Author: Dan Blank

Add More White Space & Improvisation To Your Life

Do more. Be more productive. We are told these things constantly in a variety of subtle ways. Today, I want to talk about the need for allowing for two other things in your life that are the opposite of trying to “fit more in” to your day:

  • White space
  • Improvisation

Both of these things provide enough room for potential. Room for quiet, or noise, depending on your mood. It allows the human side of things to shine through, instead of constantly pressuring you to be all “professional” with charts and spreadsheets and apps.

White space is the emptiness around the things that matter most in your life. This is often discussed more in terms of the design world, for instance when you go to Apple.com or an Apple store, and you see lots of empty white areas. It is meant to evoke elegance and turn your attention to certain areas.

In your life, white space can take many forms, from unscheduled time in your day, to structured exploration, such as intentionally taking a walk during lunch to people watch, explore new neighborhoods, or even just feed the birds in the park.

This space that is in-between the important stuff that we plan for our days (work/family/education/community), allows us to appreciate them even more. You often hear of people who reach the end of their life, and regret having not spent more time with family or traveling. Instead of waiting until the end of your life for white space, make time for it now.

Improvisation is a similar concept, the idea that you can’t – and shouldn’t – plan everything. I have seen LOTS of business plans, requirements documents, and strategy documents in my career. They never fully work out as planned, and more often than not, they work out DRAMATICALLY differently than planned.

Improvisation is providing yourself the space to know that you can’t plan everything, but that you can still be prepared to take action. That sometimes, you have to go with your gut, or you have to take actions in the moment.

And much like improv comedy, it is a skill that you can develop. Perhaps more than anything else, it is an emotional skill that you develop whereby you have confidence that even though there is no plan, there are ways to improvise that will still find paths forward. For some people, this comes down to a toolbox of specific tactics, for others it is about having the ability to completely clear their mind.

My friend Sarah Bray embodies these traits. I am in a mastermind group with her, which basically means we meet twice a month to help each other with our professional goals and work past problems.

And yet, the other day, she launched a new website called HelloMonth.com pretty much on a whim. I had never heard her mention this idea until she announced it.

I had two simultaneous reactions when I first visited HelloMonth.com:

  • Uh oh, a side project that threatens to get in the way of her bigger goals.
  • WOW, this looks amazing, and it feels amazing.

We shared a quick email exchange talking through both of these thoughts, and the more time I spent on HelloMonth.com, the more I loved it. And the funny thing is, so many other people instantly had that reaction too, Sarah has been inundated with emails of folks providing positive feedback.

When Sarah and I chatted again a day later, she explained the reasoning: “I’m just going to do it, a new fun thing.” And the philosophy behind the site: “Moving forward while staying grounded and enjoying your life today. How can I make next month better for myself?”

I don’t know if I would characterize HelloMonth.com as as white space, improvisation, or some combination of the two, but I see it as a place to play, to expand, to try, and to connect.

For myself, I spent the summer quietly beta testing a new online course with a group of 20 writers I had worked with in the past. With such a small group of folks who I already knew, it allowed me to go a bit more extreme, to be more honest and try new things. The course was called “Roadmap to Readers,” and and we tackled topics that are messy and focused on the life of the writer as a whole person:

  • The emotional challenges that hold us back. Too often people pretend that their big roadblocks are some objective problem to work past, when really it goes do much deeper. We dug. And dug.
  • How identity ties into career and success, especially for creative professionals such as writers.
  • We looked in the mirror – how do others experience your work online and off. This is not as easy as it sounds, we often hide behind protective narratives, so we worked hard to take off the rose colored glasses.
  • We talked about the hard choices needed to be successful, and tactics to encourage perseverance when nothing seems to be working.
  • We focused on taking small consistent actions to reach out to your audience and learn about them NOW, and every single day.
  • We looked at systems that can help build the habits you need to in order to work smarter.
  • And we talked about physical, mental, and financial health. Because that stuff is often not talked about, yet controls so much of our actions, and how we feel every single day.

It was an amazing summer with these writers, and I learned so much. While I am not offering this course anywhere again until 2014, the experience gave me so much room for improvisation and reflection.

How will you create room in your life?

Thanks!
-Dan

How To Ask for a Book Blurb

This is part of the Bittersweet Book Launch case study, where Dan Blank and Miranda Beverly-Whittemore share the yearlong process of launching her novel. You can view all posts here.

by Miranda Beverly-Whittemore

My friend Shirley Showalter inspired me to write a bit more of a how-to on approaching fellow writers about book blurbs. I’m by no means an expert, but it turns out I have some opinions (go figure)!

1) Meet/ approach/ let those you admire know you admire them. This can be at an event, or on social media. Subscribe to their blogs. Send them an e-mail that tells them you appreciate their work, that it has made you think, that you are a better writer/ thinker/ reader because of the work they’ve put into the world. Don’t wait to do this! You don’t need permission or a book contract or anything else. Chances are, they’ll appreciate and even remember you, because it’s so rare in this world to have someone approach us to simply say “thank you.”

