By Dan Aceto
Staff Writer

Scarborough resident Scott Hardy, 45, recently published his first book, “In Search Of … The Meaning of Life.” The book is a collection of quotes and photographs Hardy compiled and intended to provide thought-provoking questions for readers. The book can be found at Longfellow Books in downtown Portland as well as on Amazon.com.

Q. What inspired you to start the book; do you ever find yourself questioning a lot that goes on around you, or even the meaning of life itself?

A. It was probably in college or soon after that I started trying to figure out who I was, what I wanted to do with my life, what I was meant to do with my life and all those questions. And I’m still trying to figure out what I’m going to do when I grow up, and I think a lot of people are in that situation. 

I think a lot of people find themselves thrown into life, forced to get a job, find a wife, start a family, pay a mortgage, buy a house, pay the car, bills and all of a sudden they’re like “why am I doing all this, why am I here, how did I end up here, is there something else I should be doing?” 

And I think a lot of people have those questions, and I certainly did, and it started out pretty early for me. But it was really about four years ago that the idea came to me to put a book of quotes together and to leverage people from around the world and throughout history and kind of gather the best thoughts out there on the topic. Although there’s no answer to the question, “what is the meaning of life?” – and it’s different for every person – the idea of the book is to give people something short and easy to read when they have a minute or two during the day that’s thought-provoking and makes them kind of think, “Hmm? How does this apply to me?” Or, “Does this help me make sense of some aspect of my life that I’m questioning or challenged with right now?”

That’s the idea I’ve always been inspired by in books like this where you read something and all of a sudden something clicks and you get a light bulb, and you’re like, “Oh OK, that makes sense.”

Q. Do you think people spend enough time stepping back and reflecting on their lives? 

A. Well I think it’s hard, you know? People are so busy these days, a lot of men and women hold down two jobs. You know, husband and wife are both working, you’ve got kids, soccer practice. Life is really busy and sometimes it’s hard to find the time whether you want to or not, to ask these questions. One of the reasons why I thought a quote book would be good is because you can read one quote or even five, in a very short increment of time. You can read something that makes you think, yet is so quick and easy to get something out of.

Q. What sort of career have you had up until this point in your life?

A. It’s a long story. First I joined the Air Force. I thought I wanted to be a pilot, but soon after I figured out it wasn’t really for me, so I got out and got into a career in retail working for Eddie Bauer. The reason I did that was because my grandfather was in retail so it was comfortable and easy, and I understood it. Was it a good fit for me? Probably not, but I spent the next 10 years in retail until I was laid off and got into the software industry, where I spent another 10 years. 

Now I’m back in the retail industry working for L.L Bean in the call center. The one common theme throughout my career is that every job I’ve held has been related to customer service and I think the reason why it felt good was because it was rewarding for me to help people, even if it’s something as easy as finding a winter parka. I’m providing good service to somebody and interacting in a friendly way that makes them feel good and me as well.

Q. Has holding a variety of jobs given you a broader perspective on life?

A. I think what’s given me a broader perspective has just been meeting and talking with people. Also I’m a big non-fiction reader. But honestly I think it’s just living life. You know, I’m 45 years old and to get a book published, publishers ask you “what is your platform?” “Why do you have credibility to write this book?” and “Why would people believe you?” 

So what I say my platform is, “I’ve been alive for 45 years.” What better platform could you have to throw out some question about life? 

But sure, my career was part of it, as well as everything else that touched me. 

My family, raising kids, that makes you think hard about what your purpose is in life and then kind of seeing the pain and suffering in the world. Being exposed to things like 9/11, Katrina and the wars in progress now, and the pain and suffering people deal with as part of that all had an affect on me. 

I was recently able to go on a business trip to Louisiana and I got to help build a house for a survivor of Katrina. It had a big impact on me because I got to meet the owner of the house and she was living in a trailer on her property and I got to talk to her. Things like that make an impression on you and make you think, maybe this is what life is all about, putting yourself out there and giving of yourself without expecting anything in return and simply making someone’s day by being kind enough to help them for nothing.

Q. Why now did you decide to publish the book?

A. I had the idea in 2006, and began putting together the book and my proposal then and started going out to publishers and agents. For every letter I sent out, I got a rejection letter back. Finally, I was able to get in contact with a neighbor of mine whose dad owns a small press-publishing house in Maine. I talked to that publisher and he said, “Well I kind of like your idea, but I don’t like this and this.” So I changed some things and talked to him a few months later and he said, “You know I think you nailed it. I want to do it, lets sign a contract.” It definitely took me a while to get the book to the point where it was marketable and where it would be competitive, as well as finding someone to publish it. But I think I did all right, considering it was a hobby I worked on part-time primarily in the evenings.

Q. Was there a particular event that happened in your life that made you want to compile a book of quotes? 

A. I remember it as clear as day. I was driving to a client in Pennsylvania in a rental car and I was just thinking to myself – and you know cars are a great thing for thinking when no one else is there – and I was just thinking about what I could do to express myself or get myself heading in a new direction in life and all of sudden the idea of putting together a book came to me, and I just remember yelling in the car and I knew no one could hear me, so I yelled at the top of my lungs, saying “Yes, I’m going to do this,” and it was just this epiphany, “Wow there’s this book out there that I’m meant to publish.” 

