the rest of this month, ALL the MACKADE BROTHERS by Nora Roberts are ON SALE, only $2.99!! Don’t miss out!
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COMMUNITY TUESDAY!
AUTHOR SPOTLIGHT DISCUSSION: Debra Webb (Harlequin Intrigue)
She’s joining us this month to answer your questions and to share in the excitement as the COLBY AGENCY moves to Texas!
JOIN THE CONVERSATION ►

HARLEQUIN.COM: Spring CLEARANCE Sale!!
Splurge on these titles at an AMAZING price with a wide variety of titles to enjoy at 40% OFF! Fantastic deal!!
START SHOPPING ►
Expires May 31, 2012, 11:59 p.m. EDT.
Quantities are limited. Offer excludes ebooks.

CARINA PRESS: New exclusive excerpt time! Download the first 20% of THE BEWITCHING TALE OF STORMY GALE by Christine Bell!
READ IT HERE ►

Harlequin EXCLUSIVE Video Premier:
THE GRAVEYARD QUEEN series by Amanda Stevens (book trailer)
My name is Amelia Gray. I’m a cemetery restorer who sees ghosts. In order to protect myself from the parasitic nature of the dead, I’ve always held fast to these rules passed down from my father…until now. Every cemetery has a story; every grave, its secrets.
WATCH IT HERE ►

When I was little, cemetery exploration was a favorite pastime.  My house was situated between two graveyards and I spent many a Sunday afternoon wandering through the maze of headstones and statuary.  One of the cemeteries was abandoned and I wasn’t allowed to visit there alone.  Naturally, it became a favorite escape.  Nestled in a deep forest and shrouded by shade, the forgotten graveyard was a place of enchantment, a mysterious necropolis of sunken graves, crumbling headstones and fallen angels. The burials were old—pre-Civil war—and the symbols carved into the headstones intrigued me.  I could daydream there for hours.

There’s a term for graveyard fascination—taphophilia.  From the Greek words taphos, meaning tomb and philia, meaning love or obsession.  A love of tombstones and cemeteries.

When I decided to write a paranormal series, I knew I wanted the protagonist to have an unusual skill or occupation.  So I did an Internet search for strange jobs and up popped cemetery restorer—the perfect vocation for a character that would share my passion for graveyards.  She would be Southern (also like me) and a loner because her ability to see ghosts had isolated her from human companionship.  Her first name would be Amelia because it’s Southern and old-fashioned, and her surname would be Gray to symbolize the twilight world of ghosts.

Amelia became so real to me that I knew I had to create a worthy love interest, someone dark and mysterious and charismatic to lure her from the safety of her graveyard kingdom and tempt her into breaking one of her father’s cardinal rules: never associate with those who are haunted.

Papa’s rules are broken in The Restorer; the past is revealed in The Kingdom; and the future is foreshadowed in The Prophet.  Set against the withering backdrop of abandoned and forgotten cemeteries, The Graveyard Queen series offers peeks into the lush dreamscape of restless souls, deranged killers and doomed lovers.

I’ve just been given the go-ahead for three more books in the series and I would like to invite you along on Amelia’s journey as her graveyard kingdom becomes ever darker and more mysterious.

Visit author Amanda Stevens at her blog or follow her on Facebook and Twitter. Check out the new book trailer for The Graveyard Queen series below!

Harlequin Intrigue has long been the home to USA Today bestselling authors Delores Fossen and Cassie Miles and will publish the 50th case in Debra Webb’s award winning COLBY AGENCY series this July. Ms. Webb has opened up a new branch in Texas. Fortunately for the Colby staff the Lone Star state has tons of rugged cowboy P.I. applicants. As well Harlequin Intrigue has launched the careers of reader favorites Paula Graves, Carol Ericson and more recently Golden Heart winner Robin Perini. Amanda Stevens wrote more than thirty Harlequin Intrigue books before creating her critically acclaimed GRAVEYARD QUEEN series for MIRA.

In 2012 we have a great line up of new and ongoing miniseries like Julie Miller’s THE PRECINCT, Joanna Wayne’s BIG “D” DADS and Rita Herron’s BUCKING BRONC LODGE. Harlequin Intrigue will publish the long awaited sequel to CRIME SCENE AT CARDWELL RANCH by USA Today bestselling author BJ Daniels this October.

You can always expect an edge-of-your-seat read from all of the Harlequin Intrigue books. Stalkers, killers, kidnappers—we have them all. But none of them are any match for the heroes of Harlequin Intrigue. These go-to guys know how to take on any enemy and always get their girl in the end.

But we’d love to hear from you. What are your favorite stories of romantic suspense—whodunits, psychological thrillers, crime drama? Let us know.

Editor’s Note: This Sunday, May 13 is Mother’s Day, but we’re celebrating all week long! Join us on the Harlequin Blog where some of our biggest authors are stopping by to talk about moms, both fictional and the ones that raised us! Today we have Robyn Carr, author of Sunrise Point, the LATEST Virgin River novel (Mira Books).

All devoted mothers have earned a special, spacious, well decorated condo with a view in heaven.  But there are a few special mothers who should get castles.  Let me tell you about a few of them.

Amy is a Marine Sergeant.  She’s committed to her military job, the men and women she serves and leads.  It isn’t easy leaving her children behind when she deploys; she needs a very powerful support system because she is also married to a Marine Sergeant.  So meet Lydia, Amy’s mother.  There was a time, a few months, when Amy and her husband’s deployments overlapped.  Lydia was the one to step in and take care of two small children during that overlap.  Amy saw her baby daughter take her first steps on video cam.  You hardly ever see a Marine Sergeant cry.  You would have seen it that day.

