Balancing Creativity With Building A Business, And Author Nation With Joe Solari

Summary

Podcast Summary: "Balancing Creativity With Building A Business, And Author Nation With Joe Solari"

The Creative Penn Podcast for Writers
Host: Joanna Penn
Guest: Joe Solari
Release Date: January 13, 2025
Duration: Approximately 63 minutes

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1. Introduction to the Episode

In episode 790 of The Creative Penn Podcast for Writers, Joanna Penn engages in a deep and insightful conversation with Joe Solari. The primary focus revolves around balancing creativity with building a sustainable and profitable business as an author. Additionally, the episode delves into the successes and challenges of the Author Nation Conference, the largest event for indie authors worldwide.

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2. Balancing Creativity and Business

Joanna opens the discussion by emphasizing the importance of balancing creative endeavors with business strategies to ensure long-term success for authors.

Quote:
Joe Solari at [19:58]: "I suggest that authors start to build into their process in 2025 more time to tap into that default mode network and spend time thinking about how they can spend some real quality time and protect that space. Because that's where all your good ideas come from."

Key Points:

• Creative vs. Business Time Blocks: Joe advocates for segregating time dedicated solely to writing and creativity from time allocated for business and marketing tasks. This separation ensures that authors can maintain their creative flow without the constant pressure of business demands.

• Default Mode Network: Joe introduces the concept of the default mode network—the brain's state when daydreaming and generating ideas. He emphasizes the necessity of nurturing this network by allocating specific times for creative thinking and idea generation.

• Flow State: Achieving a flow state, where creativity and productivity merge seamlessly, is crucial. This state is often disrupted when authors try to juggle both creative and business tasks simultaneously.

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3. Author Nation Conference Highlights

The conversation transitions to the Author Nation Conference, exploring its inaugural year, feedback received, and the strategies employed to make it a success.

Quote:
Joe Solari at [39:33]: "We ended up with 866 reviews of sessions. And we reviewed on two things. Were the objectives clear and were the objectives met? And we had on the first one, it was like a 4.6 out of 5."

Key Points:

• Event Atmosphere: Contrary to common expectations, the conference was likened to hosting a party or a wedding, focusing on creating an open and inviting environment rather than a high-stress event center.

• Feedback Mechanism: Author Nation implemented a robust feedback system, collecting 866 reviews that rated session objectives and their fulfillment, both averaging over 4.5 out of 5.

• Session Diversity: The conference catered to a wide range of author needs, from those seeking in-depth information to others looking for networking opportunities. Features included conversation pits, collaborative worktables, and specialized sessions.

• Technical Enhancements: Plans for future conferences include improving group communication platforms and automating manual processes to enhance the attendee experience.

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4. Financial Planning for Authors

Joanna touches upon the crucial aspect of financial management for authors, referencing Rachel Heron’s podcast episode where she discusses income sources, financial planning, and taxation challenges.

Quote:
Joe Solari at [33:51]: "What could we do to make 2025 better? It's like, how do you build a recovery process? How do you give yourself that space to let the well refill?"

Key Points:

• Income Diversification: Authors often rely on multiple income streams, including book sales, teaching, podcasting, and affiliate marketing. Diversifying income helps mitigate financial risks and ensures stability.

• Financial Tools: Utilizing multi-currency accounts like Wise and accounting systems like Xero can streamline financial management, especially for authors dealing with international income and expenses.

• Mindset and Fear: Addressing the fear of financial instability is vital. Authors are encouraged to adopt a mindset that embraces financial planning and security.

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5. AI in Writing and Community Reactions

A significant portion of the discussion centers on the role of Artificial Intelligence (AI) in the writing process and the industry's mixed reactions to its adoption.

Quote:
Joe Solari at [26:08]: "We have to tap into and learn to say no, otherwise you can burn out."

Key Points:

• AI Integration: AI tools are becoming ubiquitous in writing and publishing, from spell checkers to content generation. Traditional publishers and workplaces are increasingly embracing AI, making it a staple in the industry.

• Community Resistance: Despite its advantages, some authors resist AI adoption due to fears of being overshadowed or concerns about creativity being compromised. Joe expresses hope that this resistance will diminish as AI becomes more integrated into standard tools.

• Supportive Communities: Joanna highlights the existence of supportive AI writing and art communities, emphasizing the importance of joining groups that encourage curiosity and experimentation with AI.

• Future Outlook: The host remains optimistic about AI’s role, anticipating its rapid adoption and integration into various aspects of the creative process.

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6. Joanna’s Personal Projects and Live Experiences

Joanna shares updates on her personal projects, including her upcoming thriller, "Death Valley," and her experiences with live theatre.

Quote:
Joanna Penn at [37:00]: "The story is essentially set at a luxury eco lodge in Death Valley, California... I'm attempting a mainstream, fast-paced, highly cinematic thriller."

Key Points:

• "Death Valley" Project: Joanna is deep into writing her first draft of "Death Valley," a thriller set in a luxury eco lodge that descends into chaos. She plans to launch this project via Kickstarter, offering various editions, including ebooks, audiobooks, and exclusive bundles.

• Live Theatre Experience: Joanna recounts attending "The Tempest" starring Sigourney Weaver in London, drawing parallels between live performances and the value of live experiences in creative businesses. This experience underscores the importance of incorporating live elements into her own business strategies, such as live Q&A sessions and workshops on Patreon.

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7. Community and Support Systems (Patreon, Kickstarter)

The episode underscores the significance of building and nurturing a supportive community through platforms like Patreon and Kickstarter.

Quote:
Joe Solari at [49:43]: "How do we get you to the ones that are going to have the highest impact, low effort."

Key Points:

• Patreon Engagement: Joanna emphasizes the value of live office hours, Q&A sessions, and exclusive content available on Patreon, fostering a sense of community and providing additional support to her patrons.

• Kickstarter Strategies: Using Kickstarter for launches allows authors to offer diverse editions and engage directly with their audience. Joanna plans to include interactive elements like narrating her audiobook and designing exclusive editions.

• Author Nation After Party: The conference includes an after-party featuring recorded sessions, Q&As, and networking opportunities, enhancing community bonds and providing continued value beyond the main event.

• Efficient Content Consumption: Implementing strategies like planning in advance and reviewing content post-event helps authors prioritize initiatives that align with their business and creative goals without feeling overwhelmed.

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8. Conclusion and Future Plans

As the episode wraps up, Joanna and Joe reflect on the successes of the Author Nation Conference and discuss future improvements and plans.

