24 Apr The accidental author: How I wrote a book instead of roasting a chicken

As I re-read theWARofART, I found I would rather become the accidental author of a book than figure out how to roast a chicken. The Steven Pressfield classic is the handbook on overcoming your -isms and just getting started. This is my third orbit around this sun.

Orbit One – Seth Godin’s altMBA

I first encountered the book while enrolled in Seth Godin’s altMBA. The altMBA is an intensive one-month course, which I did not make any easier by being enrolled in two classes at the same time. I picked out the book from the stack of eight. I flipped through it. And dug into the first few pages of the first section Book One: Resistance – Defining the Enemy

I scribbled notes in the margins of some chapters:
RESISTANCE IS INSIDIOUS: Oh, I recognize that one! “Not good enough”. “Who are you to ..?” I pencil on the page.
RESISTANCE IS INFALLIBLE: I underline the phrase “Resistance will unfailingly point to true North”.
RESISTANCE IS UNIVERSAL: A two-sentence chapter. I mark it with an asterisk.

Others raved about the value of the book during the group sessions. I just had my head down getting my work done. I hadn’t yet made it to the other sections of the book – Book Two:  Combating Resistance – Turning Pro, and Book Three: Beyond Resistance – The Higher Realm, and didn’t quite capture their enthusiasm.

What did stick with me, however, was the clean layout. Some chapters were no more than a few lines. It was easy to read and absorb.

Orbit Two – borrowing it as a design template for my own book

When I decided to publish Contours of Courageous Parenting - Tilting Towards Better Decisions I hoped to appeal to an audience that might include parents. Parents who would be time-strapped. Parents who want bite-sized information. Parents who can get enough value out of a chapter if that is all they get to read this week. Parents who just want the bottom line  and can connect the dots themselves. Those parents were my siblings and my cousins – and I know how their days are filled with activities and caring for their families.

“How do you want your book to look? What does it rhyme with?” the book writing prompt asked. Beyond the first visual impression of an appealing cover, I started exploring the weight of paper and studying fonts.
And the most obvious – how do parents like me want to consume our material?
The flow and design of The War of Art immediately bounced back into my mind. Short, punchy chapters. Surely, that would also make it easier to write?

I picked up the book. And studiously started again at the beginning. This time I paid attention to details such as the Foreword, the font, the placement of the titles. I was moving from being a consumer of printed information to a student of the mechanics of moving words from paper to the mind.

RESISTANCE IS INTERNAL: I see a set of scribbles in different colour ink. “Courageous Parenting.” “Making complex decisions in the face of uncertainty.” “Only one decision you cannot undo – parenting. Once we have chosen to parent we have to find the courage to embrace that decision.”
RESISTANCE AND HEALING: “What counted was that I had, after years of running from it, actually sat down and done my work.” DO THE WORK, I write in caps in the margin, the story of Steven Pressfield staring down a sink full of dirty dishes with a smile on his face fresh in my mind.
PROFESSIONALS AND AMATEURS: I have underlined “The professional plays for keeps.” “Resistance hates it when we turn pro.”

Then I hit a chapter
RESISTANCE AND THIS BOOK: “Resistance told me I shouldn’t seek to instruct or put myself forward as a purveyor of wisdom; THAT THIS WAS VAIN.” Oh, no! Imposter syndrome strikes the master. It stares me in the face too! But then, like Pressfield, I find that I might be unhappier not sharing what I have learned. This speaks to the scout within me, the person who wants to come back to the team. And say “Watch out at this point, there may be danger. And also remember to stop and enjoy the view from here.”

Clean short chapters. Here is was. The ideal design for my book. Consistent with the messaging in Steal Like An Artist by Austin Kleon (another of the eight books that came with my altMBA) I latch onto this idea. A short introduction followed by twelve short chapters. The barest minimum of words to describe the decision behaviour on the left page. The associated travel story by which I remember the behaviour on the right. Followed by two pages of book and podcast recommendations, and activities that we can all do at home. 48-50 pages. Done and dusted.

Simple. (It didn’t end up that way once my beta readers demanded more story!)

Orbit Three – Benjamin Hardy’s AMP program

I have now picked up the book for the third time.

I am a member of Benjamin Hardy’s AMP program, and theWarofArt is the assigned reading for the month of April. The theme for the month is Courage. And where courage is hiding, resistance is usually in full view. So. Back to square one. I crack open the book and pick a different colour pen.

Will I make it all the way through?