2) Again- this next one can start at any point, the sooner the better: read! Simple as that. Read the books of your contemporaries. Read the books you know (or want) your book to be compared to. Write down what, specifically, you loved about the book, what spoke to you, and, if you know your own project well, how your book and theirs intersect. This specificity is important, because you won’t just be writing a fan letter when you ask for a blurb. You’ll be saying, “we are colleagues, and here’s why.” It’s hard to say a blanket “no” to that kind of in-depth thinking.

3) Once your book is finished and revised, and your editor thinks it’s time to begin soliciting blurbs, you’ll already be prepared. Because you will have read and reflected and reached out, and you’ll be able to come to your editor and say “here are some solid possibilities of people who might really say yes.” Now keep in mind, just because you’ve emailed someone, or even had a personal exchange with them doesn’t mean they’ll remember you or feel moved to blurb your book. But if you’ve been humble and honest and appreciative, chances are they’ll at least give you the time of day.

4) We are nine months from the publication date of Bittersweet. We don’t have a galley yet (aka an ARC or an Advanced Reader’s Copy), but my editor has been super generous about creating bound copies of the manuscript . Kate Christensen’s blurb (and hopefully at least one more) will grace the galley, which will in turn (hopefully) encourage other writers who may have been on the fence about blurbing, as well as reviewers/ booksellers/ etc. It’s crazy how much time all of this takes, and how far in advance you must begin! I feel so lucky to have an editor who is eager enough to authorize printing of bound copies, and I’ve noticed that it really seems to be making a difference. It also means that we have an easy way to “nudge” folks we haven’t heard back from, by sending them the galley in a month or so- which feels much more natural than simply sending them email after email.

5) Some folks want to be contacted by an email listed on their website. Some folks will have a protective agent/editor who your editor will have to go through. Yes, these gatekeepers can seem ominous, but they can also be your allies. Especially if they like what they hear when they get a look at your…

6) …Fantastic letter. It all comes down to this (and if you can write it by hand on nice-looking stationery, all the better- just write a draft on your computer first). What should your fantastic letter say? Well, only you can decide that. But this is why you did all that work I mentioned in #1 and #2, because that genuine connection is what you’ll be referencing here. Here’s the general outline of how I craft a blurb request: I (re)introduce myself, and am upfront about what the fact that I’m asking a favor; then I write about what I deeply admire about their work, and how I believe that work connects to my own, with a clause-long synopsis about what the book is about, and then I get down to business (when we’ll need the blurb by, how to contact me, etc). It’s work, I’m not going to lie, because the goal here isn’t simply to ask someone to do you a favor, but to extend a favor to them, by speaking honestly about how their work has impacted your own. This is impossible to fake! No shortcuts! Just being warm and generous and hoping you get the same in return.

7) My last piece of advice is to try to have a good attitude about all of this. It’s a lot of work, I know. And most of us writers wish it was work we didn’t have to do. But it is- it just plain is. That’s the reality these days. I find when I’m feeling grumpy about this state of affairs, that I need to put down my fountain pen,  take a walk, and remind myself how lucky I am to be soliciting blurbs for my book that someone is publishing. Also, not to sound ridiculously cheesy, but my   attitude is definitely reflected in the letters I write. I want to present positively to those I’m asking to help me. No more bashfulness or grumbling. Just reading and writing and asking for help, with fingers crossed someone else will say “yes.”

 

Anatomy of a Book Blurb: Kate Christensen

This is part of the Bittersweet Book Launch case study, where Dan Blank and Miranda Beverly-Whittemore share the yearlong process of launching her novel. You can view all posts here.

by Miranda Beverly-Whittemore

“Gripping, beguiling and beautifully written, Bittersweet is a page turner that chills as it intoxicates. Miranda Beverly-Whittemore has created a family so dangerously enthralling that the more we learn of their greed and bloodlust, the more we aspire to belong.” –Kate Christensen, author of The Great Man and Blue Plate Special

 

 

As you know, I’ve been reading lots of books since mid-August in the interest of deciding who to ask for book blurbs, and what I’d like to say to them about their own books. In some cases, I’ve only been able to read the most recent book (or an earlier book that directly interacts with Bittersweet for some reason), but I do think it’s important to read at least one of someone’s books before asking them to do the same for you. I want each writer to know exactly why I am asking them to write the blurb for me (which usually translates into what I admire about their book/s), not just because I want to flatter them, but because it’s also a way to signal what might be compelling to them about my book, to provide language or ideas they might want to use. I find we writers are so busy that anyone making our jobs easier is seen as an ally; and since I’m asking them to do me such a big favor, it’s really the least I can do.

Still, the whole endeavor can be incredibly discouraging, especially when you’ve spent a day reading someone’s book, then another half day crafting the perfect letter on your computer, then copied it out with a fountain pen on expensive stationery, only to hear back the next day that they simply don’t blurb anyone. I chuckled knowingly at this blog entry by Shane Jones, recounting his painful experience trying to get blurbs for his novel (he ended up with 5/26, which is actually pretty good odds in this business).