Quote:
Joe Solari at [56:01]: "It was only year one, you know, it was year one."

Key Points:

• Continuous Improvement: Learning from the first year’s challenges, such as technical issues and content alignment, the Author Nation team is committed to enhancing future conferences by introducing new features and refining existing systems.

• Future Speakers and Sessions: Plans for 2025 include bringing in diverse and influential speakers like Kevin Smith, who share personal and professional experiences to inspire authors.

• Community Building: The focus remains on fostering a cohesive and supportive author community, leveraging technology and feedback to meet the evolving needs of indie writers.

• Personal Development: Joanna announces her live Q&A sessions and upcoming talks, further integrating community engagement into her business model.

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Notable Quotes with Timestamps

• Joe Solari at [19:58]:
  "I suggest that authors start to build into their process in 2025 more time to tap into that default mode network and spend time thinking about how they can spend some real quality time and protect that space. Because that's where all your good ideas come from."

• Joe Solari at [39:33]:
  "We ended up with 866 reviews of sessions. And we reviewed on two things. Were the objectives clear and were the objectives met? And we had on the first one, it was like a 4.6 out of 5."

• Joe Solari at [26:08]:
  "We have to tap into and learn to say no, otherwise you can burn out."

• Joanna Penn at [37:00]:
  "The story is essentially set at a luxury eco lodge in Death Valley, California... I'm attempting a mainstream, fast-paced, highly cinematic thriller."

• Joe Solari at [49:43]:
  "How do we get you to the ones that are going to have the highest impact, low effort."

• Joe Solari at [56:01]:
  "It was only year one, you know, it was year one."

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Final Thoughts

This episode of The Creative Penn Podcast for Writers offers a comprehensive exploration of the delicate interplay between creativity and business acumen for authors. Through the insights shared by Joe Solari, listeners gain valuable strategies for fostering their creative processes while building a sustainable business model. The discussion on the Author Nation Conference provides a blueprint for successful author events, emphasizing community building and continuous improvement. Additionally, the conversation touches upon modern challenges such as AI integration and the importance of financial planning, making it a must-listen for indie authors aiming to thrive in a competitive landscape.

For a deeper dive into the topics discussed, listeners are encouraged to access the full transcript and additional resources available on The Creative Penn.

Transcript

[Joanna Penn]

