Latest / The Daily Writer / How to Finish Your Book (with Jim Woods)

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How to Finish Your Book (with Jim Woods) · The Daily Writer

0:00
SPEAKER_02: The truth is, you're gonna fail to be really satisfied.
0:03
SPEAKER_02: It's a learning growth experience.
0:05
SPEAKER_02: Failure is defined by you personally.
0:08
SPEAKER_02: Growth is painful.
0:10
SPEAKER_02: Growth is challenging.
0:12
SPEAKER_02: It's it's a constant kind of work in progress.
0:24
SPEAKER_00: Hey friends, welcome to the Born to Create podcast.
0:27
SPEAKER_00: My name is Kent Sanders, and I'm an author, professor, and storyteller.
0:31
SPEAKER_00: This is the show where we explore the wisdom and insights of creative thinkers who can help you make a bigger impact in your business, art, and life.
0:38
SPEAKER_00: Have you ever felt discouraged because you started writing a book but didn't finish it?
0:42
SPEAKER_00: If so, you're not alone.
0:44
SPEAKER_00: Many writers, myself included, have started writing a book only to later abandon it.
0:49
SPEAKER_00: Well, today's guest will help us understand how to break through procrastination and finally get that book finished.
0:55
SPEAKER_00: His name is Jim Woods, and he's an author, editor, writing coach, and a storyteller.
1:00
SPEAKER_00: Jim understands productivity and time management at a really deep level, but he also has a gift for seeing the weak spots in a story and knowing how writers can improve those stories.
1:10
SPEAKER_00: On today's episode, you'll learn lots of practical tips for getting your book finished.
1:14
SPEAKER_00: You'll also learn why you should beware of story craft books, how to be more productive, and why it's important to be a creator and not just a consumer.
1:23
SPEAKER_00: I hope you enjoyed this conversation as much as I did.
1:26
SPEAKER_00: After the show is over, be sure to check out our show notes at kent sanders.net slash finish.
1:32
SPEAKER_00: Now on to the interview.
1:43
SPEAKER_00: But before we dive into that specific topic, can you talk a little bit about your journey from the world of accounting to the world of writing and editing?
1:50
SPEAKER_00: Because that's kind of an unusual story that we don't hear too often.
1:54
SPEAKER_02: Well, the funny thing is now as I look backwards, it all makes a lot of sense.
2:00
SPEAKER_02: Um I couldn't tell you that years ago, but now in in retrospect, it just it all fits together like a puzzle, a messy puzzle, but eventually you get the pieces in the place.
2:11
SPEAKER_02: Um I went to school here, like where I grew up in Ohio.
2:16
SPEAKER_02: I went to the University of Akron.
2:18
SPEAKER_02: I went and got an accounting degree.
2:20
SPEAKER_02: And my goal was to work for the FBI.
2:24
SPEAKER_00: Really?
2:25
SPEAKER_02: X yeah, the X-files were a huge influence.
2:28
SPEAKER_02: It was like right there around 98, the movie came out, and I was like, ooh, I've I've always been interested in, you know, kind of crime and justice.
2:39
SPEAKER_02: And I was just, I it's funny, certain movies, books, things can influence you, especially when you see them at the right time.
2:47
SPEAKER_02: And I just thought, hey, you know what?
2:49
SPEAKER_02: And I like computers, I'm gonna go into accounting and I will do white collar crime.
2:55
SPEAKER_02: And my dad is actually, he he's a retired accountant now, but he was an accountant, and so it was just like a common, like, they're like, Yeah, okay.
3:03
SPEAKER_02: And I took accounting in my senior year uh of high school, and it was pretty easy.
3:09
SPEAKER_02: It wasn't it wasn't rocket science.
3:11
SPEAKER_02: I was like, okay, yeah, this is cool.
3:13
SPEAKER_02: All right, I can work a calculator, I can do this, yeah.
3:15
SPEAKER_02: It's all right.
3:16
SPEAKER_02: So I went into accounting.
3:18
SPEAKER_02: Well, as you know, with college, Kent being a professor, where you start and kind of where you finish.
3:24
SPEAKER_02: Um, you have a couple years of basic gen eds, you know, um, really it's it's like senior year continued, at least it was for me, you know, more history and all those basic classes.
3:38
SPEAKER_02: Well, by the time I really dove into the accounting, I kind of was already on that path.
3:46
SPEAKER_02: And I wasn't like wanting to switch.
3:48
SPEAKER_02: I was determined.
3:49
SPEAKER_02: I was like, okay, FBI, white collar crime.
3:52
SPEAKER_02: Well, junior year, I go to Cleveland, you know, and go to this big career thing, and I meet with the FBI recruiter.
4:02
SPEAKER_02: And right then and there, the guy's like, oh, well, your grades aren't good enough.
4:06
SPEAKER_02: I'm like, what?
4:08
SPEAKER_02: You know, you could have heard crickets.
4:10
SPEAKER_02: I was like, what?
4:10
SPEAKER_02: Say what?
4:11
SPEAKER_02: And like right around then, too, timing-wise, 9-11 happened.
4:16
SPEAKER_00: Oh wow.
4:21
SPEAKER_02: Junior year was 01.
4:23
SPEAKER_02: And uh, as you know, 9-11 shifted absolutely everything.
4:27
SPEAKER_02: The war on terror, um, you know, languages, Arabic was very, very much in demand.
4:32
SPEAKER_02: I know like, you know, three years of Spanish, and I'm not very great at that anyway.
