The REAL story - Progress in the Process

Do you know what drives me absolutely nuts? When a process isn’t going how I want it to go, or planned for it to go, but I have no control. Do you know that feeling of frustration when you’ve put time and energy and effort into creating a plan and targets and systems around that plan and those targets, but then life happens? If you do, you’ll also know the speeding heartbeat, the tense shoulders, and the racing thoughts that come with it.

This book publishing process was full of SO MANY of these moments. 

It was December 2021. I’d finished my first draft, re-read it out loud to myself and edited, sent it to my then assistant (who happened to be an editor-in-training - we’ll talk about some of the you-can’t-make-this-stuff-up Godsends next month), and had a few friends and people I trusted to read it. It was time to submit the first draft of my manuscript to my publisher. This is one of those take a deep breath and click send moments that is a milestone in the process, and honestly, I was just relieved we were at a point where I could clear this project from my desk for a few weeks and do Christmas. That and recovery because WOW did the process so far need a lot from me. 

January came, I got my first copy back, reviewed their edits, read through it again, completely, on my own, tweaked some more, and sent it back. And then I thought, I should start planning this launch. 

As a side note, starting to plan then was a good idea. But I didn’t give “margin” (aka. adequate space) for life happening, the part of the process that wasn’t in my hands, which in publishing, was most of it. There was a guideline for how long parts of the process “should” take, so as the recovering over-achiever I am, I looked at that and figured out what the shortest period from “here” to “there” was, added a couple of weeks, and voila. End of May launch. 

 That’s cute Juli.

Lesson 1: Better to estimate long, than run tight timelines. You can always shorten them, but it’s way harder to extend them. (I always need more time than I think I need. It’s a common theme for me - I estimate low.)

A couple of weeks went by and an email landed in my inbox - your files are overdue. My files, were the bio, synopsis, and manuscript that I had sent in two weeks prior (and confirmed that they had received). 

That frustration we talked about at the beginning, well it showed up in about a ¼ of a second. What?! I had plans and now we had lost at least a week because I had expected it back by now. I did the only thing I could do - reached out, confirmed that they had indeed got it, and asked for a rush on getting it through editing so we could keep to the timeline. Thank goodness I had given myself those extra couple of weeks. Honestly, it was close to panic. Why? Because I had started seeding a May launch with people. 

Not smart Juli, not smart.

Lesson 2: Don’t talk about dates so early! Let yourself get further through the process and then you actually know, then start giving details.

Anyway, onward.

I got my edits back the second time, reviewed them, turned them around for their final proofreading within two hours, and then started pushing for the next parts of the process. The book cover, the PR promotion, the online launch party, and the Amazon best-seller plan. 

Time passed, we hit some more speed bumps, more time passed, and then in late April, book cover options landed in my inbox. And they were… well… not what I was looking for. Let’s just put it that way. I had been so eagerly awaiting this piece. It was what I needed to really start promoting and building graphics. It was what we needed for the ebook presale. It was what we needed for PR and promo… and it just…. well, just no. No.

I tried to brainstorm using my design skills, but a project like this book had to be done right. So I sent back some thoughts and a couple of images I threw together on Canva, and hoped that something would come back that I was excited about. 

You can only imagine… they came back, but still “just no.”

I had to find a book cover designer (like yesterday!). My timeline was blowing up, and so was my budget. But this was a project that I was committed to and that people needed. There wasn’t an option except to finish it and do it right

Lesson 3: Commit fully, or don’t bother starting. 

I was fortunate that another author in my network had a local company, Anthem Creative, who agreed to take me on. They knocked it out of the park, but it took some back and forth. May was officially out of the question. 

In the meantime, the last round of proofs came back, got approved, and everything we could reasonably do until we had the book cover was done. Things were out of my hands. And it was uncomfortable - really uncomfortable. 

Have you seen the Elizabeth Gilbert quote? “You are afraid of surrender because you don't want to lose control. But you never had control; all you had was anxiety.”

That was the long and short of it. 

And I had to get clear on why. 