I get to read in the quiet of the morning, just after having journaled and while the peach of the dawn is reflecting off the wings of the early morning doves flying by. Recognizing my resistance makes it a challenge to read a book this short. Maybe too many mirrors as I turn the pages? I squirm as I read, and search for a distraction.

RESISTANCE AND FEAR: “The more scared we are of a work or a calling, the more sure we can be that we have to do it.”
RESISTANCE AND ISOLATION: “I don’t feel alone because I’m imagining the reader, to whom I hope to impart … a little inspiration … and a few tricks of the trade.”

Then I read
RESISTANCE ONLY OPPOSES IN ONE DIRECTION: “Resistance obstructs movement from a lower sphere to higher”. I have underlined the word “higher” three times.  In the big blank space underneath the four-line chapter I have adequate space to write the simple begging question:

Where should I be moving from lower to higher? What am I resisting?

More intriguingly, was resisting something else the very reason I was able to write my book?

A moment for quiet introspection.

Where else was Resistance showing its ugly face?

“What made it easier to write a book at this particular moment in time?” I asked myself.

After all, I had never envisioned myself as an author. But I do like sharing what I learn with others. Especially if it saves them energy, worry or angst. Or if allows me to share forward a life hack that someone had shared with me. I had been learning and writing in community. And during COVID that camaraderie made it easier to get motivated to publish something. However small.

I had not started out expecting to write a book for the public. My original writing was private – to be shared with my immediate family. It started as a travel memoir about a journey our family had taken together 2004-2005. In a moment of COVID while all five of us were thrown back together again from different parts of the globe, it was a good moment to reminisce. And to explore with gratitude the ripple effects on our lives in the years since.

Having joined Writing in Community for the .. community .. I found myself looking forward to my regular treat at the end of a COVID home-bound day. It was an escape from reality and a better option than watching the news. Scouting through 7000+ pre-iPhone era photos for figments of our memories to include in a story about mangoes or education was like indulging in 15 minutes of nostalgic time travel.

A.W.E. – And. What. Else?

But there was more going on.

I should be getting fit. It is one of my longer-term goals. Daily exercise is on my agenda, but less often managed. Sit less. Move more. To borrow a phrase from The Stanford Center on Longevity, “Longevity is a journey” (h/t to Mark Venning of ChangeRangers for putting that phrase on my radar). I needed to do more here.

Another running (get it?!) joke in my family is that I am better able to plan for a future five years from now than figuring out what to cook for dinner at 5 P.M. If you have your hands on my book, you will know that I am more comfortable as a sous chef than as head chef. As for being able to roast a chicken without burning down the house? My sisters routinely deliver such deliciousness straight from their ovens to their dinner tables. But my roast chicken comes ready from the store. I don’t have the patience!

These goals seemed like big hills to climb when placed against sitting down to the warm fuzzy comfort of writing about times past.

So. Each of us has our sweet spots: things at which we are better, and that which is still a challenge. None of us is perfect (Thank God!)

What about that roast chicken?

“But you are writing this essay,” I hear you mutter to yourself, “You’ve published your book. What could you possibly be resisting now?”

Well. Let me give you the laundry list:

1. The laundry.
2. Marketing the book - I should be doing that as Mother’s Day and Father’s Day gifts. Or gifts for new graduates. Because it is about decisions and is that kind of self-development material.
3. Figuring out how to create a mailing list and ‘nurture sequence’ because that is what I am told I should be doing.
4. Adding an Author Page or Bookstore tab to my webpage. Fixing my LinkedIn profile. And all other such things in this category.
5. Journaling and planning my next week.
6. A 5,000 step walk – because it is still too cold in Canada (for me).
7. Learning how to properly roast a chicken.

I should be doing all these things.
I could be doing all these things.
But instead, I find it easier to sit down. And write.

Now you know my deepest secrets. You are the ideal Mom I wish to be.

How does your resistance show up? And what wonder have you put into the world in your struggle to avoid it?

Make. Take. Talk.

Make: a list of all the things you are good at doing. Focus on the ease in your life, and that which brings you joy.

Take: some time to try out something challenging, even if it scares you a little.

Talk: When does your resistance show itself, and now can you call it out?

CREDIT & THANKS; DEFINITIONS & RESOURCES:

• My book “Contours of Courageous Parenting – Tilting Towards Better Decisions” is available on your local Amazon site

• TILT the Future – my podcast discusses how little ideas, small shifts and minute moments can result in monumental changes in our lives https://karenadesouza.com/blog/
• Find a version of this thought for today article on LinkedIn, Medium, Instagram
• Photo, audio & video credits: Karena de Souza