Lessons from Launching a Book - DMH Podcast Episode 2

​One year ago today, I launched my first book, Divine. Messy. Human. which is what this podcast is named after, and it was such an incredible day. I deliberately chose the date because it was the 22nd of February 22 and it felt magical. My book was 120 days from me typing those first words to holding the physical copies in my hands ready for that day. 

I was surrounded by an incredible community of friends and colleagues and supporters. 

And the reason I tell you this is not an egoic celebration, but because these kinds of events in our lives happen all the time. What it showed me was our value, the value of community. It was about these people getting together, and at first I had no clue who to even invite to my book launch. I felt completely and utterly alone. I felt like who'd want to come to that. 

I was doubting myself. I was asking so many questions. It was that good old question that goes through my head all the time that I know to be aware of, and that I need to consciously turn down the volume on. And that is that voice saying, who the hell are you to do that? 

And that's a voice that has stopped me for a lot of my life. But in this value of community, I started reaching out to people who had made a difference in my life, whether I knew them in person, there were a few people that I had only met online before. 

They were people who were involved with the book, so obviously my editor, my photographer, my web designer, my book cover designer, there were some of my soul sisters there. And one of the things that I realized is we can't give birth to anything alone. 

We need those people around us. We need that support. We need sometimes the hand holding. We need that heart connection. 

And it makes everything easier if we have those people with whom we can connect over things like this, and who have our best interests at heart. I know that I'm a huge supporter of girlfriends and their businesses, of soul sisters of people whom I admire and respect, whether it be for their community roles, whether it be for the work they do with clients, whether it be just because they've got these incredible hearts and souls that you just want to be around. 

One thing I did also notice was that, I found it amazing, and there was a bit of grief in there as well, about who supports you in these kinds of projects and who doesn't support you? And I've seen a post today, funnily enough, on social media that said often, those clients who support you become friends quicker than some other friends and family will get behind you and support your business. 

And on my journey. I've found that to be very, very true. But there were a couple of really big glaring omissions from my book launch and from that process, one of which was somebody who I had considered a soul sister, a girlfriend, an integral part of my journey before that. 

And in needing that support and community, I guess I realized where I need to make more of an effort as well. I can be a very insular person I can be quite introverted. I'm not always the most extroverted person in the room. And it did show me some of those relationships that I need to make more effort in, and I'm still a work in progress cause I'm not always getting it right.

The other thing about writing a book was that it really is you putting your heart and soul out into the world. 

This book had been swimming in my subconscious for upwards of five years, and the process of writing was so intense. It made me go deep. It made me challenge myself. It was not a linear journey and I'm quite an organised person. I like things to have an order to be organised. To flow in what I consider a logical fashion. And what would happen is a bit of this chapter would come through an, a bit of this section had come through and then I'd be in a completely different part of the book, and then I'd go back and tune up or add more to another section. And so in the writing, I was constantly jumping all over the place. So being aware of that creative process is again a really interesting learning. And whilst you're also going deep into your soul and finding the right words to bring the pictures that are in your mind and in your feeling body to light in other people's imaginations. It's all these skills that I've often been celebrated for in my life. I was always somebody who enjoyed writing, who liked English, who loved language and words. And through my healing journey, I have realized the power that can be behind our language and our words. Words really are spelling. It is us casting spells upon our lives, upon the lives of those around us. 

And knowing how powerful words are. I felt a real obligation to get those words, right. And so it was really fascinating delving into those parts of my soul, because a lot of what I wanted to explain didn't have words. It was concepts. It was feelings. It was metaphor and this language of the soul that goes beyond words. 

And so the same with this podcast these words will go out there and they will hit the right people, at the right time is what I'm hoping, and for me, my book hopefully does the same thing. 

The other thing about putting a book out there is it is no longer your work. It then becomes open for other people to interpret what they read. And there's this amazing story from Liz Gilbert, I think it was in her book of Big Magic, when she said people would come up to her and say, "I loved that bit of Eat, Pray, Love, where you did this or where this happened". 

And fascinatingly, she was often surprised because she'd go that wasn't in my book but that was what people got from her book. 

And having this piece of your soul out there for other people to interpret actually isn't that different from everyday life. People's opinions of us, people's perceptions of us, people's own projections onto us, often taint or celebrate, the way that they see us. 