Then there are days like today, when you not only hear back from an author you admire so tremendously that you kind of see hearts in the air when you think about her, and not only does she say yes of course she’ll blurb you (and within the week at that), but then she says the most awesome things about your book that you think you couldn’t actually love her anymore than you already do. I’m talking, in this case, about the wonderful Kate Christensen.

Okay, but back up. How did I “get to” Kate? This is a question I found myself perplexed by with my first two books. I think a lot of it had to do with the fact that I hadn’t gotten my MFA, and hence didn’t have colleagues or professors who I had naturally networked with. Also, I was timid, and much less brave- it seemed so challenging to write to someone I admired and ask them for a favor, nigh impossible that I’d ever be able to get someone I adored so deeply to read, let alone write nice things about, something I’d written.

And yet- this is something Dan writes about so much- I’ve learned that “getting” to someone can actually be less challenging than I first imagined. Creating a relationship can be as simple as telling someone you admire them. Social media can be a huge boon to this, because writers are much more accessible than they ever were, via their websites, Twitter, Facebook, etc. And my relationship with Kate is a perfect example of creating a lasting connection, one that, up until now, has existed only in the ether of the web, but that still feels real and true.

I first fell in love with Kate’s writing when I read The Great Man, which deservedly won the PEN/Faulkner prize in 2008. When I found out that my friend Victor LaValle was on the awards committee, I asked him if he would feel comfortable putting us in touch. He did, and I sent her an email telling her how much I admired her. That was years ago. In the interim, I friend requested her on Facebook (she accepted), I subscribed to her mouth-watering blog, and started following her on Twitter (and she followed back). I wasn’t trying to squirrel my way into her world, and (I can only guess that) because I had initially written such an honest appreciation of her work, she knew I wasn’t interested in getting anything from her. I simply was doing what I would with anyone whom I admire- sidling up, chin in hand, interested to hear more.

That doesn’t mean I wasn’t nervous to ask her to blurb Bittersweet. I had no idea she’d even know who I was. But I knew I had to ask her- I knew I’d be mad at myself if I didn’t. So I sent an e-mail both to the address I’d used in 2008 and to her Facebook account, crossing my fingers but not holding my breath. Instead, I heard back from her in two days. And not only did she know who I was, but she remembered me well enough to say that in spite of the huge amount of work she has on her plate (teaching and writing), she’d be thrilled to give me a blurb, and to do it as soon as possible.

Kate is incredibly generous, and I’m incredibly grateful. I owe her a tremendous favor, not just for writing me the blurb, but for reminding me that it’s important to step out of one’s comfort zone every once in a while. Now I feel as if we know each other, that we might even be friends, or at least friends to each other’s work. Her writing inspires and engages me, and I am so moved to hear her say such lovely things about my writing too.

Life Is More Than A Series Of Tweets. On Taking A Break From Your “Platform.”

Writers feel so much pressure to be constantly connecting with others online and off; they are encouraged to treat each new follower and “friend” as if they could be the person standing between failure and success.

Like a hamster running on a little wheel, it spins and spins, never slowing down.

So when do you just… stop. Stop Tweeting, stop blogging, stop sending emails, or even checking your email at all? When do you stop researching, planning, strategizing and talking?

A writer I work with was recently confronted with exactly this dilemma: “Can I just stop for awhile?” After 6 years of blogging, of developing an audience and a wonderful platform, of publishing books, of doing so much, Barbara Techel is taking a sabbatical.

Here is her first blog post from April of 2007, and here his her latest, announcing her taking some time off.

She and I have worked together through a couple of my online courses, spending months together helping her craft her platform and connect with readers in meaningful ways. So when she called and asked about the idea of just STOPPING, my gut is she expected me to talk her out of it.

I, of course, didn’t. I encouraged her to absolutely take the time she needs, but to simply let her readers know what to expect. Protect your personal space by taking the time, but honor the connection that others feel to you by not keeping them in the dark. People may worry!

Recently, I shared a blog post on WriterUnboxed.com about the need to reject “best practices” and the idea of fitting in. That you don’t want to “go viral,” you instead want to focus intently on individuals, and forging relationships that are about so much more than the sale of a book.

Are you overwhelmed? Most people I know are, including many of the writers I work with. A lot of the work I do with them is to provide clarity for them that reduces the overwhelm, and gives them focus to connect with readers in a way that feels right for them.

While taking a sabbatical may or may not be what you need, honoring your own needs is critical. Life is more than a series of Tweets. Creative professionals are usually on a journey, and the books they write (or paintings they create or songs they sing) are representative of one moment in a longer journey.

Awhile back, I wrote another blog post titled The Creative Process: Not Everything Needs to be Shared, with these thoughts:

  • Our creative work need not be shared.
  • Our creative work need not earn a profit.
  • Our creative work can be a slow and personal process, and it’s effect internal, not external.

And oftentimes, all the “best practices” that promise easy success take you off track. Your journey is your own. This is why everything I do when working with writers includes a lot of personal interaction – because your goals are unique, your challenges are unique.

I want to leave you with two powerful examples of the value of not fitting in: this video by Ze Frank:

And this illustrated blog post by Allie Brosh, where she talks about her own sabbatical, and battle with depression.

Thanks.
-Dan