4:38
SPEAKER_02: But um, yeah, I I had my my goal was simply the FBI.
4:42
SPEAKER_02: That was it.
4:43
SPEAKER_02: That was my goal.
4:44
SPEAKER_02: I had no plan B.
4:46
SPEAKER_02: Well, I didn't make it to the FBI.
4:48
SPEAKER_02: I didn't have the grades, and this guy was just he wasn't the nicest guy, the nicest recruiter.
4:53
SPEAKER_02: If you think about it, you're not gonna have the best of the best, probably, is the recruiter anyway, right?
4:57
SPEAKER_02: Um, so I didn't, I didn't really, I just had it left kind of with a bad taste in my mouth.
5:01
SPEAKER_02: I was like, well, um, alright.
5:04
SPEAKER_02: I don't know.
5:05
SPEAKER_02: You know, like many other college kids or young young folks in their 20s.
5:09
SPEAKER_02: I don't know.
5:10
SPEAKER_02: Okay, whatever.
5:11
SPEAKER_02: Well, and during college, I was working for my local city, I was working in income tax and also finance, and I was I I'm still pretty good at it, but I was really good at like the investigative part.
5:22
SPEAKER_02: So the FBI wasn't that much of a stretch.
5:25
SPEAKER_02: I, you know, looking into utility bills, finding people who left the city, people who owned taxes, tracking them down, that kind of thing.
5:32
SPEAKER_02: And I loved it.
5:32
SPEAKER_02: And I was like for a while, I was even thinking, hey, maybe I could become a PI.
5:36
SPEAKER_02: Truth is you pretty much have to become a cop to become a PI.
5:39
SPEAKER_02: Okay, a private investigator.
5:41
SPEAKER_02: For the most part.
5:42
SPEAKER_02: Almost almost always.
5:43
SPEAKER_02: It's like a former cop or something like that.
5:46
SPEAKER_02: Well, I had all this accounting experience, and I just stayed working for the city, the local city where I grew up.
5:53
SPEAKER_02: In the finance department, I shifted from income tax to finance.
5:57
SPEAKER_02: Then finally I got a job in Nashville with the city of Nashville, finance department.
6:03
SPEAKER_02: More numbers, more spreadsheets.
6:06
SPEAKER_02: I kind of got away from the investigative side.
6:08
SPEAKER_02: That was the part that really fired me up.
6:10
SPEAKER_02: That was the part where it was like um I'm making a difference.
6:14
SPEAKER_02: I'm finding the bad guys.
6:16
SPEAKER_02: I'm I'm I uh I enjoyed that for a while.
6:19
SPEAKER_02: Um, you know, but it before you know it, I I was just I got unsatisfied.
6:23
SPEAKER_02: The status quo was kind of the common thing, and you know, just punch in, punch out, work your years and retire.
6:30
SPEAKER_02: And once I realized that was the norm, I just I got unsatisfied.
6:36
SPEAKER_02: I got really restless.
6:37
SPEAKER_02: I got a bit depressed and um started having physical health problems, and I um had a new baby at the time.
6:44
SPEAKER_02: It was just like the perfect storm of craziness, and now I'm so grateful that I had it because I needed all those things to push me and pull me and stretch me.
6:54
SPEAKER_02: And uh I started to realize how creative I truly am, that I'm an artist, that I, you know, was born to create, honestly.
7:04
SPEAKER_02: And I always shrugged off creativity.
7:07
SPEAKER_02: You know, I'm not a quote unquote artist, was always my mantra.
7:11
SPEAKER_02: I just was no, I'm just I'm just me.
7:14
SPEAKER_02: This is me, you know.
7:15
SPEAKER_02: And I didn't like the label, frankly.
7:18
SPEAKER_02: So even becoming a writer was like, I don't know about this, man.
7:22
SPEAKER_02: I don't like this label, I don't fit into that little box.
7:26
SPEAKER_02: You know, I don't have a sweater, I don't have a pipe, I don't have a typewriter, you know, all those things.
7:32
SPEAKER_02: All those cliche things we picture.
7:34
SPEAKER_02: Well, I started to look backwards and I realized no, I've blogged before, I've enjoyed it, I like writing when I can control the topics.
7:46
SPEAKER_02: I love stories, but during school, a lot of the stories I just didn't gel with.
7:52
SPEAKER_02: I I you know I love certain authors, but I didn't like you know some of the classic stuff.
7:57
SPEAKER_02: It just didn't gel with me.
7:58
SPEAKER_02: It didn't sync with, you know, um me creatively.
8:02
SPEAKER_02: But um Edgar Allan Poe was huge.
8:05
SPEAKER_02: When I read Edgar Allan Poe, I was like, whoa, hold the phone here.
8:08
SPEAKER_02: This guy is way different than everything else I've ever read in my life.
8:12
SPEAKER_02: And that was like a kind of a almost like a a moment where I had the aha bright light thing.
8:20
SPEAKER_02: I was like, oh, what you're thinking about writing, what you're thinking about storytelling, it ain't it ain't like you think it is.
8:27
SPEAKER_02: It isn't, it doesn't fit certain molds.
8:30
SPEAKER_02: And then I just it was simply more digging backwards.
8:35
SPEAKER_02: And uh reading The Catcher in the Rye was a real eye-opener for me.
8:39
SPEAKER_02: I was like, oh my gosh, if I would have read this in high school, I would have said, No, I want to be a writer, I want to write something really in-depth and awesome, like that book.
8:48
SPEAKER_02: I just love that book because I feel it it really told a good story.
