Promotion in Motion: When Will My Life Not Suck? with author Ramon Presson

When Will My Life Not Suck? Authentic Hope for the Disillusioned

Book Description

Is this as good as it gets? Personal crises and disappointments have led many to the pessimistic conclusion that “my life sucks.” Underneath the contemporary slang are universal and timeless questions about the human condition. People of every age, in every kind of circumstance have wondered to themselves and others: Will my life ever be better than this? Is this as good as it gets? This book is an honest and compassionate look at the real struggles we face in a broken world where bad things do happen. Ramon Presson, a marriage and family counselor, describes his own significant personal struggles, including hospitalization for depression. Using the letter that Paul wrote to the Philippians from prison, Presson shares that hope and joy are possible even when life disappoints. Full of practical suggestions for how you can live with purpose and meaning right in the middle of your everyday struggles, When Will My Life Not Suck? is a hopeful treatment of human suffering from someone who has personally lived it and counseled others through the wilderness.

About the author:

Ramon Presson, a clinically certified marriage and family therapist for over 20 years, is the founder of LifeChange Counseling and the Marriage Center of Franklin (http://www.lifechangecs.org/) . Ramon had the privilege of working alongside best-selling author Dr. Gary Chapman for many years and later co-authored several books with Dr. Chapman.  Ramon is a newspaper columnist; and with a dozen books in print he is the most published practicing therapist in Tennessee. He has served as an assistant pastor in churches in North Carolina South Carolina, Florida, and Tennessee. His newest book titled, When Will My Life Not Suck? Authentic Hope for the Disillusioned, (www.ramonpresson.com) is receiving considerable media attention and 5-star reviews.

Ramon and his wife, Dorrie, and two teenage sons live outside of Nashville in Thompson Station, TN. One of Ramon’s writing goals is to achieve his “literary decathalon”— getting ten different genres of his writing published. With poetry, magazine articles, newspaper columns, and non-fiction books in print, he’s almost half-way there. He still hopes to write and publish a short story, a novel, a one-act play, a children’s book, several cartoons, and a song.

1.      Ramon, what do you love about this book?

I admit that I love the attention-getting title. I admit enjoying the smile on people’s faces when they pick up the book or when they just hear the title. I like that this book has more of my own story in it than my previous books. I like that I got to combine the serious, comic, and poetic parts of who I am. I liked being able to take and use what I’ve experienced and learned from decades of being a pastor and therapist engaged in the lives of others who have trusted me with their deep hurts. I liked being able to write a very honest book that is filled with hope but void of clichés and trite answers. I like the book being an extension of me, allowing me via paperback and Kindle to go around the world and “speak” with people I’ll never meet.

2. It makes me smile, too. What’s the main thing you learned during the process of writing and publishing this book?

Writing and publishing a good book takes twice as long as you think it will. There are points where you have to press through the edits, revisions, and rewrites even though you are beginning to get weary of your own book and wish you could move on to writing a new one. Continuing to rework and rework a chapter can start to feel like you’re cooking the same recipe and eating the same casserole over and over. Or you start to feel like the mythological character Sisyphus whose eternal punishment was pushing a huge boulder up a hill only to get near the top and see it roll down again, destined to repeat this action forever.

But the responses I get from readers makes me feel that every minute was worth it. It’s not the sales figures themselves which give me that feeling—it’s the reaction of readers who tell me what has been happening in their lives that drew them to the book and tell me specifically how WWMLNS  has been a great encouragement to them. Getting paid to write is simply a bonus when you enjoy writing and your writing makes a difference in people’s lives.

3. What should your readers discover and want to share with their family and friends after reading this book?

The takeaway message as seen in Paul’s letter to the Philippians (which is what WWMLNS is anchored in) is that “perspective is everything.”  That there is legitimate hope in the midst of ordinary stress or despite extraordinary crisis and profound pain only makes sense and is found by seeing my life with God’s help through a new (and truthful) set of lenses. The book brings some clarity to some hard questions and some reassurance to the places of doubt, fear, hurt, and even anger. The bottom line response I want someone to have after reading this book is, “My God is great and my life is good.”

Amen! Thank you, Ramon, for visiting Reflections today.

Readers can buy the book on Amazon

Enjoy the trailer:

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