I was scared of letting people down that thought the book was coming in May, of people seeing me as a failure because I didn’t get it done, of losing momentum in my launch team because the timeline got so extended, and (at the core of it) that this whole process and all the bumps and bruises and time and energy and opportunity cost wasn’t going to be worth it.

And then I realized that I was still coming into full alignment with what I had written. The book was for me too. It was a reflection of the best of me. Me on my powerful and excited and motivated days. Me when I’m standing firmly rooted in my faith. But there was also a me that struggled to believe in herself. A me that clung to old stories and patterns. A me that had more healing to do. I believe God kept me from launching the book in May so I could do more of my work first. 

That work included coming to terms with an ADHD diagnosis and therapy around trauma from bullying as a teen. And as it turned out, finding my way out of a state of depression and anxiety that I didn’t even know I was in. My baseline for mood was low - a consistently “depressed” (lowered) normal. And I thought it was normal, but as I tested ADHD medication, I started to experience something better. More calm, less reactivity, and that baseline crept up.

Lesson 4: You don’t know what you don’t know. That’s why there are experts. Use them. 

We’ll wrap up here for this month with this. The process, whether it’s a project or your personal growth, will have its challenges. But they build us. And they teach us. They shape our character and give us opportunities to be healthier, more confident, authentic versions of us. I would never choose to go through what I went through. And yet, I see how it was a blessing and how it was for me. Look for those threads in your experience too - they’re always there.

Xoxo

Written by: Juli Wenger

Author of Fired-Up, Fulfilled, And Free

Follow Juli at @juliwenger

What if you could ditch fear, leave “not-enoughness” and “too muchness behind,” and answer the questions “who am I?” and “why am I here?”

What would it be like to live a life that you know matters? To have real fulfillment? To confidently and fearlessly step into the purpose you were created for?

This book is a roadmap back to yourself and a guide to help you get out of your own way so you can live that purpose with fearless confidence. To help you step out of your patterns and your commitment to not-enoughness. To be reminded that you are worthy because God put you on this earth and He makes you worthy. There is an assignment for you that can’t wait any longer.

This is your invitation into a life that is Fired-up, Fulfilled, and Free.

Helpful Contracting Tips from Mike Figliuolo, managing director at thoughtLEADERS, LLC

The following content is a mixture of copied text and personal interpretation. The purpose of this blog post is to share our experience taking this course and highlight it’s value and availability to access through LinkedIn’s Learning portal.

We know contracts are not the sexiest topic of conversation in business, but boy are they life savers. We have been writing contracts for years now here at YBB and we enter into contracts for a significant majority of our collaborations, specifically ones that span over months or years time. Event if exchange of services is the primary payment detail, we highly suggest you start entering business relationships with a contract agreed upon by both parties before any work or exchange is done. Through Mike Figliuolo’s course in LinkedIn, you will learn what different contracts mean, pricing and payment terms, warranties and liability terminology and expectations, and insurance requirements. He also lets you in on what you should consider when defining your project scope.

Helpful contracting tips the highlights are:

1. Minimize the size of numbers.

   “Instead of saying, "The client will pay $60,000 for 300 hours of services," say, "The client will pay $200 per hour of services rendered. "The consultant will provide up to 300 hours of service."

   Those are much smaller numbers. That's a lot easier to accept and approve on the client side.”

2. Specify expenses in words verses in numbers.

   “If you say, "The client will pay up to $15,000 in travel expenses," they'll likely negotiate that number. It's a big dollar amount. If, instead, you say, "The client will reimburse "for actual travel expenses," it's more likely to be accepted as written with no negotiation.”

3. Require a minimum purchase of services.

   “A lot of effort goes into selling, proposing, and contracting for an engagement. You don't get paid for that time. If the client uses 60 hours of your time contracting and then only does a six hour engagement,you've made a pretty poor hourly rate. Require the client to pay for a minimum number of hours,whether or not they use them. It'll at least guarantee an acceptable return on your sales and contracting time.”