From there I knew what I had to do, despite everyone, including my wife, saying, ‘”What, come on, you’re not going to publish a book.” I’m sure there are a lot of doubters out there who think or say, “How could I publish a book?” But you know what, you figure out a way. 

One of the things I’ve learned in life is that part of setting a goal is realizing and understanding that effective goal setting happens without exactly knowing the steps to achieve a goal. The important thing is actually setting the goal itself, and once you’ve committed, you’ll figure out the how-tos as you get to achieving it. One of the reasons I think a lot of people fail in being effective in goal setting is because they think they need to know all the steps to achieve a goal before they commit themselves. But that’s not true. 

What’s true is having full belief in your goal and then the how-tos will come. You’ll get help from other people, from other resources, but eventually you’ll figure it out. 

Q. So what sources did you use to find and compile the quotes?

A. I bought several books from the store, one had something like 10,000 quotes in it, and then I just leveraged some non-fiction books that I had and kind of went through and pulled out quotes from sections of books that had an impact on me. There are lots of quote sites you can go through on the Web as well and they’re neat because you can search by different themes, such as life’s purpose, peace and love and courage. 

Q. Is the book broken down into different categories?

A. Yes, there are eight different categories: courage, generosity, perseverance, humor, joy, philosophy, we are one and life’s worth. All of the quotes tie toward the theme of the book and I thought those sub-topics were the most relevant ones that I could think of related to life meaning.

Q. What was your philosophy behind pairing each quote with a photo?

A. It was one of those things I figured out three years after I started. I knew I wanted to have great quotes, but at some point I realized I could make the book even more powerful if I could pull in some kind of visual that brought the quotes to life. 

One book series that inspired me was by Bradley Trevor Greives, who publishes a bunch of gift books – not quote books – and each page has a picture of an animal, most are humorous, but they tie into what he’s writing about. One of the books is actually called “The Meaning of Life” and he writes about life and there’s funny animal pictures and I thought what if I take pictures mostly of human images that relate to the quotes to really help bring them to life. When I thought about it, it felt good to me, because I’m really a visual learner. But even if you’re not, I think it adds a lot of value. 

There are two photos I took of family members, but the rest I took from a stock photo site on the web that has like over 7 million photos you can browse by topic. From there it was pretty much just a matter of time, finding the right images that I felt could accompany each quote.

Q. Was it a very painstaking process to compile all the quotes and images?

A. You know it was a long project but I never had so much fun working on anything in my life and that’s one of the things I took away from working on the book. I knew this is kind of what I was meant to do because it felt so good and I knew I loved it. I would stay up late into the night searching through quotes and photos and pairing them together. It was kind of like a puzzle, it was really fantastic and because of the visuals, got me really excited.

Q. Are any of the quotes in the book from you?

A. No. I did write the introduction, but all quotes are from eminent people around the world and since I don’t consider myself an eminent person, I’m immediately disqualified.

Q. Do you ever record your own thoughts?

A. I do keep a journal off and on as well as a blog, so sometimes I will write in that, not that I’m trying to think of original quotes, I just write about things that go on in my life.

Possibly in future books I may decide I may want to have a part in writing them. Another idea was having my readers or customers contribute content, kind of like the ‘Chicken Soup’ guys. I also thought about doing a book where I solicit content through the website, where I would get people to mail me their thoughts, say in search of true love, for example. Have them send thoughts about love, what their thoughts are, even photos if possible. Each book would take the theme of “in search of” as a brand, and kind of incorporate different themes such as true love, life’s work and other things. 

Q. What do you expect people to take away from the book?

A. Just something that inspires them to think about life in a more positive way, no matter how big or small. Maybe they reacted to something negatively during the day, perhaps at work, but maybe after reading a quote, they thought maybe they will react differently the next time, because in the grand scheme of things maybe what happened wasn’t important after all and that there’s more to life than getting upset about little things. The book could also be for entertainment value. Some quotes are humorous, so maybe readers will take that away as well. 

Again, the book is not for everybody. It’s more of an opportunity. There’s tons of books out there, tons that are philosophical in nature that are pretty long reads, and require you to really get into them. A book of quotes can be a very quick read and an uplift to a day, so in this kind of time crunch world we live in, it’s a good option to have if you don’t have time to delve into something more serious or larger.

Q. Where can readers find the book?

A. Longfellow books in downtown Portland and Amazon. The Border’s store by the mall is in the process of ordering them, hopefully by Christmas. You can find the link on my site, www.theinsearchofsite, as well as my blog (on the website) and other related topics.

Q. Is there a certain person that you find particularly quotable?

A. Albert Einstein, and you know I used to never think of Einstein in terms of quotes. I knew he was a genius, but it turns out the guy was so quotable and has all these amazing quotes that are just about everyday life. Nothing about science and physics, just about life. The guy was just so cerebral about life in general. 

He’s quoted in my introduction, which is my favorite quote in the book because it kind of says it all and it’s about living in the moment and thinking in terms of what you can do, of giving of yourself to get the most meaning out of life. Another guy was (Mahatma) Gandhi, although I tried to really spread it out and got some celebrities such as Mick Jagger and Russell Crowe as well.

Staff Writer Dan Aceto can be reached at 282-4337, ext. 237 or news@scarboroughleader.com.