Welcome to the Creative Pen Podcast. I'm Joanna Penn, thriller author and creative entrepreneur, bringing you interviews, inspiration and information on writing, craft and creative business. You can find the episode show notes, your free author blueprint and lots [e-mail] and that's Pen with a double N. And here's the show. Hello creatives, I'm Johanna Penn and this is episode number 790 of the podcast and it is Sunday 12th January 2025. As I record this in today's show I talk to Joe Solari about how you can balance creativity with business in order to have a profitable long term author career as well as the successes and challenges of the Author Nation Conference. So that is coming up in the interview section in Writing and Publishing Things. Rachel Heron has just done her annual money episode on her podcast Ink in youn Veins where she discusses how much money she made as an author last year and where that money came from, as well as her wins and challenges about money, including mindset and the fear of it all falling apart, which we can all relate to. She also talks about pension or superannuation and financial planning if you run your own business. Also multi currency income and taxation challenges. This is something I understand in part as most of my income is in US dollars, many of my bills are in US dollars and obviously I'm in the uk so my taxation currency, my living money is in gbp. Now several people have asked about this so just for informational purposes I mainly use Wise w see multi currency accounts. So I have lots of different currency accounts and get put into there. But I also have PayPal but the PayPal fees are much much higher. So I have an affiliate link for Wise if you want to get let's say your different Amazon money paid into different accounts which is where many people start thecreativepenn.com wise thecreativepenn.com forward slash wise. I also use Xeroxero for my accounting. Now you might need an you might not need an accounting system if have daily transactional sales as I do, which is what happens when you have direct sales. Although you can have your money paid in weekly or even monthly. I like it daily. But if you are running a business then you do need some kind of accounting and it's really that's why listening to Rachel was really interesting because many authors who want to do this full time they don't really think about this practical side of business. Now Rachel shares her income split between traditional publishing deals and indie spoiler alert. She made more from indie and also from teaching and other writing adjacent means. And this is what most writers do, including me. We have book sales and then we have writing adjacent income. Now this podcast income is writing adjacent and I did just check and I guess similar to Rachel, just over half of my 2024 annual income was book sales over 6 figures GBP most indie with like 98% indie with some small foreign rights deals, the rest made up of this podcast which includes corporate sponsorship and Patreon, also affiliate income and residual course sales and speaking. So for Rachel's split, go check out Rachael Heron's show at Ink in your veins on whatever you're listening to this on on the Self Publishing Advice blog last week, Orna Ross offers creative planning tips for 2025. She says success in the creative life isn't about waiting for inspiration to strike or relying on talent alone. It's about crafting an environment where your creativity can soar. For self publishing authors, this means shaping your days and surroundings to nurture storytelling, handle publishing tasks and connect with readers. Orna then splits the various elements into time, space, people, resources, energy, mindset, tools and metrics. So it's a really interesting to think about planning on all those sides and also it might help you figure out what you might be missing. One aspect that resonated with me around people splits people into naysayers and says recognize that some family and friends may not understand or support your goals. Protect your energy. And I would add to that some online groups and areas might not also understand or support your goals. And then also yay sayers. Join groups or communities who understand the joys and challenges of self publishing. I take that further as AI is obviously one of these things that the industry is quite split over. And someone said to me this week that I was the only author they knew who was positive about AI usage and positive about the future for creatives. And that made me really sad because there are lots of wonderful places, the AI writing community and AI art community on Facebook for example. But but this person felt they couldn't share their curiosity or their creative experiments or their ideas and felt censored and almost shamed by other authors, which sounded exactly how I felt back in 2007 to probably 20112012 around being indie. If you weren't around back then, there was a lot of shaming going on that maybe there still is in some areas, but this will pass is what I wanted to say. And I said to this person, here are some groups you can go to and all that. But I do think this AI shaming will pass even faster. Hopefully it won't take as many years as it took back then, because soon every single piece of software is going to have it in. So Microsoft Word, Google Docs, traditional publishers are embracing AI and in most workplaces they're embracing AI. So I think people's adoption is actually going to be much faster, especially if the incoming Trump administration in the USA gets things moving as they intend. So yes, have hope, but curiosity and your creative experiments and ideas, yeah, are important. Back to Orna's article. She also says celebrate Progress. Whether it's 500 words, a finished draft or a book launch, every step matters. And of course, stay curious. Explore new genres, marketing strategies, and reader engagement initiatives. Curiosity fuels innovation. Absolutely. And I think curiosity is the most important thing. I actually think now it is the most important thing for a thriving creative career for both ideas for your writing, but also experimenting and trying new things in marketing and business because that's what it also takes to do this full time. I also wanted to mention an interesting episode on the Novel Marketing podcast, which is much wider than just fiction. So Thomas Umstadt Jr. He's been on this show. I've been on his show novel Marketing podcast, but this episode is called Is Traditional Publishing Surprising Trends Authors can't ignore in 2025. Now first of all, I definitely do not think traditional publishing is dying. It's changing just like everything else. But it definitely survivor bias, even just survivor bias means there's some stat, something like if a company survives for 10 years, it's going to keep surviving. You know, companies that have such a such intellectual property, such varying business and income strategies as traditional publishers. So anyway, Thomas goes into lots of interesting potential trend on the show, including those I have not heard from other people, such as a rise in religious book sales, noting that Gen Z or Gen Z as we call it, over here is the first generation in centuries where male church attendance surpasses female church attendance. However, young men are opting for traditional Catholic and Orthodox churches rather than the rock concert style mega churches their millennial and Gen X parents preferred. And that is absolutely fascinating. And there links in his extensive show notes to the source media on that. It's interesting to hear that because I have actually heard that from other sources too, being sort of again adjacent to the religious community. He also notes girl bosses and anti heroes are on the way out. Strong male heroes and moral clarity are on the way in. Now that's interesting. Obviously. Personally I write both strong women and strong men. I like strong characters regardless of gender. I also personally I do like moral clarity, so I think that's interesting. But of course this is only one perspective and I know there'll be plenty of people listening going, no, that can't be true. I write this and this is going really well. And of course that's what's so interesting about these trends episodes. They're full of interesting data points. Thomas also has an episode on how to write novels Men Want to read, which is one of his most popular episodes. So yeah, of course we want men reading. It is something crazy. James Patterson always says this. It's something like 80% of his readers are women, so he markets mainly to women. So interesting that Thomas is covering that. He also comments on AI. He says most authors now use an AI powered spell checker and AI tools are now defaults on most new computers. Most authors have started using AI tools whether they realize it or not. The honor system doesn't stop bad actors, and it doesn't stop authors who are ignorant about what is powering their grammar checker. As someone who has spent decade decades pushing back against various societal trends, I can tell you whining is not a winning strategy. I love that, and I do disagree with much of what Thomas says, but I also find his episode challenging and therefore interesting. I've been, as I mentioned, I've been on his show several times. He's been on this show. We have very different world views, so it's not surprising we don't agree. But not agreeing with someone doesn't mean we shouldn't listen sometimes and challenge ourselves with some new data points, points outside our own echo chambers. We may even end up changing our minds or at least understanding someone else a little more. So that is the Novel Marketing podcast and Thomas's site is AuthorMedia.com and you can find novel marketing podcasts wherever you're listening to this. In personal news, I am deep into writing the first draft of my desert book which will be called Death Valley a Thriller. After going back and forth with ChatGPT and Claude for maybe 50 or 60 different book titles, I've just decided that that is a really good title and of course there's no copyright on titles, so I'm just going to use that. I've also decided it will be my next Kickstarter. I'm really enjoying it and I plan on having the pre launch page up soon, getting the book cover done and it will go live in the second half of March. This one will be all the editions. This is a full on Kickstart it's going to have ebook. I. I will narrate the audiobook. It's going to have bundles, it's going to have the paperback, plus the obviously the exclusive foiled wonderful extra edition which we'll have fun designing. But yes, I think I'll do the audiobook. I'm taking inspiration from the lovely Katie Cross and just going to do my own. At least that's the plan for now. I've been playing with Midjourney and done some epic covers. Really epic. And the story is essentially set at a luxury eco lodge in Death Valley, California. And these different characters arrive and there are guests and there are staff. A bit like the White Lotus, if you've seen that sort of luxury in paradise. And then a storm hits and they're cut off and the exclusive luxury resort descends into chaos and death. Lots of thriller fun and nothing supernatural. I'm attempting a mainstream, fast paced, highly cinematic thriller. That is the plan. Jonathan and I were also in London yesterday. We went to see the Tempest starring Sigourney Weaver. Yes. Live theatre in the West End. And I was thinking about the sort of. The costs and the benefits and even just for a day out with train tickets for two of us and lunch and the theatre tickets and drinks. And it was probably the cost of streaming Netflix for a couple of years, but it illustrated the power of both live and streaming entertainment. The theatre was. Was packed. It was almost. This was a matinee performance. It wasn't even an evening. Sigourney had a standing ovation and people were obviously thrilled to see her in person and see Ripley in person, even though she was playing Prospero. And the Tempest is. It's one of my favourite Shakespeare plays. I've seen it multiple times. It has a storm. I do like a storm. If you've read my fiction, you'll know how much I like a storm. And Ariel the spirit and Caliban the Monstrous. And it's essentially a darker fantasy with a bittersweet ending and has some of the most quoted lines from Shakespeare. Things like hell is empty and all the devils are here. That is from the Tempest. Also, what's past is prologue, Brave New world. Aldous Huckley's book title came from the Tempest. We are such stuff as dreams are made on. And one I used in writing the Shadow, which is this thing of darkness. I acknowledge mine. One of my favourite quotes. It was also a signed performance. So a woman in the corner of the stage signed the whole performance. And incredible even just to watch her sometimes because she did the whole thing, all the actors, all the lines in sign language. It just felt part of a live experience. Now all this to say that people will pay 10x20x maybe 50x for a live experience over something digitally streamed. And this is something musicians also have to take into account. And really I was just thinking, okay, this is why we need live aspects of our business. If you want to make a living this way, you need to have live aspects to your business. So for example, in my Patreon we have live office hours and I'm doing that end of January. I demo some AI stuff and we do questions live and it, it is live. And that's becoming a more important part of my Patreon. And I've decided as part of my Kickstarter I'm going to do a what it will be a brand new workshop essentially how to write thrillers. Since I've been writing thrillers for 15 years now, I' figured I could do a workshop on how to write thrillers that will be live. Also a batch of consulting which I also do live. Now we need a balance of both. Obviously, if you want to make a living this way, having writing adjacent income is a good thing. So thanks for your emails and comments and photos this week. Thanks to Leni who heard something on a podcast and sent it to me because it was so cool. The Edible museum and that [e-mail] I wanted to tell you all because it is very cool. They have an anatomy collection so you can get like chocolate hearts and things like that. Not heart is in Valentine's heart but actually anatomy hearts. That is fantastic. That's ediblemuseum.com thanks to Janet who sent me some lovely photos from a Commonwealth war grave in Gvera near Venice in Italy. And thanks to Jill who sent a photo from southern Vermont where it's currently colder than I'd pre she says but the two Bernese mountain dogs are loving it. Beautiful photo of the dogs in the snow with the early morning sun in the fields. So please leave a comment on the podcast Show Notes at the creative pen.com or on the YouTube channel. Send me a email joannathecreativepenn.com Let me know what you think about the episode or anything I say in the introduction and send me pictures of where you're listening. I love to hear from you. It makes this more of a conversation. So this episode is sponsored by Kobo Writing Life, Kobo's free, fast and easy self publishing platform favoured by independent authors all over the world. KWL was built by authors for authors and their mission is to help you reach digital readers wherever they are, however they want to read or listen. Looking for a way to get your books into the hands of more readers? Kobo plus is the answer. As a subscription service, Kobo plus allows readers to discover and enjoy unlimited books for a monthly fee. And as an author there is no exclusivity or time limitation. It's a win win. And just to be clear there no exclusivity. Unlike some other subscription services we know, by enrolling your titles in Kobo plus through Kobo Writing Life you can increase your earnings by reaching a whole new audience of avid readers who are eager to discover their your next favourite book. And remember that subscription services help new readers try things and try new authors with no risk. So that means you can find new readers basically. Sign up [e-mail] KWL and that will redirect to a lovely landing page on Kobo Writing Life with lots more information and useful tips for authors. Sign up today at thecreativepenn.com kwl and see your readership grow. So this type of corporate sponsorship pays for the hosting, transcription and editing, but my time in creating this show is sponsored by my [e-mail] TheCreativePen thanks to the 8 new patrons who've joined this week and thanks to everyone who've been supporting the show for months and years. If you join the community, you get access to all my backlist videos and audio covering topics on creativity and writing, AI, mindset, business and my patron only Q and A solo episode and my office hours. The Patreon is a monthly subscription, the equivalent of buying me a black coffee a month, or a couple of coffees if you're feeling generous. You get access to everything, all the backlist content and Q&As. And if you get value from the show and you want more, come on over and join us at patreon.com/thercreativepen that's P-A-T-R-E-O-N.com//thercreativepen Right, let's get into the interview.