4. Define your classes of travel.

   “Many consultants spend a lot of time on planes and in hotels. The client will want you to choose the cheapest accommodations possible. Don't sacrifice your lifestyle unreasonably. Specify acceptable classes of travel in your contract. At thoughtLEADERS, when we travel internationally, we specify that we travel business class. My instructors are on the podium for eight hours, teaching a class to up to 35 people. I cannot put someone on a plane for 20 hours to go to Singapore and teach a class back in economy in the back of the plane. It's specified in the contract the class of travel that we'll use.”

5. Use terms like in its sole discretion, or as mutually agreed upon in writing.

   These terms can simplify contracting and improve negotiating success. The terms are advance permission to make a decision without further approval, or they get the contract done sooner and leave the smaller points for future discussion and mutual agreement.

If you’re interested in taking Mike’s course on LinkedIn, here is a list of learning objectives you will learn:

Learning objectives

• Identify effective consulting contracting techniques.

• Explain how to evaluate an attorney for legal counsel.

• Compare and contrast different types of major contracts.

• List the major players in a contracting process.

• Define payment terms.

• Define warranties and liability.

• Scope a consulting engagement.

• Describe how to negotiate major contract points.

The REAL story - 3 Reasons that writing a book sucks.

Last month we dove into the REAL story behind what writing a book is like. And I promised you that we would get past making the decision and figuring out “why?” Well, that and into the time, tears, and imposter syndrome… 

So let’s hop into the DeLorean and jump back a year.

Literally. Because that’s when I put pen to paper on this thing that would become Fired-up, Fulfilled, and Free.

I know right?! It’s only been a year and it’s DONE! This goes to show you that when you commit, have the right support, and a “why” that holds, you can do anything. 

Anyway, let’s have some fun.

3 REASONS THAT WRITING A BOOK SUCKS.

#1 - Overwhelm

Here’s a fun fact - a typical non-fiction book runs somewhere between 40,000-80,000 words. That’s about 100 pages of single-spaced content on an 8 1/2x11 (on the low end). Sitting down with that in mind can be a complete brain imploder. 

I coach people through chunking big projects down into manageable pieces on the regular. And I'm a pro at building systems for myself to do just that. There was still a “holy crap” moment though, staring at an empty screen with the little line going blink… blink… blink… 

The big picture of a book can leave you in paralysis because there is so much to do. So much content to come up with. So many hours in front of you. And guess who likes to show up then - your ego. It likes to feed you with language like “I don’t know how I’m going to do this” or “I can’t possibly come up with that much content.”

Why? Because taking on a big project like this could change things. And your ego is firmly attached to your current way of being and doing. It hates change. It wants to keep you firmly in your comfort zone, and there is nothing comfortable about writing a book.

Coach tip: “I don’t know” and “I can’t” are your ego’s go-to when it’s trying to keep you in your comfort zone.

So I sat there at my computer, looking at my outline, trying to put some words on the page and then erasing them… trying to find some kind of flow (which doesn’t work well when overwhelm is in play btw)... Sometimes I gave up. Other times I pushed through and wrote something that I thought was crappy, but returned to later and could work with. Sometimes I shook it off and told my ego “we are not doing this today.” And then I'd find an inspiring song to play in the background or change locations (anyone else sad that Blackbird Cafe closed?) and sat there until the flow came. I’m pretty strong-willed so that did work sometimes.  

And that brings us to…

#2 - Imposter Syndrome

“Who the heck am I to write a book?” 

If you’ve been hanging around YBB connect for a while, you may have hopped into my imposter syndrome course. It’s something I’ve been doing my work on and teaching on for the last few years.  And yet...

Here’s the sucky part - ALL your stuff will come up when you take on a project like this. ALL. OF. IT. And much like with overwhelm, our ego is at play trying to keep us safe (aka. the same) and in our comfort zone. But it can be so mean! 

“You’ve only been in this business a year-and-a-half. Maybe you need to know more before you do this.”

“Who would want to read this book anyway?”

“How are you writing about enoughness when you still struggle with it?”

“Are you sure you have a grasp on the psychology piece? What if you’re wrong? What if people call you out on something you don’t know that you don’t know?”

“What if no one buys it?”

