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Explore your curiosity - Interesting people with fascinating stories.
Life consists of three things:
-The stories we tell others
-The stories others tell us
-The stories we tell ourselves.
Michelle, welcome aboard to the show. So happy to have you with us today.
Speaker 2:I am thrilled to be here, Ari.
Speaker 1:We now the the audience doesn't know that this is our second attempt. So, hopefully, it's gonna work this time. And I think of maybe third attempt, one was my fault, the other issues, man, we've been through a rough time.
Speaker 2:Life happens.
Speaker 1:Yeah. This is true. I got three kids. I I don't I know it? What what is the worst possible moment in your life that you can recall?
Speaker 2:Oh, I have to choose because there have
Speaker 1:been Oh, man. Tell us both the stories. Don't choose. We wanna hear it all.
Speaker 2:Yeah. If I had if I had one, I I think I would be an oddball. So I think the worst I think the worst moment was when let me see. Let me, like, gather my thoughts for a moment. I think the worst moment was when I was my husband left after twenty three years and I did I got married at 20 and I did not know how to be a single person because I went from house to being married, and I didn't know who I was.
Speaker 2:And I was 43. And I think that was one of the worst moments of my life, but one of the ultimate best moments.
Speaker 1:Thank you for that that out for me because otherwise this wouldn't have a next question. It would be like, I'm so sorry. Next topic. Good. But this is this is a I think it's a human truth that our worst often, you know, twenty years later or ten years later are often also our best or our most important at the minimum.
Speaker 1:Why did it turn out to be your best in retrospect as well?
Speaker 2:Well, that's much easier, and I don't have to think about it. It's because even though I floundered the first year, maybe the first two years, I read a lot of books. I read Changes That Heal, Women Who Try Too Hard, Boundaries, all all the books. And those books were very instrumental in my healing process. And ultimately, I just found out who I am.
Speaker 2:And I like who I am. And I have I'm a work in progress. I have developed skills as an adult post divorce that I never thought I had. Like, somebody pointed out I was a people person, and I just laughed in their face. Like, are you kidding me?
Speaker 2:Because I was the wallflower and very quiet and very timid, very shy, and now you can't shut me up.
Speaker 1:You know, I the thing that I I love the most about the story is that even when you're in your forties, you can discover new depths and whiffs, you can become a new person, and you can just completely decide that you're going to rediscover yourself. I think to me, that is the most inspiring thing. And if you can do this in your forties, could do it in your twenties. Right? You can change.
Speaker 1:You can be an awesome person even if you don't like yourself right now. And and maybe you should cut yourself some slack, but that's a whole different point. I I I wanna I wanna follow-up and and ask you, when exactly in your journey did you write? And this is, I can't say this without laughing, Inspiring thoughts while you're on the pot. And you used the pseudo name for this, which I think is brilliant.
Speaker 1:It's Anita Flushing.
Speaker 2:Yeah. Joking, boy. You'll get that in a minute.
Speaker 1:When did you write this and what the hell inspired you to write? Do you have a toilet on your book? Like, it's literally got a toilet on the book in the middle of a field. Why? What what what what, you know, what buslightening struck you at that moment?
Speaker 2:Yes. That is a great question. And I wrote the book in 2015 when I was transitioning from doing copywriting, you know, website content and things like that, to being a ghostwriter. And I call myself now a recovering ghostwriter because I did that for six years.
Speaker 1:But We'll when I transitioned to come back to that. What? We'll come back to the ghostwriting. When
Speaker 2:I transitioned, I thought, how can I help people write their books? And I don't have one. Yeah. And so I thought, oh my gosh, I have to gather something together and have a book so at least I have one. And I had the notes for this book, Bathroom Prayers, in a file for years and years and years.
Speaker 2:Pulled it out, and it's inspirational. It's funny. There's some poignant stories in there. There's some real vulnerable stories in there. There's some practical tips.
Speaker 2:It's just a fun book. I still have one on the back of my toilet tank, and that's what it's meant for. And just a quick read, inspiring thoughts while you're on the pot.
Speaker 1:I love that. So so and keep me honest here that I'm getting the the the order of things correctly.
Speaker 2:Mhmm.
Speaker 1:But is this when you were a ghostwriter or is this later on when you decided you're gonna, you're gonna work with Fennefellers?
Speaker 2:Yes. Well, the reason why I wrote Bathroom Prayers was because I was marketing myself on LinkedIn, which is my special spot for marketing. And an NFL a former NFL player reached out to me and asked me if I had ever ghostwritten a book. And having never ghostwritten a book, I said, sure. Sure, I can.
Speaker 2:Say yes and
Speaker 1:then Why not? Figure it love that.
Speaker 2:So that's what I did. And I ultimately, he wrote his own book, and I pursued him, followed up with, checked in with for seven years. Now I've helped him with two books and heading into a third soon. But that's how it all started. And then my target market was really former pro athletes, particularly NFL, NBA, but NFL since I knew that world.
