On Thursday, I will be presenting a workshop at one of Myron Golden’s Six Figure Business Schools held in Harrisburg, PA on How to Write a Book. I helped Myron with transcribing, content editing, and proofreading his new book. Ebony Treasure Map, which is a great read, by the way, even if you’re not African American. It will change the way you think about and use money.
I was working on my talking points yesterday and found they came quite easily. I think it’s because I know the process of writing books. Now I just need to figure out what my next one will be!
Last week, my kids and I were visiting my parents in Savannah, GA. Working virtually, the world seems smaller and I almost forget about the differences in other parts of the country. Maybe that’s why I was struck with wonder at some of the “little things” that were quite different from home. 1) I saw a real, live gecko for the first time. My kids said, “Look, it’s just like the one on the Geico commercial!” 2) When we went fishing, we caught more sharks than fish. Apparently, the waters off Savannah are warm, and this time of year has quite a lot of sharks. They were small–less than a foot long, but impressive. One was even a Bonnethead, which looks like a mini Hammerhead (dubbed the “killer shark” by my 4 year old). 3) You can’t buy McDonald’s iced coffee in the South. That is a tragedy!
What is it about travel that makes it tiring to the body but rejeuvenating to the mind? Someday I might have to be like the VAs that travel the country and work out of their RV. Back to work!
I like to read ProBlogger. Today I was reading an interview with Lee Dodd, who started a place called Earnersforum.com, a site dedicated to learning to monetize more on the web. Lee is 27 years old and recently earned over 222,000 in a 3-month period. Yes, for those of you doing the math at home, that’s a yearly income of almost $900,000. Wow. Most of the income comes from advertising revenue from his sites.
Now for those of you who get real excited about this, good, you should. It’s harder than you would think. First you need to find a great, unsaturated niche, develop great content, create a diehard fan base, a “sticky” site that draws in repeat visitors, and pick a good advertising program. Then wait with your fingers crossed. It’s not a get-rich-quick scheme.
It’s free to register. My user name is Lauren Hidden. Hope to see you there!
I was checking out bloglines tonight and came across this interesting post over at Successful Blog and left a comment (mine is number 21). It got me thinking about how different writing is from speaking. I just edited a phenomenal book by a great professional speaker. To listen to the audio recording, it was dynamic, informative, and powerful, to read the transcript, it lost a lot of it’s power. Why?
In the written word you need way more structure and perfection than you do when speaking. I’m not saying public or motivational speaking is easy, I’d rather write than speak anyday. But you lose voice inflections, gestures, the ability to have a “false start” where you say the first few words of your sentence, stop and start over with a new one. You can’t skip around with your topics when writing. You need to finish one before moving to the next.
I used to do transcription for the SpeakerNetNews teleseminars and it would take me about 4 hours to do the transcription and another hour or hour and a half just to edit it into complete sentences and clean up grammar. The difference between the spoken and printed word is way bigger than most people realize.
So for now, I’ll continue telling speakers that, no, you can’t transcribe a speech and turn it into a book without editing it!
I spent almost all day yesterday editing and proofreading a book. Because the project was a rush job, I utilized the talents of an independent proofreader, who does phenomenal work. We sent files back and forth using Track Changes and one of the issues that came up was a sentence very similar to this: “One of the people wants to go to the seminar”. Now, the question that arose is whether the word should be “want” or “wants”. The dreaded spellcheck kept marking wants as wrong, but in this case, you need to break down the sentence to determine whether to use the single or plural form of the word. One (the subject) of the people (prepositional phrase) wants (verb)…. The subject and verb need to agree, so wants is correct, not want.
This scenario is just another reason not to automatically hit the “change” key every time spellcheck alerts you to a problem. It also supports the fact that handing off your work to a friend (or colleague) is a great idea when you’re proofreading. This is also Step Four in my co-authored book, “Write It Right: The Ground Rules for Self-Editing Like the Pros”.
Recently I saw a story on MSN about how drinking one can of regular soda per day (like Coke), can make you put on 15 pounds in a year (provided you maintain your previous caloric intake before you start drinking the soda). Wow. For someone like me, who definitely could drop 15 pounds, (more than once!), I have decided not only to eliminate regular soda from my diet, but also eat less processed foods, less meat and more fruits and vegetables.
For me, who has a HUGE sweet tooth, that’s challenging. I started this on Wednesday, and so far, so good. I have not had a single regular soda. I drink water all day, occasionally a very small glass of milk or juice (once a day) and one can of caffeine free diet Coke a day. My only real “junk food” I’ve included in my diet is a Quaker chewy granola bar, because that satisfies my sweet craving. I went to Strites Orchard last week and picked up a bunch of fresh fruits and veggies and will go back tomorrow for more. Instead of using a pre-packaged pizza crust, I made my own in my bread machine this week, I’ve eaten toast with organic peanut butter and natural honey or Kashi cereal for breakfast, fruit for a snack and veggies with some low cal dressing and small amounts of cheddar cheese or some cooked veggies for lunch, my granola bar in the afternoon and a dinner with the family at night.
Yesterday I went off my program for our neighborhood’s block party and ate from the potluck of yummy foods. I’ve decided not to deny myself on the rare special occasions.
The first day of this experiment, I was majorly craving chocolate and soda. It was really bad. I suffered through the first day, the next day was better and by the third day I wasn’t craving sweets. It’s almost like your body gets addicted to sugar. I now have more energy, am starting to lose weight and feel better about myself. I’ll keep you posted.
Wednesdays are my weekly day off, to celebrate summer and spend some QT with my kids. I made some awesome cinnamon sugar muffins and was washing up the mixing bowl when I was struck with this thought: Editing is a lot like washing dishes. Think that’s a stretch? Really, it isn’t.
Think of your first draft as a mixing bowl that’s covered with muffin batter slime. Sure, it’s still a metal mixing bowl, but it’s far from useful. You wouldn’t mix anything else in it when it’s still that dirty. It’s the same principle with the first draft of your written material, whether it’s a book, a press release, an article, or a blog post.
So back to the mixing bowl analogy: You fill up your sink with tons of soapy bubbles and let it soak, you scrub away the grime and your bubbles disappear. It’s much cleaner, but not clean enough to use again. That’s your second draft.
Then, you drain that water and fill it up with fresh soapy water and lightly scrub it again. It doesn’t take you as long this time, and it doesn’t look vastly different from your first wash (or edit), but when you’re done, your mixing bowl is sparkling.
Think of your writing as that mixing bowl. Don’t ever be satisfied with a first draft. You need to scrub it hard (edit), drain the water (let it sit), and wash it again (do a final proofread). It’s not redundant effort, you need to self edit your writing. If you don’t know how, your writing will give the same impression to your prospects and clients that a mixing bowl that still has gobs of batter on the side. It’s a turn-off.
If you need help self-editing your writing, consider my book, Write It Right: The Ground Rules for Self-Editing Like the Pros. It takes you through an easy 10-step formula to improving your writing.
Over a year ago, I posted about my experience in transcribing Billy Graham’s last crusade for Penguin Putnam in New York last year.
Newsweek has posted an article online called, Pilgrim’s Progress, where at 87, Billy Graham reflects on his life and the views and positions he has taken. I’m still impressed with this man. He acknowledges his errors in judgement, and doesn’t apologize for changing some of his views over the years. He also doesn’t pretend to have all the answers. Billy Graham is a truly remarkable man; positive and insightful, even in the final days of his life.
There’s a new article on my site that explores the topic of how to raise entrepreneurs. I hope you enjoy it.