W.B. Yeats once said, “Do not wait to strike till the iron is hot; but make it hot by striking.”
There’s a kind of truth in those words that doesn’t sparkle—it burns. Yeats wasn’t offering advice on decorating a greeting card. He was reaching deep into what it takes to move forward when the conditions aren’t favorable, when the warmth hasn’t come, and the way forward looks like work instead of welcome.
William Butler Yeats was born in Dublin in 1865. His father painted portraits and held fast to his ideals, even if they didn’t pay the bills. The family had more ideas than income and moved often, living between England and Ireland, searching for footing. There were books, arguments, and plenty of questions about what mattered. That mix—rootless and thoughtful—shaped the boy who would later shape the language of a country.
By the time he was twenty, Yeats had started writing poetry. His early poems were filled with myths and dreams, soft light and quiet longing. They weren’t yet what they’d become. But he wrote them anyway. That was his way—strike first, and trust the heat would come.
One of the defining figures in Yeats’s life was Maud Gonne, an Irish revolutionary and actress with strong opinions and a will to match. Yeats fell deeply in love with her. He proposed several times. She refused every time. He didn’t collapse under the weight of her rejection. He turned it into poems—careful, measured lines that spoke of loss without wallowing in it. The heartbreak didn’t undo him. It clarified him.
His writing sharpened as Ireland stirred. When the Easter Rising came in 1916, he watched fellow writers and activists imprisoned or executed. The world he had known cracked, and he saw the weight of words in the debris. In his poem Easter, 1916, he gave voice to the strangeness of a nation reshaping itself. “A terrible beauty is born,” he wrote. Not from distance. From witness.
Later, when Ireland became a Free State, Yeats accepted a seat in its new Senate. He didn’t step into politics for recognition. He stepped in because he knew words could hold a country together when everything else felt like it might split apart.
Another turning point came through Lady Augusta Gregory, with whom he co-founded the Abbey Theatre. Together, they gave Ireland a place for its own stories to be told—on its own terms. They didn’t wait for someone to offer a stage. They built one.
As he aged, Yeats’s voice didn’t soften. It deepened. He watched the world shift and crack—watched violence, disillusionment, and creeping modernity—and he kept writing. His finest poems didn’t come early. They came after he’d lived some miles, watched the world shake, and decided to speak into the storm. The Second Coming, The Tower, and Sailing to Byzantium came from that later stretch. They weren’t youthful declarations. They were shaped by years of striking.
In 1923, he was awarded the Nobel Prize in Literature. It wasn’t for a single piece of work. It was for the arc of a life shaped by deliberate, ongoing effort. His poems weren’t always easy. But they were necessary. They carried a weight that couldn’t be faked.
That’s what he left us. Not a call to wait until conditions are right. But a call to move, to write, to act—especially when they’re not. Writers don’t need permission or perfect silence. They need resolve. They need to pick up the hammer and begin.
If you’ve been sitting on a story, an idea, a calling you can’t quite shake, this may be your sign. Don’t wait for the mood to strike. Strike first. The heat will come.
Read The Second Coming. Read Sailing to Byzantium. Not because they’re famous. Because they were forged in cold moments—by a man who kept swinging. You can too.
Help Us Spread the Word
If this message inspired, informed, or gave something worth thinking about, please consider sharing it. Every share helps grow a community of readers and writers who believe in the power of stories to make a difference.
Please invite others to join us by using this link: https://publicationconsultants.com/newsletter/
Thank you. We’re always glad to have one more voice in the conversation.
Author Campaign Method (ACM) for Authorpreneurs
This is Publication Consultants’ motivation for constantly striving to assist authors sell and market their books. Author Campaign Method (ACM) of sales and marketing is Publication Consultants’ plan to accomplish this so that our authors’ books have a reasonable opportunity for success. We know the difference between motion and direction. ACM is direction! ACM is the process for authorpreneurs who are serious about bringing their books to market. ACM is a boon for them.
Release Party
Web Presence
Book Signings
Amazon Author Page
Facebook Profile and Facebook Page
Active Social Media Participation
Ebook Cards
The Great Alaska Book Fair: October 8, 2016
Costco Book Signings
eBook Cards
Benjamin Franklin Award
Jim Misko Book Signing at Barnes and Noble
Cortex is for serious authors and will probably not be of interest to hobbyists. We recorded our Cortex training and information meeting. If you’re a serious author, and did not attend the meeting, and would like to review the training information, kindly let us know. Authors are required to have a Facebook author page to use Cortex.
Correction:
We take the quote by Marcella Smith, Small Press Business Manager, Barnes & Noble seriously: “The author is essential to the success of the book, giving energy behind the book to make it something that a customer will come in and ask for. That is what makes the difference in a book that sells, that develops legs, and has a life of its own. Otherwise the book goes on the shelf and stays there for three months. Then it gets returned.”
This is Publication Consultants’ motivation for constantly striving to assist authors sell and market their books. ACM is Publication Consultants’ plan to accomplish this so that our authors’ books have a reasonable opportunity for success. We know the difference between motion and direction. ACM is direction! ACM is the process for authors who are serious about bringing their books to market. ACM is a boon for serious authors, but a burden for hobbyist. We don’t recommend ACM for hobbyists.
We’re the only publisher we know of that provides authors with book signing opportunities. Book signing are appropriate for hobbyist and essential for serious authors. To schedule a book signing kindly go to our website, <
An Author Page on Amazon Author Central is a serious author ACM requirement and desirable for the hobbyist. Author Central is a free resource designed to help authors become more active participants in the promotion of their books. In Author Central you can manage an Author Page, update information about your books, and view Customer Reviews and sales information for your bibliography. If you don’t already have an Author Page on 
We hear authors complain about all the personal stuff on Facebook. Most of these complaints are because the author doesn’t understand the difference difference between a Facebook profile and a Facebook page. Simply put, a profile is for personal things for friends and family; a page is for business. If your book is just a hobby, then it’s fine to have only a Facebook profile and make your posts for friends and family; however, if you’re serious about your writing, and it’s a business with you, or you want it to be business, then you need a Facebook page as an author. It’s simple to tell if it’s a page or a profile. A profile shows how many friends and a page shows how many likes. Here’s a link <> to a straight forward description on how to set up your author Facebook page.
Active Social Media Participation
Mosquito Books has a new location in the Anchorage international airport and is available for signings with 21 days notice. Jim Misko had a signing there yesterday. His signing report included these words, “Had the best day ever at the airport . . ..”
The Lyin Kings: The Wannabe World Leaders
Time and Tide
ReadAlaska 2014
Readerlink and Book Signings
2014 Independent Publisher Book Awards Results
Bonnye Matthews Radio Interview
Rick Mystrom Radio Interview
When he published those overseas blogs as the book The Innocents Abroad, it would become a hit. But you couldn’t find it in bookstores.
More NetGalley
Mary Ann Poll
Bumppo
Computer Spell Checkers
Seven Things I Learned From a Foreign Email
2014 Spirit of Youth Awards
Book Signings
Blog Talk Radio
Publication Consultants Blog
Book Signings
Don and Lanna Langdok
Ron Walden
Book Signings Are Fun
Release Party Video
Erin’s book, 
Heather’s book, 
New Books