Speaker 2:And so a lot of my clients are former NFL players.
Speaker 1:So you you're getting to know deeply, intimately a lot of pro athletes. What are the insights that you have? What were the challenges in the process, and and what were the moments of delight?
Speaker 2:Oh, well, the I'll start with the good first. The the moments of delight are I love their mindset. Many were told, you're too short. You're too slow. You'll never make it.
Speaker 2:You're too poor. And that was their dream. And they did whatever they had to do to get to the biggest stage on in the world. And so I love the mentality, the mindset, everything like that. The the downside, I would say, would be sometimes they're flaky little son of a guns.
Speaker 2:And I had a really hard time at the beginning getting paid. I have this funny habit of wanting to eat regularly and pay my rent. And so it I had to pursue other business professionals. But I do have quite if you go on my website under clients, I do have quite an extensive list of former NFL
Speaker 1:get paid upfront nowadays.
Speaker 2:I I love working with them. I really do, and I still do, but just not as often.
Speaker 1:Do you insist on getting paid upfront nowadays with the NFLers?
Speaker 2:I had the change, and plus, I'm not a ghostwriter anymore.
Speaker 1:Fair enough.
Speaker 2:So, yeah, ghostwriting, you have to get a hefty deposit because it is so expensive, because it's so time But now as a book and publishing consultant and taking their book and do all the doing all the inward parts, you know, helping them self publish, doing all the the behind the scenes part, then, yeah, 50% up and then 50% at sixty days after. And that has worked a lot better. And plus my clientele has changed for the better through the years as well.
Speaker 1:It's interesting because just doing that filters out certain people, right? So it has this kind of impact. Yes. Okay. I wanna go back to something very interesting.
Speaker 1:You said you call yourself a recovering ghostwriter. Give us give us the absolutely horror of being a ghostwriter.
Speaker 2:I found that it was just I did not like the long form of it. You can only take on, you know, one or two clients at a time, especially with memoirs. I don't think I was particularly talented at it. But the long form, I when I came to the point of I can't do this anymore, I didn't even want any new clients because the the No. Enough.
Speaker 2:Yes. Exactly. So I I thought I did not create my business to be this miserable.
Speaker 1:Yeah.
Speaker 2:And so I shifted 15 degrees to the left or to the right. And I
Speaker 1:What what when was this? At what what stage in your life? What age? Because you're doing a lot of pivots. This is so delightful.
Speaker 2:Yeah. That was about six years into ghostwriting. And I had done it for six years and toiled and struggled. And it it just wasn't my sweet spot. Were you
Speaker 1:were you afraid? Like, oh, this is like this is my thing. This is what I do. What can I do? Can I do something else?
Speaker 1:Like, what did the what were the emotions going through your mind when you're like, oh, I can't do this anymore?
Speaker 2:Yes. Well, what I said is just I didn't create my business Winning Proof to be this miserable, to feel this and and wanting to just not have any new clients. So I was at a networking, online networking event. And that's when I heard about if you've fallen out of love with your business, maybe it just needs a little shift. You don't have to throw the whole baby out.
Speaker 2:Just shift it. And so that's what I did. And I thought, what are the things I love to do within the ghostwriting? And that's exactly what I do now. And I am in love with it, passionate about what I do.
Speaker 2:And that's all the, okay, you have an idea, you know, back cover copy, coordinating the whole project 60. Keywords, categories, publishing, all that.
Speaker 1:Brilliant. Brilliant. I mean, this is such an important message, I think, because this problem of kind of falling out of your of your business, it's it's it's common. It's not uncommon. And, you know, people put a lot of sweat into their businesses, and it it's easy for it to, you know, not be fun after some time.
Speaker 1:What is the future hold for you? Are you before another pivot? Or or is this it? Is this the fun thing that you're doing now?
Speaker 2:This is my zone of genius. This is what I find the greatest joy in. I don't anticipate any more pivots except just to learn more. There's so much to learn, and I'm very thankful and and fortunate that I have an industry mentor who has been in the industry twenty five years. And she has been a wealth of knowledge for me.
Speaker 2:I will call her in a panic sometimes. Hey, my client, and this happened, and this happened, and I can't get this to work. And she just helps me a lot. So I would say a pivot is to just keep you can never learn everything there is to know about the publishing world, and it's ever evolving. And so you always have to keep sharp to stay relevant.
Speaker 1:So so let's go into the publishing world. Social media has kind of bent us all over, and let's explain that because our audience doesn't really understand what's happening. So twenty years ago, how could you get published by the big four? What was the process? Well Twenty years ago.
Speaker 2:Yes. You created a book proposal. You shopped for a literary agent. And that literary agent, with your book proposal, which you were paying, and you still pay 8 to $15,000 for it. Yep.