8:53
SPEAKER_02: And uh basically I shifted focus and I said, okay, I really want to pursue writing, I really want to pursue creativity and helping others because I was miserable, I hated my job, and you spend most of your time doing your job, and it kind of trickled over, and I really just hated my life.
9:10
SPEAKER_02: I was self-loathing and just it wasn't pretty, it was terrible.
9:14
SPEAKER_02: And I finally quit my job in Nashville, and I didn't really have a plan.
9:19
SPEAKER_02: I gotta be honest, I didn't have a great vision or plan.
9:23
SPEAKER_02: But I over the time I had been learning publicly, and even if you don't have an audience or think you don't have an audience, the truth is people are watching.
9:33
SPEAKER_02: Yes, people are listening, your story absolutely does matter.
9:39
SPEAKER_02: And I was just constantly connecting with other writers, authors, um, artists, everyone I could.
9:45
SPEAKER_02: That was what kept me um moving forward was meeting with people for coffee, listening to podcasts like this.
9:52
SPEAKER_02: Um, you know, that that whole who you spend your time with is kind of who who you become.
9:59
SPEAKER_02: And it was just a it was a gradual progression.
10:02
SPEAKER_02: It took me from 2011, summer of 2011, to the summer of 2014 to really grow and learn and evolve.
10:11
SPEAKER_02: And that was when I quit my job in 2014.
10:14
SPEAKER_02: And I've been working as a freelance writer, editor, coach, you know, working with different clients all over the place um basically since 2014.
10:24
SPEAKER_02: And it's it's been a bit of a roller coaster ride, Ken.
10:27
SPEAKER_02: I mean, you're you're one I'm always in touch with, and you kind of see some of the the ups and the downs.
10:32
SPEAKER_02: And I kind of pride myself on being honest and transparent with it.
10:35
SPEAKER_02: I mean, it's it's uh it's definitely a roller coaster ride, but it's so much better.
10:41
SPEAKER_02: It's I'm so much more happy and fulfilled compared to just that punch-in, punch-out mentality.
10:48
SPEAKER_00: Yeah, yeah.
10:49
SPEAKER_02: It's definitely stressful.
10:50
SPEAKER_02: I mean, there is no doubt it's stressful, but it's a different kind of stress.
10:54
SPEAKER_02: It's a stress where you can only point at yourself and say, Well, what am I doing?
11:00
SPEAKER_02: Am I doing my best?
11:01
SPEAKER_02: Am I, you know, working on having a positive attitude?
11:04
SPEAKER_02: Am I working out?
11:05
SPEAKER_02: Am I taking care of myself too?
11:07
SPEAKER_02: Versus the, you know, punch in, punch out, just kind of doing time attitude.
11:13
SPEAKER_02: So that's my story in a in a in a I guess in a nutshell there.
11:18
SPEAKER_00: I think that is that is such a key point that you make about stress because the stress that you impose on yourself because you're pursuing a goal that's important to you is way different than the stress somebody else imposes on you to meet their goal, especially if it's something you hate or you don't enjoy doing.
11:34
SPEAKER_00: So, yeah, I think that's that's a really great point.
11:37
SPEAKER_00: So I know that in your work with writers and in your journey in becoming uh a writer, editor, coach, and a whole bunch of different things, that you have become really passionate about helping people start things but also to finish things.
11:51
SPEAKER_00: So when we look specifically at the world of books and writing, in your work with writers and also maybe looking at ourselves as well, why do you think that there are so many unfinished books in the world?
12:01
SPEAKER_00: What is the deal with people starting books but not finishing them?
12:04
SPEAKER_02: Well, there's a Hollywood myth out there that has really, really made it harder for writers.
12:13
SPEAKER_02: And I and I'm just specifically gonna pick on Hollywood right now because we're such a visual society, everything's evolving more and more visually.
12:21
SPEAKER_02: Um, you'll see the Jerry McGuire in the beginning where Tom Cruise writes a little memo or mission statement, and he you just see a little clip it, clip of him writing for you know 30 seconds on the screen, and then all of a sudden he has this thick booklet that he's getting printed out at Kinkos, and then it's hand he's handing it out to everybody, and you know, it's changing things.
12:47
SPEAKER_02: It was literally like two scenes, it was like writing, printing, in their hands.
12:53
SPEAKER_02: I mean, it was so fast, and I think that that we've kind of accepted that's how writing works.
12:59
SPEAKER_02: And excuse me, uh the I think there's a lot more to it.
13:04
SPEAKER_02: I think there's the editing, I think there's the thinking, um, I think there's often the outlining, there's the the growing behind the scenes phases.
13:15
SPEAKER_02: Um yeah, there's some there's definitely some bursts where you're writing more, no doubt.
13:20
SPEAKER_02: But that's not typically how it works with finishing.
13:24
SPEAKER_02: Finishing is like, you know, uh a baseball team putting a bunch of runs on the on the board, and to get on the base, you you might get hit by a pitch, you might get walked, you know, you might get some singles.
13:38
SPEAKER_02: It sure ain't all home runs.
13:40
SPEAKER_02: It is not all, you know, grand slam home runs.
13:43
SPEAKER_02: I mean, I think baseball's a decent analogy on that.
13:45
SPEAKER_02: And I think that it's showing up to the plate.
13:48
SPEAKER_02: I mean, there's strikeouts, and uh, I think that's part of it.
13:52
SPEAKER_02: I think as a writer, you're gonna strike out a lot.