“All your people are going to leave you because you’re not being ‘secular’ enough.” 

“You’re not focused enough for this.”

“What if you’re still too much of an awkward try-hard like when you were a kid?”

Brutal right? But aren’t we always our own worst critics?

We’ll come back to this in the next part because these connect to #3. First, though, let's flip this for a minute. How do we get through and persevere when we are being so mean to ourselves?  And when we legitimately question if the stories we’re telling ourselves are true? 

Well, we remember this: 

Knowing our purpose or "why"

+ Moving toward it

= Means imposter syndrome is a CONFIRMATION THAT WE ARE ON THE RIGHT TRACK. 

Imposter syndrome is an invitation to keep going!

It shows up because we are stretching and changing and on a growth journey. So it’s actually a good thing. Still not fun, but a good thing. 

#3 - Facing all your Crap

Writing this book required me to be transparent about my journey. It’s not a biography or anything. It's more like how Brene wraps her personal stories in with the tangible and tactical info (she’s my hero). And that meant I had to explore my history. Not just that, but part of my purpose is helping others to be unapologetically authentic, so I have to walk the talk.

So when I got into enoughness, I had to face my struggles with “am I enough?” and have I really overcome enough to write about it. When I talked about being too much, I had to contend with where I still felt like I was too much. 

Fear… going to battle with our ego… up-leveling our people… and all the other ways that we get in our own way… I had to consistently evaluate where I still had work to do. 

And it’s not like it was some optional thing that seemed like the responsible play. It was happening whether I wanted it to or not. *Cue ugly cry* It was another way for my ego to try to keep me from changing. That and God was working some things out of me that I couldn’t take with me into my next season.

We can look at this as the continual uplevel, which sounds way better right? Honestly, though, I was exhausted. I spent 6 weeks writing the first draft of the book. And between starting at the screen like “uh…….”,  questioning myself about what people would think (my personal kryptonite), and the emotional energy going into working through the baggage that came up, I was drained. 

I’m grateful now because hindsight is great. Plus, carrying less of that emotional baggage created so much more freedom for me to powerfully stand behind living with bold faith, unapologetic authenticity, and fearless courage.

Sucked? Yes. Worth it? Also, yes.

So to bring it home…

The actual writing of the first draft took EVERYTHING that I had to give. It meant that I had to create boundaries around my time and keep my priorities straight. Faith, family, book, clients. Full stop. And I had to lean into my “toolkit” way more than in a typical season. 

• more music

• more journaling

• more God time

• more nature

• good nutrition

• lots of water

• and carefully selected people to lean on and ask for help.

And there was a continual return to understanding this:

Our purpose is for us, but it’s not about us. 

This book wasn’t about me. It was about the people who were waiting for it. The people who were waiting for the spark, kick in the pants, clarity, hug, or permission slip that would change the trajectory of their entire life. I couldn’t quit because they were worth more than my discomfort or my fear.

Maybe there is something you’re in the middle of right now and it feels too big. Maybe your ego and your inner critic are viscous and you’ve almost given into the stories. Maybe the fear of failure or rejection has almost won. 

Know this - you are so much more capable and powerful than you realize, and we all need you to dig in your heels and say “no ego, we are not doing this today.” We need you to go to battle for yourself because there are people who are waiting for you to step through the fear. It could change everything for them and you. 

Always in your corner,

Coach Juli

Written by: Juli Wenger

Author of Fired-Up, Fulfilled, And Free

Follow Juli at @juliwenger

————

What if you could ditch fear, leave “not-enoughness” and “too muchness behind,” and answer the questions “who am I?” and “why am I here?”

What would it be like to live a life that you know matters? To have real fulfillment? To confidently and fearlessly step into the purpose you were created for?

This book is a roadmap back to yourself and a guide to help you get out of your own way so you can live that purpose with fearless confidence. To help you step out of your patterns and your commitment to not-enoughness. To be reminded that you are worthy because God put you on this earth and He makes you worthy. There is an assignment for you that can’t wait any longer.

This is your invitation into a life that is Fired-up, Fulfilled, and Free.