[Joe Solari]

Joe Solari helps authors build great businesses through books, courses and podcasting, as well as strategy and operations consulting. He's also the Managing Director of Author Nation, the biggest conference for indie authors in the world. So welcome back to the show, Joe.

[Thomas Umstadt Jr.]

Thanks for having me on again. I really, really enjoy the time we get to spend together. It seems like we talk more on the show than we do at events that we meet each other at.

[Joe Solari]

Absolutely. Well, we're often both very busy, but yes. So you've been on the show a couple of times before and I'll link to those in the show notes. So we're just going to jump in today. Now, as we head into 2025, authors are assessing their priorities for the year. Now, in your experience helping authors build profitable businesses, how can we balance writing and marketing so both are sustainable?

[Thomas Umstadt Jr.]

That's such an awesome question. And I think a lot of folks that are used to hearing me on your podcast or other podcasts are going to think that I'm going to go right into like talking about profitability or budgeting, but I'm going to actually get a little different approach for you on this whole thing. Let me give you some context first, and that is where do you have your best ideas?

[Joe Solari]

Personally, a lot of my ideas come from traveling ban places in particular. So I have to go and visit things and input in order to have ideas.

[Thomas Umstadt Jr.]

Yeah. And that doesn't surprise me. I've asked the question of a lot of creatives and what I've discovered in asking that question is there tends to be two different things that come up. Like it's when I do something like go on walks or a lot of times it's things like driving or a shower. And why that is. There's science behind this and it's you have two distinct networks in your brain that you need to use for creativity. One is the default mode network. That's what your body goes into when you daydream. It's when you were sitting in class and getting bored by your teacher and it would make you go off and think into your imaginary world. That's a natural place for you to go go. The other system is your executive functioning system, which is what helps you focus and get words out and hit deadlines. And there are two distinct systems that sometimes will overlap, like an event diagram. When that happens, that's your flow state where you feel like you're the ideas are coming and you're getting them down on paper. The interesting thing about that is that's completely counter to what you're told to do as an entrepreneur and hustle culture. Right. You're just supposed to produce. You're supposed to produce words, you're supposed to sit in a chair, you're supposed to produce. But what you do is when you are only focused on that one side, the executive function sign, you detach yourself and you distance yourself from your creative well, so what I would my answer to your question is that I suggest that authors start to build into their process in 2020 five more time to tap into that default moat network and spend time thinking about how they can spend some real quality time and protect that space. Because that's where all your good ideas come from. That's when you feel like you're being blocked. It's because you're disconnecting yourself from that default mode network work. So it's sound business advice in the sense of there's this process that's core to your business that we need to get more efficient and think about how we can improve its performance.

[Joe Solari]

I really like that, and I feel like this is something I've always done, is that I separate my time into creative time and business and marketing time. Because I find, like, I can't do both in the same time period. So when and when I had a day job, it was I'd get up first thing in the morning. You know, I'm a morning person. So I'd write before going to work, and then in the evening I could do business and marketing. And this podcast was started after my work, back in. Back in the day. And so perhaps that fits into what you're saying, is that you have to schedule different types of time, some for input and creativity and thinking and not doing much sometimes, and then other time for business and marketing. And I feel like maybe authors sometimes try and do everything all at once, and maybe that's why it doesn't work.

[Thomas Umstadt Jr.]