Speaker 2:And they would shop your manuscript to the big five. And so
Speaker 1:in essence hiring a salesperson, so to speak. And and but there was a chance in hell. Like if you had something, was a chance.
Speaker 2:Miniscule chance, because all of the big five, they don't none of them take unsolicited manuscripts. I think most everybody knows that. But literary agents, of course, have ins and they work with the big five. And so, you have to have credibility, and your manuscript has to be good.
Speaker 1:Has to
Speaker 2:be They don't take cruddy writing.
Speaker 1:Okay. Social media has changed this. What does it look like today?
Speaker 2:Well, I would say the bulk of people, and I work with self published authors. Have a teammate who is in communication and does have relationships with traditional publishers, including the big five. But with social media, the ability to market yourself, the ability to include your connections in your book journey. And even though I haven't seen my clients do this, I tell my clients, include your audience from the beginning. If you have two two or three book covers, put it on your social media channel and ask a, b, or c, and include them.
Speaker 2:Make them feel like they're part of it. And that's the glory of social media.
Speaker 1:The step. Right? Mhmm. What if what if I'm trying to get published by the big five and I don't have a social media following? I'm not an influencer.
Speaker 1:Do I have a chanceinhellcom okay. That's
Speaker 2:Bye bye.
Speaker 1:This is this this is so so here's what's happening. Here's how the industry has changed. The big five are looking for people of a 100,000, a million followers. They're going to them and they're saying, hey, wanna write a book? And if you don't have a 100,000 followers, yeah, go away.
Speaker 2:That's exactly right. And even the big five with all of their, you know, Simon Schuster and, you know, all that's just the one that pops into my mind first always. But they want to leverage what you already have. And so they want sell
Speaker 1:your book. Why? We don't need to sell it for you. Great.
Speaker 2:Yeah. Exactly. They will leverage and do some marketing, but they want you to have a giant following first.
Speaker 1:Yeah. A base. Yeah. Is this deeply disturbing? Are we concerned as human beings that the next brilliant book is not gonna be published by a big house because of this process, or is it not a big deal because self publishing came around?
Speaker 2:I think it's because self publishing came around. There's some some big authors out there, some well known authors that and don't let them don't ask me who they are, but they're out there and they are self publishing because with a traditional publisher, they're going to keep the rights. They're gonna keep the royalties for a certain amount of time, maybe forever. Right. And they're gonna have a giant royalty split in their favor.
Speaker 2:And authors, big and small, are realizing if they self publish, they get to keep everything rights, royalties, everything from the beginning. So but you are paying to publish.
Speaker 1:Yeah. You've given a big chunk to Amazon too. The those guys are
Speaker 2:Well, now yeah.
Speaker 1:Yeah. Nice in between 30 to yep. But okay. So so self publishing kind of this whole new thing. It's it's it's it it really changes the dynamic.
Speaker 1:So if it's not the end of the world that the big five are not going after these brilliant ideas, maybe it's the end of their world and they just can't see it. I mean, are they becoming these populistic, you know, reality shows that is not going to have the deep insightful authors because they can vet them with a whole bunch of followers? I mean, they just going to have a bunch of, you know, alone and naked, you know, actors? Like what's what what, you know, ten, twenty years into the future, what are the big five going to look like?
Speaker 2:That is such a good question. And it's just kind of a sci fi question because, you know, I think big publishers will always be around because you have the very famous authors who can easily get deals with the big publishers, with the big five. So I think they'll always be around. But I think also that more and more authors will want to self publish because they don't want to be in that world. And plus, they take up to two years to finish your book.
Speaker 2:If you are self publishing, you know, five months, beware of the ones that say I can get your book done in fifteen days. Not any reputable book.
Speaker 1:You can't get your book done in fifteen days. No. Let's start it there. Regardless of who's going to help you. Michelle, what an absolute delight.
Speaker 1:We have only one scripted question on the show. Everything else, I don't know what I'm gonna ask. If you had to go back to and I used to say 20, but I've changed it to the most difficult part of your life, what would be the advice that you would give to yourself?
Speaker 2:I would say, if I was talking to my 20 year old self, I would say don't listen to everything. Don't believe everything everybody tells you, good and bad. Because if you believe all the bad, then you're not going to live up to your potential. You're going to take that in and you're gonna start believing it yourself. And it's the story that you're gonna start telling.
Speaker 2:Don't believe all the good, says, because then you get a big old head and you might think of yourself more highly than you ought.
Speaker 1:You know, our our tagline is life consists of three stories. Stories you tell to yourself and the stories other tells you. Yes. About you. So I can only say thank you for finishing with our tagline.
Speaker 1:Michelle, what an absolute delight. Thank you for joining our show today.
Speaker 2:I am so glad that we connected and Thank that I was able to do you very much.
Speaker 1:My god, my cheeks are hurting because you made me laugh and smile so much. Good. So now I need to go battle the three children. Thank you so much. I appreciate you.