Are you trying to write a book and struggling? Or even any piece of writing? Inspiration is everywhere. Know that and know that if you are open it will find you.
I was recently watching Killing Eve. The script is brilliant. Earlier the same weekend I did a binge on The Good Place – another brilliant script. Programs like these fascinate me. Where do the writers find their inspiration and do they have any spare?
I find inspiration in all kinds of places and I am sure that you do too.
Let’s look at where the inspiration to write a book might come from.
Ideas are often sparked by conversations
This might be conversations in the pub, over a coffee, with friends around the dinner table, with your higher self or with clients. You may have done some research and found a gap in the market which means that you can leverage your knowledge, skills and experience to boost your brand.
Or you may have had an awakening that has shaken your life, and you find that you have a message that you have to share. You may or may not build a business around this.
The first book I wrote was called Six Weeks To A New You. It was a workbook. I was studying nutrition and thought that I wanted to move out of marketing into this world. I didn’t, but some 25+ years later some of the content proved useful for a different book project.
I wrote this because of conversations with friends who wanted help with their health and lifestyle.
For you, this might a conversation that leads to be a pivot book that takes you in another direction
Inspiration comes from your everyday things
Next, I wrote two books on marketing; one was how to market for small businesses and the other a marketing review. These came about because I was a marketing consultant and they made my life easier. I used them for client work, coaching and workshops. At the time they were available as PDF only.
For you, these are books to clarify your processes, for coaching and training and for your personal brand.
Ideas come out of the blue
Next came a book on Natural Fertility Planning (NFP). A friend was struggling with getting pregnant, and as I tried to support her nutritionally, I learned all about NFP and was fascinated, so much so, I started a fertility business alongside my job. Last year I gave all of this content away to someone struggling to get into this space.
For you, this might also be a pivot book, but consider the life of the content…
Inspiration could strike when on a course
It was while I was doing an NLP certificate training course that I could see different ways to expand my personal journaling, writing to heal coaching and the way in which I wrote books. Some of the planning and writing techniques I use today have their roots in NLP. While doing this training, I also enrolled in a year-long ILM Executive Coaching course.
What NLP and executive coaching gave me were additional tools to support my and others personal growth. These courses came at a time in my life when things were not as wonderful as I would have liked. My journaling expanded, I learnt more about me, and I developed my own exercises for journaling, reflection and creative life writing which helped not only me but many others that I worked with.
Both of these courses combined with my love of writing as a healing tool helped me to create another book called Writing to Heal. This book supported my coaching, workshops and out of it I also created an online course (also undergoing a massive review).
For you, this could be a book which supports lifelong work and interests.
Inspiration comes from your processes
While I was coaching people in both life and business, I saw a way that writing a book could facilitate healing. It struck me that people would either write their books as a healing process and/or use them to build a brand and business around this awakening.
As coaching merged into helping write books for personal reasons and into books for brand and business reasons, Plan your non-fiction book in a weekend was born. I like to have my processes documented and easily available. This book also forms the basis for coaching, online courses, workshops and retreats.
For you, this could be a book around which you build your brand and business.
Your imagination is triggered when teaching
While teaching and coaching I had the good fortune to be asked to work with three other trainers on a program for executive leaders. Sadly the training company, despite the amazing feedback and reviews decided that this wasn’t the direction for them and pulled the course.
The four of us got together to preserve the content and wrote Navigate Executive Leadership. The course was inspired by one of our authors who has been very ill, and we wanted him to have a legacy book.
For you, this could be a book which preserves your knowledge, skills and experiences which you can use to build your brand and business.
Inspiration comes from illness and adversity
Another book, yet to be published has been the hardest to write. It is a book that I never expected to write. Healing Osteoporosis Naturally came about because my spine fractured. The first thing I did after screaming in pain and crying a lot was to journal. I knew that journaling would support my healing journey.
Then I encountered an unfeeling sausage machine medical industry hell-bent on giving me drugs and ignoring me. This fired me up and given that I had a background in nutrition – I’d already trained in naturopathic nutrition – I knew that there was a better way.
I thought about that first book that I had written, it was a process, and I needed somewhere to start. I knew that I had to heal the imbalance that had occurred in my life as well as my body and so I started to write this book as I created a healing process for me. It was if every book I’d ever written was coming together to help me get well.
What I noticed in the many forums I joined searching for answers was hoards of scared people. People overwhelmed by information, who didn’t understand themselves, how this had happened and what to do. With nothing else to do, apart from learning how to walk again and ask for help, I researched, experimented on myself and wrote.
Healing Osteoporosis Naturally has been one of the hardest books to write; it’s currently on hold in the editing stage as I take time out to work on other projects around my core business. This book will be published in 2020 ready for National Osteoporosis awareness month in May.
The great news is that 18 months later my bone density had increased by 2.2% and was almost normal. Phew!
I have written because I feel so passionately about healing through nutrition and writing. This is not a book that I want to build a business around unless you count writing to heal as part of this.
This is a book that has simply called to a deeper part of me, and I know I have to help others with the skills and resilience that I have. Who knew that what started all those years ago would come together in a book that has had such an impact on me?
For you, this could be your passion or cause project, something that calls you outside of what you do for your business. It will be a healing project, and it could be a pivot into a new business.
Inspiration comes from life
I have written other books which are not published, and these are what I call my healing project books. They cover leaving a man who was living a double life and how to do that in a planned way. A book on my journey to self-love and currently I am writing a fictional piece which covers betrayal, forgiveness trust and finding love again.
Ideas and inspiration comes from many places
You can see that books come to life for many reasons. Each of these books were relevant at different times in my life, and practically all of them are still useful in some way. Natural fertility planning as you can imagine is no longer useful having passed that window…
I have a few questions…
- Where are you? What is going on?
- Where do you want to go with your life and business?
- What do you want to create?
- What inspires you?
- How does life inspire you?
- Where do you draw your inspiration from?
- How ready are you to write a book which may heal you, but that will most likely impact and inspire others personal growth?
When I talk about healing, this also covers healing people, organisations and ‘stuff’ that is going on that needs addressing.
The book that you want to write, how do you know it’s the right book for right now?
I’d love to know what you want to write, what inspired you and your hopes and dreams for this book.
Please do connect with me when you are ready to be supported in your writing adventures.
Join Write Your Book and let’s get your book out of your head and into the world.