13:55
SPEAKER_01: You're gonna that is so true, right?
13:58
SPEAKER_02: You know, I mean, you're gonna have those nights where you're like, oh my gosh, um, should I even be playing this game?
14:04
SPEAKER_00: Oh my gosh, that in itself is a major question is uh, you know, should I even be doing this?
14:10
SPEAKER_00: You know, and yeah.
14:10
SPEAKER_00: And we go back to our childhood and we think so-and-so said I was never a writer, they said you weren't gifted, they said you should go be this when you grow up.
14:18
SPEAKER_00: And you know, it's funny how as an adult, all those things that you experience as a kid sometimes can really haunt you, and you you return to that inner seven-year-old, you know.
14:28
SPEAKER_02: Yes.
14:28
SPEAKER_02: Well, it's such an emotional thing.
14:31
SPEAKER_02: We although we might age physically, that doesn't mean we're aging you know mentally.
14:36
SPEAKER_00: Yeah, or emotionally.
14:37
SPEAKER_00: That's a very true.
14:38
SPEAKER_02: Or emotionally, I mean, and and don't you think it it's almost like I think technology can cause some of that regression?
14:45
SPEAKER_02: And I I know I like to dig into my past a lot.
14:49
SPEAKER_02: It's just who I how I'm built, how I'm wired.
14:51
SPEAKER_02: I literally can just dive into all that stuff from the 80s, and I feel like a kid again.
14:57
SPEAKER_00: Well, I love the 80s, you know what I mean?
14:59
SPEAKER_00: It's best I can for music, right?
15:01
SPEAKER_02: And and the toys and Saturday Saturday cartoons, remember those?
15:06
SPEAKER_02: And all that stuff, and you can literally live in the past.
15:10
SPEAKER_02: And it's so easy to do that.
15:12
SPEAKER_02: So I think all that past stuff, we can live in our past now.
15:17
SPEAKER_02: Every single bit of our past for the most part, we can like find bits of it online.
15:20
SPEAKER_00: Yeah, on YouTube, you can get lost.
15:23
SPEAKER_00: So let's say somebody has uh written part of a book or they've got an idea for a book.
15:28
SPEAKER_00: They're they're part way to having a finished, completed product, but they're not quite there yet.
15:32
SPEAKER_00: Are there some practical strategies, just like super practical tips you would give somebody for here are are certain things that you could do to ensure that you can finish your book, or at least greatly increase the likelihood that you can finish it?
15:46
SPEAKER_02: Focusing on one scene, focusing on one idea.
15:51
SPEAKER_02: Um chapter.
15:54
SPEAKER_02: It's all how you want to break it down.
15:55
SPEAKER_02: Um, if any of those sound overwhelming, you could focus on just like one paragraph.
16:02
SPEAKER_02: Just keep breaking it down until it's completely doable in your mind.
16:07
SPEAKER_02: Where it's like, okay, I absolutely can do this.
16:10
SPEAKER_02: And if it gets down to hey, I just want to write one sentence, whatever it takes.
16:15
SPEAKER_02: It's just knowing that you can absolutely do this.
16:19
SPEAKER_02: And a lot of times I think we want to give in to fear or procrastination or you know, bright, shiny syndrome.
16:25
SPEAKER_02: And I think that's a big part of why people don't finish, they lose focus and they say, Oh, well, I don't like this idea as much, it's not as cool or interesting now.
16:35
SPEAKER_02: I want to jump to this other idea.
16:39
SPEAKER_02: I think that's always the case.
16:41
SPEAKER_02: There's always going to be distractions and other ideas.
16:44
SPEAKER_02: I think we often just need to have a system in place, maybe a notepad, just for ideas.
16:50
SPEAKER_02: And, you know, your your mind's gonna keep racing unless you do something about it if you have another idea.
16:57
SPEAKER_02: Well, you know, make a short little video with your phone and just record the idea.
17:02
SPEAKER_02: And okay, I did the idea, it's down, I'm gonna save it back to my book, back to finishing.
17:11
SPEAKER_02: And if you've left your book sitting on a on your hard drive, it's really hard to get that momentum back.
17:17
SPEAKER_02: I think there's there's something about that.
17:20
SPEAKER_02: It's like, you know, uh the dusty treadmill, it's like that gym membership you haven't used in a while.
17:26
SPEAKER_02: I think it's okay to ask, it's okay to ask for help, and that's where you can get support.
17:30
SPEAKER_02: And Ken, I've reached out to you before, and if uh our schedules would only sync up a little, we'll be like, hey, hey, will you write with me?
17:36
SPEAKER_02: Write with me for the next hour.
17:38
SPEAKER_02: You write with me for the next half hour.
17:40
SPEAKER_02: And that can change your life too, because anymore I'm just texting people.
17:45
SPEAKER_02: I don't I don't care if they're writing as much now.
17:48
SPEAKER_02: But I I texted my friend Anna last night.
17:50
SPEAKER_02: I was like, look, I was like, I'm writing for the next hour.
17:53
SPEAKER_02: And I sent a picture of me at the coffee shop on my computer and talk about accountability, and you know, having great encouragers in your life is really important.
18:03
SPEAKER_02: And then she's like, Yes, you can do it, go.
18:06
SPEAKER_02: That that little you know one one-line text really does help because when you're working on a book, it's it's a marathon, it's not a sprint.
18:17
SPEAKER_00: So for people who are listening, let's let me throw out a few examples.
18:21
SPEAKER_00: Let's say person A is a college student who is taking uh a full load of courses, maybe they also work a job.