Absolutely. You're really getting into the core of this. There are different systems and they have to be honored in different ways, and you need them both. And we're on the Creative Pen Show. Come on, let's. We got to talk about creativity. It's like we forget that's the source of the product. Right. Like, I get very focused on, oh, it's a business. You have this product you have to put out, you have these customers you need to serve, and all that stuff does. It has to be done. But what you asked was, how do we make this sustainable process between the marketing and the writing? What I'm getting at is there are some things that we can do to make that process easier. And what it means is understanding that this isn't up and to the right like a business chart of sales. It's an undulating cycle. Right. And let me give you another context for this. If we look at creativity as a profession, so you have this natural talent as a creator, we've identified that you've got this active imagination and you love to spend time in the story world and it's fulfilling to you. That's no different than if we noticed some natural athletic talents, talent. So what would we do around that if we saw that you were a really good tennis player? Well, we would work on your endurance and your speed. We would work on racket skills. We'd work on all these different things to supplement that natural talent. One of the big things we would also do as for an athlete is we would have a recovery cycle. We wouldn't just say after you finish winning Wimbledon to go play the French Open. Right. We'd put you in an ice bath, we'd stretch you out, we'd go into some kind of process that would get you to be ready for the next time you play. And I think that goes again back to that first question of yours. What could you do to make 2025 better? Is like, how do you build a recovery process? How do you give yourself that space to let the well refill? And there's a lot of things right now in the world that are really, really detrimental to you. Refilling the well, because we're talking about this really powerful default network and that time where you just need to be bored to let it kick in.

[Joe Solari]

Yeah.

[Thomas Umstadt Jr.]

What do we do? Well, we get on social media and we doom scroll and we do a bunch of stuff to fill in that time that really deteriorates. It does two things right. You lose that time time that you need and it deteriorates your capacity because you're doing really horrible things to your neurochemical system with these dopamine hits from scrolling. And when I've been doing this research, it's kind of scary to see what could potentially happen with these. Destroying all this creative capacity out there that we need to have new ideas come up, whether it's a new story or the cure for some disease.

[Joe Solari]

Yeah, it is tough. And in fact, one of the things I do, I think is try and be active in my open time. So you said there be bored and being bored is really hard, as you say. And so I go for a walk often and going for a walk means I can't look at my phone while I'm out walking and I'm looking at nature and that I guess you mentioned the shower. We cannot stay in the shower for hours at a time, but I can walk for hours at a time. And most people, wherever they are, there should be somewhere you can go and walk. Although perhaps not at a gym. I don't know. A gym is also very stimulating in terms of the screens, particularly in our American gyms, there are so many screens everywhere. But this is also really hard for people. And I know there will be people saying, but social media is how I. Not me particularly, but how I might be selling books. And so this is the hard part, right? This is what it comes down to. I love what you're saying, but then people are like, but I have to be on social media because how else do I meet my business goals? So let's, let's talk about that, about the business side as well.

[Thomas Umstadt Jr.]

Sure, sure. So again, you have to put into context and let's use this perfect example of somebody that right now probably is. There's a bunch of folks out there that are listening here that are seeing really amazing success with their strategies on TikTok. Right. So it's like you're going to say what you just said, I have to be on this platform. Platform. It's like, yeah, you do, but how are you on the platform? Are you on this platform to develop meaningful relationships with your audience? Because also this thing is about how do you make your business fulfill you? Right. If it's just about hitting business goals, Right. That gets you on that hedonic treadmill where you always have to be hitting goals to feel like something's happening versus like, no, I'm really trying to help an audience connect with work that's meaningful to me and will be meaningful to them. Right. And in that process, I need to carve out some specific time to be on TikTok and I need to do these specific things on TikTok. That's all executive functioning kind of stuff. Right now there may be like, well, I need to come up with some creative stuff for TikTok tock. Well, maybe you need to spend some time in that default network space to think of those ideas. But just sitting for an hour and a half scrolling on TikTok instead of being on a walk or doing something that gets you into that space is going to hurt your business, not help your business. Right? So I think that you have to really, really think through those compartments of social media and where it makes sense. Then you get into a whole other side of how social media can make us get into comparison and all kinds of other horrible things. Talk about that for hours.

[Joe Solari]

Yeah, and it's interesting because we also do have to make decisions about time. You mentioned time. We only have limited time. And you and I are older now.

[Thomas Umstadt Jr.]

Yeah.

[Joe Solari]

And time gets more and more limited, unfortunately.

[Joanna Penn]

But I.

[Joe Solari]

When TikTok blew up and I looked, I've looked at it Several times. And every time I go, I choose not to do this because it. My time doing other things is more valuable. Like I. I'm doing calisthenics and practicing doing handstands. At this point in my life, practicing doing handstands is more important than TikTok. And other people make a different decision. But this is, I think it's very interesting. So this is one thing is we have limited time. We have to make a choice over the time. And also we do have to schedule downtime. But what are some of the other things or the mistakes that you see authors making? Again, back on the profitable author business, but also the fulfillment that you mentioned.

[Thomas Umstadt Jr.]

So I think that, and again, this plays off of what you just said is we think that we have to do it all or whatever comes into our feed or becomes a trend with whatever place where we're getting information. It's like, oh, I have to do this thing now. Like, I have to do TikTok. And it's obvious that I've got to do TikTok because I see these people that are making all this money at this. And to your point, you chose to do something different. And I think this is one of the hardest things in any business is the saying no, right? But the reality is if you look at something like venture capital or private equity, they're in the business of saying no. They have a process that they evaluate what they're going to invest in and what they're going to do, because they know they have a finite amount of time and capital, that if they don't say no to 99% of the things that come over the transom to them, they're just going to run out of money and have bad investments. So they have to have a system where they evaluate what is the best use of time and money. And the reality is that for authors, that that time component is the real finite resource. There's so many authors that have figured out how to get a business ramped up and make money with no money. Like, this is the land of bootstrapping, right? Whereas a lot of other businesses, you can't even get into this business unless you have capital. But here's one where people have figured out ways to do that. But if you're not looking at the best use of your time, and what we talked about earlier is now we're saying you need to think about a chunk of that time in a different space that isn't necessarily doing business y stuff that means you have less time, right? So, like, how do we Best use that time in 2025. I and I think that you're better to pick one or two things and really invest and do them well, then try to do 10 things half heartedly.

[Joe Solari]

But then how do people pick one or two things? Because I remember this like again back in 2009 when I started this podcast. I'd never done a podcast before. It was very, very new actually in podcasting era. And I was like, I'm just gonna try this. And at the same time, I started a YouTube channel again quite early on in, in the that time. And, and although I still have a YouTube channel, it didn't become the thing that I enjoyed or that actually is part of a profitable part of my business. But I didn't know that before I started. So if people listening, they're like, okay, well should I try TikTok or should I do Facebook ads or should I use a subscription service? Or like, how do they know? Or how do they pick the one or two things that might work for them and might help make their author business profitable?

[Thomas Umstadt Jr.]

