Think again.
One of my students came to me with his book idea.
As we started flushing his idea, we realized
he had three books in him rather than one.
Layer by layer, we picked threads of his thoughts
and arranged them in different piles.
Now he can write them all.
One by one.
Here are 5 steps to limit the scope of your book.
1. Choose a specific theme.
2. Define your audience.
3. Set a clear objective.
4. Create an outline.
5. Revise and edit.
Leave the rest for the next book.
Conversational writing is like having a one-on-one conversation between your audience and you.
It’s real, meaningful, and builds trust.
It helps you connect with your audience by using language and phrasing familiar to the audience.
It avoids heavy words and long, winding sentences.
Back in the day, authors used to use formal English to write books.
Today, more and more authors choose conversational English to convey their message.
Here are five ways you can achieve a conversational tone:
Take Notes – Most of my ideas come from reading. I make sure I write them down, using whatever is handy – an iPhone, a notebook or a piece of paper.
Write in ‘first’ and ‘second’ person – Use ‘Your’ and ‘I’ rahter than ‘them’ and ‘they.’
Use Contractions – Use I’m, you’ll, I’d, How’s.
Tell stories – A good story can appeal to emotions and create empathy. We are tuned to like stories from childhood.
Use simple words – Don’t say ‘utilize’, say ‘use.’ Don’t write ‘accorded,’ write ‘given.’ Don’t say ‘expedite,’ say ‘speed up.’ Don’t write ‘convene,’ write ‘meet.’
Avoid passive voice – Passive voice is “The outcome is guaranteed by the company. Active voice is “Our company guarantees the outcome.”
Write as if you are talking to a friend.
Another tool to make your writing more conversational (something I forgot in the excitement of making Canva slides) it is parentheses. Parentheses are used to provide additional, yet essential information but can also add liveliness to the writing. Here, see them in action:
She left work early and bought the ingredients on the way home: a chicken, streaky bacon, butter, olive oil (she’d never heard of it), garlic (ditto), button onions (ditto), button mushrooms (ditto), herbs (mostly ditto), a quarter bottle of brandy (you only needed two tablespoons but you couldn’t buy two tablespoons) and a bottle of burgundy (you only needed half a bottle but they’d drink the rest).
“What changed?” you may ask.
“Everything.” I would respond.
I was traveling through the US and Canada for the past 6 weeks. Each time I travel, I return as a different person.
Travel changes you. You see new things. You meet new people. Your perspective changes. And you transform.
“Travel and vacations are a means to reshift and reorganize identities,” says Karen Stein, author of Getting Away from It All: Vacations and Identity.
How did this trip change me?
I have a better clarity of what I want to do. Before this trip, I was agonizing for months about what to do. How to take my writing to the next level. How to find a niche so that I can stick to it for years to come.
During the trip, I realized, that although I am passionate about multiple things, my real passion is “books.”
I love to read them, and l love to write them. But more than anything else, I love to help others write theirs. Several of my students have published their books, and it has changed their lives. That makes me feel proud of them.
And proud of myself.
During the trip I realized if there is one thing I can’t live without – it is writing.
But writing in a vacuum has no joy. Joy comes from when others read your stories and are transformed by them. Joy comes from when you can teach others what you do and they can replicate it.
I must say, I lacked confidence in myself. I didn’t think I had much to offer.
During the trip, the confidence of the American people rubbed off on me and I am relaunching my book writing course, my newsletter, and my challenges.
For the next few days, I will work on those and reveal them as they get ready.
Stay put.
“Future is so bright that my eyes burn looking at it.”
Is your writing boring?
It is not making the impact it should make?
Do you have trouble converting readers into customers?
You need to learn to copywrite.
I used to dread copywriting.
I thought it was too hard.
I thought copywriting was not really writing but selling.
I thought, if I kept writing the way I did, I will be true to myself and will start making an impact one day.
But my writing wasn’t getting anywhere.
Until I learned the art of copywriting.
I found it wasn’t hard.
It boiled down to 21 Rules.
Download my FREE mini-guide now and improve your writing dramatically.
Has your Inbox turned into a monster sucking the time out of your day?
Mine did. Until I slayed it, once and for all.
Like everybody else, I get lots of emails every day.
A vast majority of them I didn’t even read. But they kept clogging up my inbox. The ones I wanted to read got buried deeper and deeper.
I subscribe to a lot of newsletters but when I receive them I didn’t get time to read them.
Sometimes I would open it, read a bit, find it useful, and then close it to read it later when I have more time. That later never came.
Then last year I implemented a five-step strategy to bring my inbox to zero and keep it that way.
This is what I did.
1. I created a folder called Inbox 2 and moved all the existing emails there. The whole 9000 of them. I left them there. If I needed them they are there.
2. As new emails started arriving in the empty Inbox, I started unsubscribing the ones I wasn’t reading anymore.
3. I subscribed to a read-it-later app and forwarded the ones I wanted to read.
4. Emails that demanded action from me went to my task manager.
5. If there was something that required a calendar event, it went to my calendar.
Now I spend 7 – 10 minutes a day on my inbox.
I take action on the tasks in the time allocated for them, usually once or twice a week.
I read the ones I want to read during my reading time, usually at night or when I am waiting in queues or reception rooms.
Now emails don’t sit heavy on my head and I have free mental space to write.
What is your email management strategy?
Do you wish you could finish what you started in a reasonable time span without getting distracted?
I do.
But more often than not, it takes me much longer than I like to finish a task and the cause is – distractions.
So, I decided to tackle “distractions,” today, once and for all.
First of all, what are distractions?
Distractions are things or factors that divert your attention away from the task at hand, making it difficult to stay focused and productive.
They can interrupt your workflow and hinder your ability to concentrate on your writing.
According to Nir Eyal, there are two kinds of distractions:
External Distractions: Things in our outside environment.
The pings, dings, and rings can derail a well-planned day.
Internal Distractions: These are internal emotional triggers that slip you off the track.
When you feel bored, lonely, stressed, or anxious, and start checking your phone or surfing the internet, you succumbed to an internal trigger.
External distractions are less of a problem.
It is the internal triggers that get me every time.
Usually, they occur when I am tired.
Scientists have found our brain can focus for short spans only.
We can pay close attention to something for about five to ten minutes before our brains start to lose focus and switch off like a light bulb.
I have found I can write for fifteen minutes at a time. After that, I need a pause.
That is why I turn on a timer when writing.
Fifteen minutes and then my brain knows it will get a break.
There are a few other things I do to manage distractions:
What do you do to manage your distractions?