18:28
SPEAKER_00: So they've got all these things going on and they want to finish their book.
18:31
SPEAKER_00: Person B is let's say a young mother with uh two small kids at home.
18:36
SPEAKER_00: Okay.
18:36
SPEAKER_00: You know, that's kind of your life stage.
18:38
SPEAKER_00: Um you're dealing with small kids, you're kind of overwhelmed many times with those responsibilities.
18:43
SPEAKER_00: Let's say person C is uh a father in my stage of life with you know teenage kids, I have one teenage son, you know, they're running their kid all over the place, they've got church commitments.
18:56
SPEAKER_00: Um what would you say to some of these people who who have lots of commitments and it seems like they don't have any spare time in the day?
19:04
SPEAKER_00: What are some practical ways they could start to carve out some time in their busy schedules and actually get their book done or at least make some progress on it?
19:12
SPEAKER_02: Yeah, yeah.
19:13
SPEAKER_02: Well, no matter what stage you're in, college kid, mother, father, um, no matter what age, it ain't gonna get easier because even when you're retired and you know think you have all this tons of time, actually your space will just fill up as you have relationships, as you have things going on.
19:34
SPEAKER_02: So I think the important part is finding those spare moments.
19:39
SPEAKER_02: Um, specifically, okay, college kids, they're gonna have really, really weird schedules.
19:44
SPEAKER_02: I mean, really, really odd.
19:46
SPEAKER_02: Some are gonna be night owls, it might depend on your tests, right?
19:50
SPEAKER_02: Your exams, when you're, you know, certain times you'll have to study more, you know, cram sessions, right?
19:56
SPEAKER_02: Um, I would say for them, a lot of that would be habit stacking.
20:01
SPEAKER_02: And by habit stacking, I mean um, you know, whenever you eat lunch, whenever you eat dinner, and that might change.
20:09
SPEAKER_02: That might change.
20:10
SPEAKER_02: Like it might be one day to the next, depending on classes, i.e.
20:14
SPEAKER_02: at noon one day and three o'clock the next day, I don't know.
20:18
SPEAKER_02: Um, I think habit stacking is the way to start out, and I think that for me, like Kent, specifically for me, lunch hour was absolutely prime time.
20:29
SPEAKER_02: And I think it's always easiest to attach it to a meal because we have to eat.
20:35
SPEAKER_02: We have to.
20:36
SPEAKER_02: So if you attach it to a meal, say you don't even get a lunch hour, let's say um you're eating whenever you can spare time.
20:43
SPEAKER_02: You just you first off, I think you do need the time to you know prepare lunch to sit down to take a break.
20:50
SPEAKER_02: I do think that's one thing you need to change.
20:53
SPEAKER_02: Um, but it doesn't have to take a lot of time.
20:56
SPEAKER_02: Um, just jotting some ideas down on your phone, you know, using your phone for taking notes versus YouTube or Instagram or Facebook or whatever, you can be a creator instead of being a consumer.
21:11
SPEAKER_02: And if it means taking some of these apps off your phone, so be it.
21:16
SPEAKER_02: But holy cow, that shows commitment.
21:18
SPEAKER_02: And I think that's a great step where you're like, I'm really serious about this.
21:22
SPEAKER_02: I'm taking off Facebook off my phone.
21:25
SPEAKER_02: I'm taking YouTube off.
21:26
SPEAKER_02: All those little things that we do.
21:28
SPEAKER_02: We find time to watch YouTube videos, but then we say we don't have time to write.
21:32
SPEAKER_02: And I'm I'm not just picking on everyone, I'm picking myself too.
21:35
SPEAKER_02: Um, you know, write on your phone any free moments that you have.
21:40
SPEAKER_02: You could write on your phone.
21:41
SPEAKER_02: You I know you like Evernote, Kent.
21:43
SPEAKER_02: I love Evernote.
21:44
SPEAKER_02: You could have an Evernote folder, writing, blog posts, book, you know, chapters, uh scenes.
21:52
SPEAKER_02: I think there's a lot of potential there.
21:54
SPEAKER_02: And so for the college student specifically, I'd say you attach that to your lunch, your dinner, what Whatever.
22:00
SPEAKER_02: With the mother, you gotta tap, you gotta ask for help too.
22:04
SPEAKER_02: You gotta have that time.
22:06
SPEAKER_02: If if um nobody's taking care of if mama's not taking care of herself, she's not gonna be very good at taking care of others.
22:13
SPEAKER_02: Same with fathers too, but um, especially mothers.
22:16
SPEAKER_02: I think mothers even more so will you know place their kids before their own needs.
22:21
SPEAKER_00: Right, right.
22:22
SPEAKER_02: And I think asking your spouse for help, asking your friends, um, babysit swap.
22:29
SPEAKER_02: I think that could be good.
22:30
SPEAKER_02: A babysit swap.
22:31
SPEAKER_02: And let's be honest, you might need a nap more than you need to create, like to write you might not have the mental energy.
22:41
SPEAKER_02: But here's the thing you could nap for 45 minutes or an hour and write for five.
22:47
SPEAKER_02: You gotta prioritize your own, you know, mental health and physical health before some of these other things.
22:55
SPEAKER_02: And as you catch up on sleep, as the kids you know start to nap better, and as that, you know, uh sleep cycles change and evolve.
23:04
SPEAKER_02: Again, I think you could probably squeeze in some writing versus some of that, you know, watching whatever show at night.