Yeah. And again, this is where you have to kind of step back and ask yourself these questions like, what is my natural curiosity leading me to? And when do I feel it's being fulfilled? So we can just use your examples. Right? Of course you're going to want to try these things as they come up. Right. You're going to see, oh, this is a new thing. But what is it that I want to get out of it? So from a personal standpoint, am I feeling energy come to me? Am I getting something out of it or is it feeling like it's draining me? Right. You have to honor that. Number two is how does it align with your business practices? Do you really like when you step into something like TikTok, there's the how to, right. There's courses, there's all kinds of people that have talked on shows like mine that how to do this. But is that the audience that you're looking for? Are those. Is that the kind of interaction you want to have with your audience? And I think using you as an example, you've been very deliberate and said no in instances that probably have pissed some people off. But it's because you understand that like in the long run it's not going to work well for anybody because you're not going to be getting fulfilled. Is that a fair statement?

[Joanna Penn]

Oh, yeah.

[Joe Solari]

But I also annoy myself sometimes. I'm like, why can't I? Like, why can't I do video? Like, I really just don't like, as you say, curiosity. And also, what drains you. Video drains me. And it always has it. Like some people say, oh, it's because you, you know, whatever, getting older. And I'm like, no, it always, always has. And so I don't really. Also, I don't listen to music. I don't do noise. I like silence. I like quiet. And I think we, as you say, we have to tap into and learn to say no, otherwise you can burn out. Right?

[Thomas Umstadt Jr.]

Yeah. And I think when we go back to thinking about where your creative well gets filled is like them. Going to a coffee shop is a place of creativity. I go there and I'm eavesdropping on people's conversations and thinking about the coffee. Like, it's not a place where I can do that. So part of this idea is for you as a listener on the show, thinking about these ideas. What is it for you? Not, what is the community saying? There's no shortage of ideas on ways to make money as an author or to monetize your creativity. Then there'll be more coming. There's going to be a bazillion new ideas that come with innovation. You're not going to be able to do them all. All. So you need to be really deliberate and pick the ones that do two things, in my view, and that is connect you with the audience that you want to connect with. Right. Because again, if this is about making money, you need to have people that see that your creative content is worth more than the cold hard cash in their wallet. And two, it fulfills you like it and fulfills you in the right way. Okay, what do I mean by that? Not that it makes you get your ego pumped up or gives you a bunch of status in fake things like Rank, but that it fulfills you by you. Like, I am now truly in touch with my meaning. Like, I understand the me why I'm on this planet. This helps me to feel like a full human being being. That's the part that I think is getting lost in this whole hustle culture, is that you're going to feel good when you hit this particular monumental thing, like making seven figures. No, you won't. You won't. I know this because I've worked with so many people that have done that and they come to me and they're like, I've worked harder. I'm more burnt out. I have the mantle. I won the trophy. I sold a million dollars worth of books this year. Year. But you know what? I can't keep this up. And what ends up happening is the ones that are successful going forward find themselves in a place where they end up becoming most likely more profitable, selling less books, but doing something they love. They find that sweet spot because they've changed their focus. They've gotten away from like, hey, wait a minute. If I do some things with my business, business, tune some things up here, I can make more money than I've ever made before and I can feel good and I can tap into things that I was necessarily missing out. Like, I can connect with my family more, I can travel more. I can feel that I can leave certain parts of my business and not think that it's all going to crash into a. A heap.

[Joe Solari]

Yeah, exactly. And that's why we were emphasizing profitable. And I know you talk about this, this a lot because a lot of the numbers that you can see, screenshots on various social media or whatever are, are the above the line figures. They're not necessarily the profit figures. They're the income or the revenue, but not the profit. So that's where we like to focus and profitable life, I think, in general, just having a. A happier life. But I want us to get into Author Nation now. 2024 was the first year and I was there. It was fantastic. I bought my ticket for 2025 before I even left Vegas. I was one of those. As you were talking about it, I went on and I. I bought it. But let's just first of all, from your perspective, what went well about the conference from I guess you and from Suze and the team, but also from feedback that you got.

[Thomas Umstadt Jr.]

Oh, wow. I don't even know where to start. There's so much. I think the funny thing was so many people were like, oh, you have to be really stressed out and there's got to be a lot of stuff going on. The feeling was more like being the host of a party or your wedding. Right? Like, you have this big event that you've planned. You want to make sure everyone's having a good time, but it wasn't like there was fires to really put out. We had been working on this thing for over a year, and we have a team that really did an amazing job at. At putting together the programming and building a system like that people don't understand. Like, this is where my creativity really was able to come out and take a business and work on it. So the show as a whole was surprising to people at the things that we focused in on. Like, we spent a lot of time with the space. We made sure that the space was Open and inviting. We had rented a bunch of furniture, couches and stuff. So people had these conversation pits to hang out in. And that came out of observing other shows that tended to, in my view, make authors feel anxious and confined and claustrophobic. And we didn't want that to be the case. We wanted to make sure that there was different facets for authors. So the folks that were really there to kind of fill their well with information, we had a lot of great sessions. Yours was a great example of that. But we also know that there's a lot of people that they never go into those sessions. They just need a place to hang out and do deals and talk and network. So we had different spaces for that. We had, like I said, these conversation pits. We also had a bunch of tables around where people could sit and work together. All of that stuff was designed to hit the needs that we kept hearing people say when we asked them about what they want out of a show. Now the feedback we've gotten, that's the other thing. We built a system so we were able to collect reviews off of every single session and about the overall show. So we ended up with 866 reviews of sessions. And we reviewed on two things. Were the objectives clear and were the objectives met? And we had on the first one, it was like a 4.6 out of 5. The objectives met was like a 4.55. So we had really, really good feedback system and we had good feedback. And the great thing was is we then, like. I'm sure you were sent your reviews.

[Joe Solari]

Yeah, that was great. Yeah, really good.

[Thomas Umstadt Jr.]

So it's funny when we did that, there were some people that again, we can all be self conscious and it's like, no, those aren't bad reviews. You got to filter out some of this stuff.

[Joe Solari]

Yeah, for sure. And actually this would be like a tip for people if they are coming. If you're using that app again, I didn't make the most of that app until towards the end of the week. And then I realized that there were slides on there from people's talks. So if you missed a talk, you could go get the slides and you could sync it with your laptop and all of that kind of thing, as well as doing the ratings. So yeah, that app, I think next time I'll be like, using that. Are you going to use that same one?

[Thomas Umstadt Jr.]

