Thursday, August 18, 2005

A Sweet Surprise!

Wow! I sent out my very first newsletter, "Just Show Up . . . With a Pencil" just a few hours ago and wow! What an amazing response! Great notes and hello's from friends and clients and people who actually requested my newsletter! What a great feeling to be acknowledged for providing great content. Thank you!!!

If you would like to receive a free copy, you can sign up at www.SoYouWantToWrite.com. I also have the first issue available for download on my site on the Resources page.

Wednesday, August 17, 2005

Hello!

Thank you for visiting. Have you always wanted to write a book? Are you ready to write but don't know how to get started? If you answered YES!, sharpen your pencil and get ready to learn how to organize your material, produce content for your book, stay motivated, deal with procrastination and "writer's block" and much more!

Welcome!

I love to write and I love to write about writing, although I have to admit, my very favorite thing to do is help others write their book. What a joy to be able to do this every day via writing, coaching, boot camps and private writing sessions. My dad always said, "If you do something you love, you'll never work a day in your life." He was so right! I am so lucky and very grateful.

Oops! I fell down and wrote a book!

An interesting (and a little painful) thing happened to get me started on this amazing journey of writing books. As I was zipping down a flight of stairs, I missed one, fell and broke 3 bones in my ankle. Ouch! This resulted in surgery and several months in a wheel chair. Unable to go anywhere further than 10 feet from my front door, I had lots of time to think about things. Spending 3 months in a wheelchair turned out to be a major turning point in my life, I learned a lot about myself and discovered a treasure buried deep inside me, writing.

To keep myself entertained and stop focusing on all the things I couldn't do, I started making a list of all the things I could do and would do when I was able to return my rented chair on wheels. I made it a contest to come up with 3 new things that I could do each day. I also had an on-going challenge with myself to create 3 easy, economical, delicious and healthy meals a day – all prepared and cooked from my wheelchair! This resulted in 2 books: "101 Things to do in a Wheelchair", and "One-Pan Cooking: Eat Healthy for 30 Days for Less Than $10 a Day".

I Meet Tony Robbins

I also thought about how I could make money from my wheelchair during my recuperation. I took an inventory of my skills and ended up with an assignment transcribing audio files for Robbins Research. This, by the way, is a great way to make money sitting at home listening to and learning (and typing) incredible content. They liked my work and after a couple of months invited me to work with Tony Robbins on his new book. (By now I had very gratefully returned my wheelchair and donated my crutches).

I started out as a transcriber on the book project and was soon promoted to being Tony’s Creative Assistant. This turned out to be a year-long international globe-trotting university on the art of writing a book. Our writing sessions were conducted on the beach in Fiji, overlooking the ocean on the Gold Coast of Australia, a golf course surrounded by the majestic Santa Rosa Mountains in Palm Springs and a breathtaking view of the forest and mountains in Vancouver, Canada. Needless to say, it was an amazing experience and fabulous adventure that I will always treasure. This also provided me with a one-of-a-kind skill set: How to get content out of your head and onto the paper.

Writer’s Boot Camp is Born

Soon after arriving home from my adventure, my sweetheart and I bought a lovely home in La Quinta, California, complete with this adorable "casita", and moved in a few weeks before Christmas, 2004. I was on fire! I wanted to write! I created tools, materials, wrote a book, “So, You Want to Write” and most importantly, created a process to help people write their book. I named it my “Writer’s Boot Camp”. The outcome? To write your book in 3 days – or less! An amazing thing happened. People came!

So here I am, 8 months later, having helped 21 authors write over 30 books! Many of my authors write 2 books during the 3 day session. I have one superstar who wrote 3 in 2 days and an incredible success story of an author who created the storyboards for more than a dozen books in 3 days! More about that later.

For free Writer's Tools, please visit my site:
www.SoYouWantToWrite.com

Next Post: How do I Get Started?