23:12
SPEAKER_02: And uh I think for fathers, again, I think uh especially like a guy like you, Kent.
23:17
SPEAKER_02: I would I would literally I would nail you down tight on it.
23:20
SPEAKER_02: I'd be like, okay, what do you do on your lunch hour?
23:23
SPEAKER_02: Seriously, what what does your lunch hour look like?
23:26
SPEAKER_02: Because sometimes I think it's it's like we're fiddling with our phone, or maybe we're kind of browsing online and watching YouTube videos, and um, you know, I think there's a million different little things that we do, but we don't think about the time or the mental energy that it takes.
23:43
SPEAKER_00: So it sounds like, you know, to kind of summarize all this, it's just the idea of being intentional, being assertive.
23:50
SPEAKER_00: Really stubbornness, I think, plays a big role in it.
23:53
SPEAKER_00: You know, because you can't just write and create whenever you're feeling inspired or whenever you have a pocket of time, you know.
24:00
SPEAKER_00: If you wait to say, well, I'm gonna I'm gonna create only when everybody's out of the house, only when I have a block of time to myself, then that's really tough because then that way it's kind of a passive approach to productivity.
24:12
SPEAKER_00: But you have to be proactive and and take initiative and sometimes be just really stubborn in a nice way, but take charge of your schedule because if you don't take charge of it, somebody else is going to, for sure.
24:23
SPEAKER_02: Absolutely.
24:24
SPEAKER_02: Couldn't agree more.
24:25
SPEAKER_00: Well, as we start to kind of wind this down, um are there any books that you feel like every writer should read, you know, in terms of just kind of filling your own creative well, maybe books on the craft of writing or storytelling books, anything that you would really recommend?
24:42
SPEAKER_02: I really like The War of Art because the concept of resistance, I think that's like the great introduction to it.
24:49
SPEAKER_02: Um I also like the book Do the Work because Stephen Pressfield essentially takes you through an entire project.
24:58
SPEAKER_02: And that's a breeze-through kind of book.
25:01
SPEAKER_02: You could breeze through that and like really determined.
25:03
SPEAKER_00: Yeah, they're very short, very breezy.
25:05
SPEAKER_02: Yeah.
25:05
SPEAKER_02: Yeah.
25:06
SPEAKER_02: I mean, you could literally pick it up, read a little, put it down.
25:09
SPEAKER_02: Um, I like those a lot, is kind of the, you know, just knowing that resistance is out there, and that's kind of what makes us procrastinate, putting a name attaching it to that.
25:20
SPEAKER_02: Um, I really like the book Story Maps.
25:23
SPEAKER_02: Story Maps is the name of it by Daniel Calvisi, C-A-L-V-I-S-I.
25:31
SPEAKER_02: I really like his style because it's simple, it's not like complicated.
25:37
SPEAKER_02: Some of those craft books, you look at it, you're like, oh my goodness, this looks like calculus to me, not story.
25:43
SPEAKER_02: I think there's always a real caution with those craft books.
25:48
SPEAKER_02: That's I I'll just give you those three right there.
25:50
SPEAKER_02: I think we can often use them as procrastination.
25:54
SPEAKER_02: I know I have before in the past.
25:56
SPEAKER_02: A lot of times the answer is not in a craft book, um, because if you ask a hundred writers the same question, you might get like a hundred different answers.
26:07
SPEAKER_02: Um I think that in many cases it's like sitting there with a pen and paper and just saying, I'm going to figure this out.
26:16
SPEAKER_02: Again, that's stubbornness.
26:18
SPEAKER_02: If you just get really stubborn and say, seriously, I know how to figure this out, I can figure this out.
26:24
SPEAKER_02: A lot of times you can do that.
26:27
SPEAKER_02: You can figure it out.
26:29
SPEAKER_02: Um, the answer is not necessarily in a story or writing book.
26:34
SPEAKER_02: Um, it's actually you already have it, and it's just really close, and it's just a tiny little micro adjustment or a tiny little tweak to a scene, or you know, just a tiny little perspective shift is your answer.
26:50
SPEAKER_02: Um, especially like I'm writing a novel, and I literally I was stuck and I was jumping around, I'm like, man, I'm missing part of this.
26:57
SPEAKER_02: This chapter ain't working.
26:58
SPEAKER_02: It just ain't working.
27:00
SPEAKER_02: I'm looking at it kind of, and of course you want to fall into the tangent of holy cow, I'm a lousy writer, I'm bad at this, I'm not good.
27:07
SPEAKER_02: You know, all the slippery, slippery slope.
27:11
SPEAKER_02: But the answer was like, oh, you know what?
27:14
SPEAKER_02: What if I tried this?
27:16
SPEAKER_02: What if I included another character?
27:19
SPEAKER_02: And, you know, what if I cut this little text out?
27:22
SPEAKER_02: It's a it's a humbling experience taking text out of your document and just sticking it over to the side in another comment or you know, deleting something.
27:31
SPEAKER_02: Heaven forbid we move some text around.
27:33
SPEAKER_02: Um, but that's part of the deal with being a writer.
27:36
SPEAKER_02: And literally, I pulled like you know, a hundred words out of my document, just put it in a comment so I have it for later.
27:44
SPEAKER_02: I like to use Scrivener.
27:46
SPEAKER_02: And then I just started typing where that where that blank space was.
27:50
SPEAKER_02: And I think the story is like ten times better now, and it makes sense and it's coherent.
27:55
SPEAKER_02: And it was just a tiny little you know, speed bump, a road bump that you know it you can stop.