Yeah, we're going to use that again. We may be evaluating. I actually had somebody come up at the show that's a programmer and he talked about programming something specific for us. So we're gonna look at that as a potential. But the idea is having something like that. We were really happy with the tool we used. The only thing we wanted we were hoping to add into that was better group communication. So a way for authors that are there to have a single platform to network between themselves and message each other. So that's the one thing that we're trying to figure out. But like all those pieces, we spend a lot of time. Like if you notice, we have a numbering system that tells you what room something is in, what day it is, what session during the day that all feeds back into our system. Because this year what we're really working on is all the stuff that was kind of manual processes that we hand carried through the building. It's like we're automating all that, that stuff. We're using agents and tools that are now available to us. So you'll see this for folks that are submitting to speak, that starts you in a process that will eventually feed all the information into the contract we send you and then push information into our system so that our folks don't have to be typing stuff in. Right.

[Joe Solari]

That is good. I actually did submit my. Because I knew we were talking, I was like, right, I'm going to submit my talk. So I did actually go through that process and I noticed it was very organized and there were all the things I could put in and yeah, so that was. That was super useful. And on that, I guess you mentioned there the automations and agents and AI. There was a lot of AI sessions at Author Nation 2024, but there was also a lot on direct sales. There was lots on Kickstarter and people selling on Shopify. And these are some big trends that are coming. Or here, what are your thoughts on some of these big overarching trends and will you continue to cover them in the show in 2020?

[Thomas Umstadt Jr.]

Yeah, I think we probably had the single most comprehensive track on AI that anyone's ever put together in the creative community while at the same time having a massive amount of information on how to be an artisan. So the idea for us isn't to be one thing to everyone other than the place you come to get exposed to everyone, everything. The idea that there's one way to do this is ludicrous. And I. This kind of gets to some of the stuff we were, you know, you and I have talked about or how we do things today is very different than how we've done things in the past. Right. You just as a human being, if you're going to be an author for 30 years. You're going to change, you're going to, you're going to make decisions. Hopefully you're get to a point where you're saying there's some stuff, stuff I, I'm not going to do. And I think one of the best examples of all of bringing that change is we had Johnny Truant at the show, one of the co authors of Write, Publish, Repeat. Right. Or the OG of like Fast Publishing doing a session on being an artisan and how his focus is now on creating meaningful relationships around his work with a small intimate group of fans that can support him. And there's two parts to that. One is like, how do, how does he do that? But also that bigger message of like, yes, I've matured and changed what I think is important for me to be fulfilled. And that's what we want the show to be about. The hard part can be, is if you're newer and you come in, it's like, oh my God, there's too much stuff on the buffet. That's our responsibility to try and help people manage and absorb this content.

[Joanna Penn]

Yeah.

[Joe Solari]

And on that you have tracks, don't you, for people who haven't written a book yet to different genres, to people like me who want the much more advanced content. But there's stuff for people who haven't even written a book as well.

[Thomas Umstadt Jr.]

Yeah. It's so that if you've never written a book, you can come and like, frankly, if you haven't written a book, you're in that part of your publishing career, there isn't a better thing to do. And why is that? Well, there's more people on the planet in that one room for that five days that have done what you want to do than anywhere else. So why not be there and ask them questions and learn from them and see what is their, their way of doing it. Right. Because in the beginning you just need to get that book out right? Then you can start understanding some deeper things about what your business will look like. And you and I are a long way away from that first published book. But that was a massive endeavor. We forget about that sometimes of what a massive endeavor that first book is. So once that does happen, then it's like, oh, well, that wasn't that bad, I can do that again now. How do I want to do that? How do I want to connect with people? And there's so many different ways now. That's the other thing, right? Is like it used to be, oh well, you just got to get on Amazon. Well, no, maybe you need to. Maybe for you, the best thing because of your writing style and the way you work is that you're building your business on Kickstarter. Right. And we'll have people there. Like we have the Kickstarter people, right?

[Joe Solari]

Yeah, Oriana. Yeah.

[Thomas Umstadt Jr.]

And what we're doing is now that we've gotten the first one under a belt, we're going out to folks like, I had a conversation with Oriana just before the new year for next year and like, okay, what if in our online community you come in and coach a cohort of people to do Kickstarter and instead of having a session at Author Nation that is educational, hey, you should do Kickstarters. You just meet, you have a session where you meet with those people and talk about what worked and didn't work in those Kickstarters that you ran over the year. Right. That's a whole different way that we use the idea of community and a week long show to get the support mechanism that people really need. Right. Because is sure we can run a great show and take out our fire hose and just drown you in ideas, but what happens afterwards to help you implement those ideas? And the first part is, what we're talking about is picking the ones to implement.

[Joe Solari]

Very important.

[Thomas Umstadt Jr.]

Sitting in front of a notebook with 60 great ideas is, can be paralyzing. Right. So how do we get you to the ones that are going to have the. And it's something we talked about at the show is high impact, low effort.

[Joe Solari]

Yeah. And I think one of my tips for people is to plan in advance. So even though it's not up there yet, towards November, the, the schedule will be around so people can kind of see. All right, we'll. Well, what, what do I really want to go to? And what I had in my schedule, which I planned ages in advance because I was arranging meetings and all of that kind of thing was this is a session I have to have to attend. And then there might be other sessions I'm like, that will get a two and if I'm around I'll go to that and if not I'll figure it out later. But really planning in advance and then as you say afterwards, like reviewing your list at least a week later and seeing what still resonates, resonate from what you went through because there might be a ton of stuff you wrote down that a week later you're not so enamored with. So I think that's really useful is putting the extra time in to do the scheduling and then do the sort of thinking later.

[Thomas Umstadt Jr.]

