I’m Shelly L. Francis and I laugh that my initials are like true SeLF. In 2018 I became a “free-range” writer, speaker, and author coach-companion-consultant, helping aspiring authors unleash their creative courage. And now in 2020 I’m the founder and publisher of Creative Courage Press, LLC.
I have been a communicator in a range of business sectors from publishing to government to high tech and health care. Whether running my own business or serving organizations, the common thread throughout my career has been bringing to light best-kept secrets — technology, services, resources, ideas. I bring people together to facilitate collective impact and good work.
Before this current life focus, I relished being behind the wheel on a working-sabbatical, coast-to-coast road trip, working with authors, visiting friends and family and meeting new people. Before that, I wrote The Courage Way: Leading and Living with Integrity, a book that Spirituality & Practice named as one of the “Best Spiritual Books of 2018.” I wrote it as a leadership book on behalf of the nonprofit Center for Courage & Renewal during my tenure there (in Seattle) as the marketing and communications director. Before that I directed trade marketing and publicity for multi-media publisher Sounds True, Inc. Before that, well, you can see my career path on LinkedIn.
If you go way back, you could say my publishing career began in second grade as an author/illustrator of several series of books. The pages have been lost in the dust of time, or boxes somewhere still packed. I continued as editor of school newspapers and yearbooks from junior high to high school to college, and then into business communications.
I am also the author of a cancer-caregiving memoir, Damocles’ Wife: The Inside Story of Cancer Caregiving & Long-Term Survival in the Midst of Motherhood, Marriage & Making Life Matter. (I do love long subtitles!) But more importantly, I feel strongly about the well-being of caregivers–whether that means physicians, nurses, family caregivers, or other healers, and that means also caring about self-care of us and them. That’s a big reason why Resilient Threads is the first book for Creative Courage Press.
I’m reviving my inner artist with a book called Eleven Brave Pinecones and Emotikin World blog. I am also working on two more books, including two tentatively titled The Reframe Game and RE: The Elephants. Tune in for now at my blog called Fortitude and on Instagram.
Listen in to recent podcast conversations about courage.