28:02
SPEAKER_02: I mean, you could literally but no, there's this, there's this obstruction in the road.
28:07
SPEAKER_02: Can't I can't get by.
28:08
SPEAKER_02: You could literally say that.
28:10
SPEAKER_02: Um, or you can just say, you know what, I'm just gonna I'm gonna back up a little bit.
28:16
SPEAKER_02: Oh, you know what, I can just drive around this, or I can, you know, um go slowly, go carefully.
28:20
SPEAKER_02: Heck, I can always get out of my car and walk around.
28:22
SPEAKER_02: There's we want to get all like overly judgmental when things don't go perfectly.
28:29
SPEAKER_02: And I know that's I don't even consider myself a perfectionist, but listen to what I just said.
28:36
SPEAKER_02: Overly judgmental when things aren't going perfect.
28:39
SPEAKER_02: I am a perfectionist, I'm in denial about it.
28:41
SPEAKER_02: Often, I think a lot of us are.
28:43
SPEAKER_02: So I think with story, with craft, I think there's always going to be a million new books out there about that.
28:51
SPEAKER_02: And it's interesting.
28:52
SPEAKER_02: I think it's fine in moderation, but man, if you're not in moderation, you could read 15 books on screenwriting and not even have one screenplay finished.
29:03
SPEAKER_00: Yeah, I would say just pick one and go with it.
29:06
SPEAKER_00: Because you know, the question is whose system are you going to use?
29:10
SPEAKER_00: You know, there's all kinds of different systems out there.
29:13
SPEAKER_00: A lot of them are good, some of them are not that good.
29:16
SPEAKER_00: You know, I guess I'd my caution is I would be careful about somebody who writes a lot of books about screenwriting or who does a lot of teaching about it, but they've never like had a screenplay produced.
29:26
SPEAKER_00: You know, I'm always a little kind of suspicious of that.
29:29
SPEAKER_00: Um which in my mind that that in some ways it's it's that thing of you know, those who can do and those who can't teach.
29:37
SPEAKER_00: And I'm saying that as a college professor, you know, there definitely are people out there who it's like, well, they can analyze and critique everybody else's stuff, but they can't actually produce their own stuff.
29:47
SPEAKER_00: And in fact, I had a conversation with uh one of my students yesterday, and I was saying, you know, one of the the points of I'm I'm teaching a course on storytelling, which is kind of ironic now that I now that I think about that, and I said, you know, I want this course to be, yes, about doing movie analysis and story structure and that kind of stuff, but also I want it to to propel you forward to produce your own stuff.
30:09
SPEAKER_00: Don't just be a critic and some some person who's analyzing everybody else's stuff.
30:14
SPEAKER_00: I want you to use that to create your own stuff, and I find that most of the people who are creating lots of cool work are too busy making stuff to critique everybody else's stuff.
30:25
SPEAKER_00: And I would I would love to to get more to that place in my own life.
30:30
SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
30:31
SPEAKER_00: But it's it's so tempting to just analyze things and you know break stories down, and I love all that stuff, and so you know, those those of us who have analytical personalities, sometimes that's it, that's a real curse because we overthink everything and we get stuck.
30:45
SPEAKER_02: Yes, I completely agree, and that's a struggle I've I've encountered many times in my own career where it's close.
30:54
SPEAKER_02: It's a shadow career, I think is the right term for that, Kent, where it's like it's really, really close.
31:00
SPEAKER_02: It hits a lot of those.
31:03
SPEAKER_02: Um you're you're almost getting all the itch.
31:06
SPEAKER_02: You're like scratching almost all of the itch.
31:08
SPEAKER_02: You've got like, you know, if you had a mosquito bite or several on your leg, and you're getting like eight of the nine mosquito bites on your leg, you're gonna be like, oh, I think I'm okay.
31:17
SPEAKER_02: I think I'm okay.
31:19
SPEAKER_02: And in the reality is you're still not satisfied.
31:23
SPEAKER_02: And the truth is, it's you're gonna have to fail sometimes.
31:27
SPEAKER_02: You're gonna fail to be really satisfied.
31:30
SPEAKER_02: It's a learning growth experience, and don't be afraid to fail.
31:33
SPEAKER_02: I mean, I I I think uh that's one of the best pieces of advice you probably pull away from this.
31:38
SPEAKER_02: Yeah, and it failure is defined by you personally.
31:43
SPEAKER_02: Um growth is painful, growth is challenging, but and I mean you're gonna fail too as you're growing.
31:54
SPEAKER_02: But it's it's a constant kind of work in progress, and that's why, you know, for a musician that put out their first album, you know, it took them like 10 years to make that first album, and you don't see all the behind-the-scenes stuff.
32:10
SPEAKER_02: It I think that's I'll be honest, I I mentioned uh uh JD Salinger, his novel.
32:17
SPEAKER_02: He only wrote one novel, Catch him in the Rye.
32:19
SPEAKER_02: That was it, and that took him 10 years.
32:22
SPEAKER_02: And I think he was like, there's a reason I think part of his not publishing anymore was like, I don't want to fail again.
32:31
SPEAKER_02: I won't live up to the standard that I set for the first book that I novel that I made.
32:37
SPEAKER_02: I think that probably was part of it in the background.
32:40
SPEAKER_02: Um, so I think we really need to consider, oh, it's this is gonna be a challenging path.
32:47
SPEAKER_02: It is, but it's gonna be a lot of fun.
32:49
SPEAKER_02: And if you have a great attitude, that's like so essential.