And putting a book out there is a public way of saying, "This is me. This is part of me." 

Having opened myself up for abusive relationships through my own conditioning, through the way that I felt about myself, I also understood that by me putting myself out there publicly, it very much could open me up to abuse. So I did a lot of work with mentors, and healers, and spiritual teachers, on healing that part of myself, so that those opinions didn't affect me quite as much as they might have five years ago if this book had come out when I first started thinking about it. 

Another thing that came really clear to me through this process was the difference between procrastination and percolation. 

Because for years there, I would start my book and on my computer I have so many false starts at this book, so many words, and chapter ideas, and book outlines, and titles that, at some times I thought, what is wrong with you? Why can't you get this written? And I'd go, oh, another false start. 

There'd be all of these stories going on in my head. But when I worked with this coach who was the one who guided me to start writing the manuscript it was like all of those stories and excuses fell away and it wasn't until the words started really coming out of me that I realized my book wasn't ready to be birthed any sooner. 

The book itself needed me to be at a place in my healing where I could tell the parts of my story that I did tell in the book, which is not a lot of it by the way, but that I could tell those parts of my story with love, and compassion, and grace, and dignity. 

The people who harmed me, the people who have abused me in my life, the people who have hurt me the most, are probably some of the people I love and adore the most, simply for the fact that they have given me this gift. They have helped me reconnect to my spirituality. They've helped me reconnect to my divinity. They have helped me reconnect to my femininity. To my Divine Feminine. 

And I have learned so much about myself, about human behavior, about trauma cycles, about life, through what I've been through. And for me, that is the biggest gift of all. 

And that for me has been what this book process has given me. Now, I'm not saying that other people need to go out and write a book, because I think a lot of these lessons are very much transposable into other areas of life. You can pick this up into work projects, into family affairs. 

What is that value that you put on community? How do you build those relationships? How do you make yourself available for friends? How do you allow yourself to be open and vulnerable in a way that other people can connect with you in a deep level and feel safe to connect back so it's not just a one way street? 

Checking out where those supports are coming from. Because for me, some of the supports came from places I did not ever see them coming from. And that was in itself incredibly amazing, and I felt so humbled, and honored when I stood up in front of everybody at my book launch to give my speech. 

There was a big gap in the room that night where, especially two really important people in my life, I could see them standing there energetically, but I knew that their physical bodies would never, ever be in a room to celebrate me in that way. And often in the night, I would find myself feeling quite emotional and almost welling up over it. 

But the one thing that really turned me around was that my daughter was there, and no less than five or six times throughout the evening she'd come up to me and put her arm around me and just say, "mum, I am so proud of you." 

And with each time that she said that to me, the energetic presence of those other people who were not standing there seemed to fade just that little bit more. Because I realized that the most important people, my children, were watching me. They were taking cues from me. They were seeing me achieve something that I had dreamed of achieving, that they had seen me work so hard towards, and to have them proud of me that made all the difference in the world. 

So who's watching you as you move through the world? Who could you be inspiring? That you don't always know. Because I can tell you kids don't often come forward and tell you how proud of you they are. So trust me, I did absolutely lap it up when it happened. 

But think about who could potentially be watching. We often don't know, especially with social media, the number of people who've come up to me and said, "I've seen you all over socials" and I'm going, you've never commented or liked. So you never know, who's watching, and sometimes that can be enough for you to be able to step up into a place of greater visibility and greater leadership. 

And as with me having to dive deep into the writing of the book, we also need to dig deep and dive deep into why we perhaps may not be showing up the way that we want to show up. We may need to dig deep into those defense mechanisms that we put up to try and keep ourselves safe. 

And to work with mentors or guides, or whomever it is that we choose, to be able to move from those reactionary states into the responsive states so that we feel fully in control. 

And it is a work in progress, even now, every time I put up a social media post or now a podcast there's nerves, there's fear. 

There's questions of, am I doing this right? And I'll put it out there I never actually know if it's right or not. All I can do is keep showing up for those people who sometimes are behind the scenes. Who are not always visible but who these words make their way to and either inspire or give peace to. 

I am sending you so much love. Have a fabulous day, wherever you be, and tap in to your heart and connect in to that higher part within you. Until next time.