Meet Joan, the mother of a soldier.  She’s not all that computer savvy, but when her son went to Iraq, she figured out a few things, including Skype.  She kept track of the time difference so she could be there for him whenever he had time for her.  To hear Joan tell it, she had more deep, philosophical and spiritual conversations with her son while he was in Iraq than ever before in his thirty-five years.  To hear her son tell it, his mom helped get him through it.

And here’s Maureen, whose son is a recently returned hero, and a triple amputee.  He’s young, determined, strong, but he still has many needs.  He not only needs lots of rehab, he will need continuing medical support until he’s fully functional.  He isn’t ready to live independently yet and sometimes finding all the avenues to support is difficult and exhausting.  But a mother like Maureen is up to the task – that’s her child.  She doesn’t even have to think about it.  She’ll help the Army get him on his feet…er, you know….

Say hello to Susan.  She is a Marine wife and mother of three.  Now she’s a caregiver and mother and volunteer for the Wounded Warriors Project.  Her husband came home with a hundred percent disability and she is so grateful to have him home, to be able to unite their family again.  But there aren’t enough hours in the day for Susan – yet with the support of other wives of disabled warriors, friends and family, somehow she does it.  What her growing children see is a woman whose love somehow makes her creative and strong.

That’s just a few – I have a few thousand more.  Castles, all.  God bless every military woman, wife, daughter and mother.  Happy Mother’s Day from a grateful America.

UPDATE! Quest & Kendal’s third (and final) egg hatched this morning and the new family of five were enjoying a meal together this morning. Judging by last year, we should see some remarkable growth in our hatchlings over the next few weeks and Kendal will be kept busy keeping all those bellies full. A fledge watch will soon begin in earnest and we are sure to have some incredible (and hairy) moments as the hatchlings become mobile.

Harlequin encourages anyone who wishes to learn more about peregrines, pledge support or discover what they can do to help this threatened species to visit the Canadian Peregrine Foundation at www.peregrine-foundation.ca.

Editor’s Note: This Sunday, May 13 is Mother’s Day, but we’re celebrating all week long! Join us on the Harlequin Blog where some of our biggest authors are stopping by to talk about moms, both fictional and the ones that raised us! Today we have Susan Mallery, author of Almost Summer, the NEWEST Fool’s Gold novella (HQN Books).

I often hear from single readers who are still looking for The One. They’re tired of dating losers, and they want to know where they can meet a man like the heroes in my books. I tell them good men are out there, and they’re worth the wait. There’s truth to the adage to watch how a man treats his mother if you want to know how he’ll treat his wife. His respect for women – or lack thereof – will show.

I love a man who loves his mom. I don’t mean a mama’s boy. I mean an independent, grown man who has transitioned from needing her to nurturing her. He considers taking care of his mother his responsibility, especially if his dad’s no longer around, and it’s an obligation he willingly bears on his broad shoulders. After all, she cared for him when he was a child; it’s only right that he should watch out for her now. He will do whatever is in his power to make sure that she’s happy and safe.

In SUMMER DAYS (May 2012), Rafe Stryker storms to Fool’s Gold because he thinks that Heidi Simpson sold the Castle Ranch to his mother and then refused to hand over the deed. His mom was bilked once before in the small California town, and Rafe will do anything to keep that from happening again – even work the land himself while a judge determines the rightful owner. After years of ranch work when he was a kid, to help support his family, Rafe went to business school so that he’d never have to be a cowboy. But if that’s what it takes to protect his mother’s interests, then he’ll saddle that horse gladly.

When you do meet a man like Rafe, hold on tight . . . and thank his mom for raising such a fabulous son!

The Curious Reader’s Guide to EROTIC Romance…
Of course you’re curious about erotic romance…but perhaps the thought of asking questions has you turning fifty shades of red. Fear not: Harlequin has the perfect primer for newcomers to the naughty stuff. (We are romance experts after all, offering erotic reads that run the gamut from the boudoir to the dungeon!) So read on! You know you want to…
EXPLORER ►

COMMUNITY TUESDAY: Hats off to Mom!
Our Mother’s Day Infographic offered some FUN and surprising statistics gleaned from our 2011 book catalog! JOIN the discussion in our Café Lounge!
HERE ►

How do you celebrate Mother’s Day?

HARLEQUIN.COM: Mother’s Day Gift Shop
Does your MOM ♥ books?!! Well we’ve some some great ideas – PLUS some YUMMY recipes & FUN stats too! Find the perfect gift!
HERE ►

CARINA PRESS: Did you know EVERY DAY one book from Carina Press
will be offered for 99 cents?!!! Preorder Callie Croix’s erotic romance, LET ME IN for 99 cents!
HERE ►

Harlequin EXCLUSIVE Video Premier:
SONS OF CHANCE Trilogy by Vicki Lewis Thompson (book trailer)
The Last Chance Ranch in Jackson Hole has three sexy new residents!
Welcome to the Sons of Chance series, where the men are hot and the women are happy! Travel with Vicki Lewis Thompson down a winding dirt road to the Last Chance Ranch, dedicated to the proposition that we all need a last chance to find whatever we deserve, especially love (and great sex). WATCH IT HERE ►

Last year, Quest and Kendal successfully hatched only one eyas which was banded and named Harlequin. Naturally, we are quite excited at the possibility of being proud godparents/guardians to three new peregrines this year and are already making plans for a fledge watch to ensure that the hatchlings survive their first few days.

Harlequin encourages anyone who wishes to learn more about peregrines, pledge support or discover what they can do to help this threatened species to visit the Canadian Peregrine Foundation at www.peregrine-foundation.ca.