32:54
SPEAKER_00: So, where can people find you online and discover more about your work?
32:58
SPEAKER_02: Well, I write um I write on medium.com.
33:02
SPEAKER_02: I'm I'm on there quite a bit.
33:03
SPEAKER_02: I've been sharing more and more of my work on medium.com.
33:07
SPEAKER_02: Uh just Jim Woods writes, and uh new project I'm launching soon is called Story Crafting, where it's storycrafting.co.co, because I don't know who took dot com and I tried to get it, but I couldn't get it.
33:22
SPEAKER_01: So I'm dot co.
33:24
SPEAKER_02: I know, right?
33:25
SPEAKER_02: It's it's the internet, right?
33:26
SPEAKER_02: Um, and I have a special offer for your listeners where storycrafting.co slash create.
33:34
SPEAKER_02: You can uh book a coaching call with me where we can really dive into story or productivity.
33:40
SPEAKER_02: Um, primarily story crafting is is my real bread and butter that I'm moving toward, but I'll be honest, productivity is a huge part of it.
33:48
SPEAKER_02: Um, you have to have good habits, you have to get momentum.
33:52
SPEAKER_02: I think those are two parts of story crafting that we often overlook.
33:57
SPEAKER_02: Um, but yeah, it's uh basically they can uh get a coaching session for like the price of a cup of coffee, and it's uh storycrafting.co slash create.
34:08
SPEAKER_00: Awesome.
34:09
SPEAKER_00: Well, Jim, thanks so much for being on the show and for being one of my early guests.
34:13
SPEAKER_00: I appreciate your friendship and um you know how you have helped me with a lot of creative endeavors and uh appreciate all the great stuff that you shared today.
34:21
SPEAKER_00: So hope everybody's has listened really closely because Jim has shared like a book's worth of great tips and advice.
34:28
SPEAKER_02: Thank you so much, Ken.
34:29
SPEAKER_02: I really appreciate it.
34:34
SPEAKER_00: Well, I hope you enjoyed that interview with Jim Woods as much as I did.
34:37
SPEAKER_00: At the end of every interview, I want to share several things that I learned, and these are sort of key action steps that you can put into practice right away to start becoming more creative and effective in your life and your work.
34:50
SPEAKER_00: So here are three specific takeaways that I learned from my interview with Jim, and all of these apply specifically to writing, although I think they do have application for lots of different types of creative work.
35:01
SPEAKER_00: Number one, focus on one scene, chapter, section, or paragraph at a time.
35:08
SPEAKER_00: This simple advice is really easy to ignore, but it makes a world of difference in staying focused and for writing in the moment.
35:14
SPEAKER_00: It's super easy to feel overwhelmed when you have this huge project looming right there out in front of you, but when you focus on the small section that you're working on, you can make really steady progress until the whole project is finished.
35:27
SPEAKER_00: Number two, write in the spare moments of your day.
35:31
SPEAKER_00: You know, all of us probably spend a lot of time sitting around playing on our phones and just wasting time, you know, five minutes here, ten minutes there during the day, or maybe that's just me and you don't do that, but most of the people I know, including myself, do that and we're guilty of wasting time that way.
35:47
SPEAKER_00: Sometimes we're just sitting around waiting for something to happen.
35:51
SPEAKER_00: Well, you don't need to be at your desk in quote unquote writing mode in order to make some progress on your book or your project.
35:58
SPEAKER_00: You can take five minutes here or ten minutes there or fifteen minutes here or there, and you can get some writing done and you will be really surprised at the results.
36:06
SPEAKER_00: Now, if you're serious about making the most of your creative time, check out the post on my blog on how to track your time.
36:13
SPEAKER_00: There's a link in the show notes.
36:15
SPEAKER_00: And number three, use habit stacking to get more writing done.
36:19
SPEAKER_00: Now, as Jim explained in our interview, habit stacking is the process of linking two habits together.
36:25
SPEAKER_00: For example, you can link your writing time with your lunch time.
36:29
SPEAKER_00: Even if your lunch period is only, say, half an hour, you can actually get a lot of writing done while you eat.
36:35
SPEAKER_00: I mean, we're all going to eat anyway, so you may as well do something productive during that time.
36:40
SPEAKER_00: Whenever you link writing to an activity that you're going to do anyway, you're a lot more likely to make it happen.
36:46
SPEAKER_00: Well, friends, that wraps up this episode of the Born2Create podcast.
36:50
SPEAKER_00: You can find the show notes at KentSanders.net slash finished.
36:55
SPEAKER_00: For more great resources to help unleash your creative powers, visit my site at KentSanders.net.
37:01
SPEAKER_00: If you enjoyed this episode, please subscribe and leave a rating and a review in iTunes.
37:07
SPEAKER_00: It only takes a minute, and you can do this by visiting KentSanders.net slash iTunes.
37:12
SPEAKER_00: When you subscribe and leave a rating and a review in iTunes, you're helping other people to find the show.
37:18
SPEAKER_00: When you leave a review, please include your Twitter handle and your review so I can give you a shout-out here on the podcast.
37:24
SPEAKER_00: Thanks in advance and thank you so much to those who have already subscribed and left a rating and or a review.
37:31
SPEAKER_00: Finally, if you enjoyed this episode, please consider sharing it with a friend or a family member who you think would enjoy it.
37:37
SPEAKER_00: Until next time, remember that you were born to create and designed to make a difference.
37:42
SPEAKER_00: Now go create something awesome.