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Allow Me to Ruin Your Christmas (And Fix Your Creator Mindset) · Your Mic

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  Allow me to ruin your Christmas. It's more than a suggestion. Actually, it's not a suggestion during
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  this episode of your mic. It's the name of my third novel, which I published independently
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  back in 2022. Now, what does my third novel have to do with your journey as a podcast host? Well,
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  everything. Now for some context. I had written the book Allow me to ruin your Christmas as a way
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  of hashing out some feelings. Some would probably say anger management issues after reading the book,
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  which is now an audio book in the form of a podcast. Just search Allow me to ruin your Christmas
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  on your favorite podcast app and boom, you can listen to it for free. So it was really I would say
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  more along the lines of dancing with my shadow while also lampooning the stereotypical
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  hallmark channel happy ending movie trope plug in a different geography plug in a different
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  kind of character, but the plot is always the same. The guy gets the girl and it's a happy ending
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  and everyone lives happily ever after blah, blah, blah, blah. So I had fun doing the exact
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  opposite. And the result was a pretty fun thrill ride that got a little grim and gruesome and
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  dark at times. Now back to the writing process. It was fun. However, the editing part, the part
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  that came after the actual creativity. That's where your podcast journey comes into play.
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  So if you were to treat the perfectly imperfect manuscript as you would your podcast journey,
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  you would know that you're going to get kicked in the teeth quite often. Me getting kicked in the
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  teeth would actually be my editor quite literally dying suddenly over the course of a weekend.
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  And it was horrible. Somebody died. A wife lost her husband, but wait, the plot twists even further,
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  because if that's not enough, his partner who's now tasked with editing all the books under their
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  publishing house's name is locked out of his machine, not a password in sight, including my book.
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  So guess who had to start all over when it came to editing allow me to ruin your Christmas. He did.
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  And so me trying to be the empathetic guy was like, hey, this is really horrible and
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  I don't feel right. You have with you having to start all over knowing how much it meant, how much you
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  know your business partner meant to you. And this is all just a loss. He was one of your closest
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  friends. And I just don't feel right doing this. And that's in addition to it being a lot of work
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  having to start all over because there are all these projects that there are other projects that
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  they're working on as a publishing house, an indie publishing house. And so this was me trying to
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  lighten the load. And the answer I got was, well, we still need to push forward with a fall 2022
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  release date. Otherwise, it's going to mess up the system with Amazon. And I don't know what I
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  don't know. And of course, I didn't know that there is a process that it was going to get messed up
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  and it would ruin their back end, whatever. And so I was thinking to myself, and of course,
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  I was right in hindsight that this was not going to go well. And it didn't. The book was published
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  with a few typographical errors. And after doing some podcasts, guest appearances, I had learned
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  that typically a few errors is acceptable in the indie in the indie publishing space. And I will
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  say as a reader of both indie and traditionally published books, I've actually read some books where
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  that were traditionally published where there were more than just a handful of grammatical mistakes.
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  It happens. We are perfectly imperfect people. So how does this relate to your creator journey
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  as a podcast host? Well, you've got to prepare to be shocked and surprised when things literally
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  go off the rails over the course of a weekend. And when you think that things could not get worse,
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  there's another plot twist. And then there's another plot twist, and then there's another,
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  and another, so on, and so forth. Listen, at the end of the day, somebody died.
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  That somebody was my editor for the third novel, Allow me to ruin your Christmas. And not only did
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  his business partner have to start all over again. The book was put out with a few errors.
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  We could not delay the release. And then, and then because life is full of twists and turns.
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  In 2023, I was dropped from the publishing from the publishing house due to poor sales,
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  more twists and turns. How about literally two people showing up to a book signing?
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  How about more than a thousand dollars in ads run and no more than 50 books sold?
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  So really, the lesson here is, are you doing it because you're expecting an actual monetizable ROI?
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  Are you doing it for fun? I was a little bit of both. I wrote that book out of the three. I wrote
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  that book as like the one where I had the most fun writing. And I think it was because I, by that time,
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  knew what it took to structure a novel and create characters and write in a first-person POV.
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  I knew how to write in a way that would dazzle certain readers who were into that kind of a twisted
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  plot. And so it was fun. It was less trying to figure out stuff and more about me ruining people's lives.
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  Which is a very twisted thing to say. But when you're an author, when you're a writer of fiction,
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  that's literally what you do. How can I torture people? Now, when it comes to your podcast,
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  Journey, you definitely do not want to torture people. The process itself can torture you,
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  which is why I'm having this episode and this conversation with you one-on-one is because
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  the podcast journey, like an author journey, like a business owner journey, like an entrepreneurial
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  journey, will no doubt kick you on the teeth over and over and over again. And when you fall down,
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  sand is going to get kicked in the face, kicked in your face. And then after you get your teeth
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  kicked in, you fall down and you get that sand kicked in your face, you're going to get punched in
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  the stomach. And then someone's going to stomp on your kneecap. And then you're going to get up
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  and you think you're going to be okay. And there's blood and sand all in your face and it's grimy
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  and blended in together. And then you're on your two feet, but barely. What happens after that?
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  What happens? You get clothes lined and you're back on the ground once again.
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  It's not easy. Growing a podcast audience, like writing a novel, like building a business,
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  is far from easy. It can be simple. It could be systematized. It could be monetized.
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  Never is it going to be easy. And the struggle is always, always guaranteed. Even when you have
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  something systematized, operationalized, there's always going to be something that will go awry,
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  a botched recording, a battery dying out, and then realizing, oh crap, I don't have a spare
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  battery. When you run out of memory on a card, when the internet goes out at your office or in
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  your home studio, and you have zero control over that, when you're supposed to be recording,
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  the only day of the month where you can get into the studio to record. And what happens?
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  You get sick and you lose your voice. No control over that.
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  Our journey as creators, whether we're podcasters who are also business owners and entrepreneurs,
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  or for podcasters and authors, or what have you, is always going to be full of twists and turns
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  and things that go wrong and things that don't go as planned. How we bounce back
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  says more about our journey and who we are than our best piece of work. At least that's what I think.
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  And I stand by my work. I'm just throwing it out there that maybe just maybe when things
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  do not go well and things are messed up, how we get back up and how we adapt, how we overcome
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  really tells the story of who we are and what we do and the meaning behind it.
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  So this Christmas, this New Year's, I wish you all the best and in 2026, I am rooting for you.
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  And I hope that whatever, whatever got in your head, whatever was living rent free in your mind
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  in 2025 will be laid to rest in the upcoming year. Really appreciate you listening.
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  And if you have found this story, the story of allow me to ruin your Christmas, if you found it
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  useful or insightful, please feel free to share with the podcast host in your life. Until then,
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  keep your mic hot.