Yeah. And there's two things that I want to touch on on that. The first is, is one of the areas where we recognize that we can do a better job. And that is when there were lower reviews on sessions, the trend seemed to be that we didn't do a really good job at helping the audience understand that topic. Right. Because the way we did our reviews is we also asked what level you were as an author. And what we would see is these stratifications where it's like, oh, look at all the high reviews from these people that were beginners and all these low reviews from people who were advantageous, advanced. And we screwed up and we, we made this thing seem like it was for everybody. And so one of the things that Shell and I, we were just talking and Shell was like, if you want to get your session approved, you're going to have a higher chance of doing that, saying, this is for this specific group than saying, oh, no, this is for everybody. We really want to make sure that we're identifying the right experience level to make that work. The second thing is, if you went to the show and you were a maniac and went to a session every time there was a session open, the best you could have seen was about 23% of the content that we put together. So, I mean, 70% of the sessions you miss. Now let's put a little math on that. You're probably not going to look at all those because of, again, what level you are. So let's say you missed half of what you could have, you should have seen. Well, that's why we're doing this whole thing about the after party that's going, you know, it starts. Starts. The 11th is this idea of like, hey, we're gonna have all these videos in an area. You watch the videos that you didn't see. There's a spot where you can go and put in questions. We're going to submit those questions to the presenters and then we're going to have hour long Q and A sessions on Zoom to get those questions answered. So you get a couple things out of this that never has happened at a show before. And one is, one is we can pull this virtual and live community together so we can make a more cohesive author community. Two is you get a way to get more value out of those sessions that you missed. But three, even with a session you went to, you now had time to digest it and look at your notes and think through some things on your business without being at a crazy show with all your friends. And you may have some more questions that you want to get clarified with the speaker. And now you can get on there and say, hey, now I'm looking at my business. What about this or that. And they'll be able to give you really good feedback that's pertinent to your business. So, like, we're really trying to think how this is a community of communities that gets results.

[Joe Solari]

Yeah. Now we do have to say that there are inevitable challenges with every business. And in fact, one of the challenges was my session. The recording didn't work. So I am actually redoing my session as part of this after party. I'm actually going to give the session again with some updates because of course my talk was on AI and it was in November and we're two months on and things have changed. So I'm going to be doing that again. But yes, challenges, sometimes things don't work. But what were some of the other things that were challenges or that you're changing and improving? You've talked about some of them, but anything else that.

[Thomas Umstadt Jr.]

Yeah, so. So, I mean, on that particular subject, out of 160 sessions, I think there were eight that we had issues, technical issues with. So like we want to have zero fault on that. But like, fortunately we've got a solution. Right. In your case, you don't have to record video, you just show your slides. We can honor your. I know this is not a thrill.

[Joe Solari]

For you, but it's like definitely not a thrill. But I'm happy to update the slides and do it again. And like you said, you're doing the after party, so it might actually work really well.

[Thomas Umstadt Jr.]

Yeah. And the point is having this situation where we can interact around that material and frankly we have to get that session done because you were one of the highest rated sessions. There were. Right?

[Joe Solari]

I mean there were jolly good.

[Thomas Umstadt Jr.]

Yeah, you did like, and I think that that kind of tends to like. We had a fundamental difference in how AI was seen at the show. And why was that Was how we were approaching the subject matter. This wasn't about how it is just used in creation of content. We were talking about all kinds of stuff, the good and the bad of it and as well as how this is going to be able to do things for you and your business that you don't want to do or frankly you're not that good at and the machine is going to be better at it than you. So that's part of it. But your question was about, like, what could we do better? We have the reader event, and we're always going to struggle with that until we get to the point where we can do that on a full weekend. We know that having a Saturday for that means we get a lot more people to show up. We rolled out some technology at that event. It was the first time it was ever used. It went pretty well. But, like, we've got a whole bunch of. A whole list of stuff we have to. To improve with that. And we wouldn't have had that list unless we went and did that project. Right. So the idea of us creating a way for us to sell print books at a show and authors not have to figure out how to get the books there, we've got the first part of that solution and the readers could order books. We had them printed on demand and delivered to the shoe show. And now that we have that system working and we know that it works, that we need to get it so that it's a really pleasant experience for everybody. So those kind of things are like, marginal things that we need to adjust to make things better. And again, like, with this is stuff I enjoy, like, now that I can see where we need to improve things, then we'll figure out how to improve the big thing for us.

[Joe Solari]

It was only year one, you know, it was year one.

[Thomas Umstadt Jr.]

Yeah. And I think that that was for us. This first year was a lot about, like, okay, there's. I never run a show before, first time I've ever done this. And the team. So there was people on our team that were involved with the previous show and knew what to do at the show. But we were making so many changes that there was a lot of moving parts that were new and had to be watched. And the beauty of something like this is to see the impact that it has on the community while at the same time being able to work with people on making it happen. So it's very fulfilling for me because I can see, you know, this is like how my creativity comes out and working on a business, but it's even more rewarding because I'm doing it with people and we're having fun. Fun, right? Like very high performing team.

[Joe Solari]

Yeah. Well, fantastic. So if people want to come, where can they get tickets for Author Nation 2025? And is there any way they can Access what happened 2024?

[Thomas Umstadt Jr.]

Sure, sure. So we have, right now, early ticket sales are open, so we have a deeply discounted ticket that you can buy in the month of January. So if you came to the show and bought your ticket at the show, you got the best price and that was only available to those people that came to the show. Now we have our early Bird special and you can go to Authornation Live and sign up for that. We also have another offer there called the Regret Remedy Bundle. And what is that? There was a lot of people, people that were like, well, I'm gonna just wait and see how this show went. And then they lost their mind after they saw all the fun. And their friends were who were at the show that were like, oh my God, this thing is amazing. And all over Facebook are people sitting on these big white leather couches with smiles on their faces. So if you, for whatever reason didn't come, you can buy this Regret Remedy package. And it includes the after party. So you'll get all the videos from 2024 and you'll also. It's bundled with a ticket for 2025. And in both cases we offer a installment plan so that we're trying to help you manage your cash flow as well. If you can't afford the full ticket, you can break that up over a six month period to manage your cash flow better. So again, that's all. Go to Authornation Live to learn more about those. And we've got some examples of the sessions from 2024 to give you a feel for what the show is like and all the fun testimonials from people. And I can say this, as far as the 2025 show, we've got some amazing stuff lined up. We haven't announced it yet because we're contracting things right now, but when you look at last year, we had Kevin. Kevin Smith. Did you stay around for the Kevin Smith?

[Joe Solari]

Yeah, I was, I'd never heard of him. And then I was like, oh, this, this dude is funny.

[Thomas Umstadt Jr.]

Yeah. And I think that like a lot of people were like, why Kevin Smith? He's this old director from the 90s. And like one, he was so generous with his time. Like he was there, like the session alone was almost two hours. And then he hung around with people. But more so he. He honestly spoke about being a creator and talked about major issues that he had in his life. He had a severe heart attack that almost killed him. He had a nervous breakdown. He went. He spent time in a psychiatric hospital. He talked about all those issues and was really motivational to people. And so like, those are the kind of people we're bringing in to have authors see, like, you're not the only ones that are having these kind of issues. Here's A dude who's a big Hollywood movie guy and he's dealing with the same stuff as a creator. Getting words on the paper.

[Joe Solari]

Yeah. Fantastic. And also we should say since this is a podcast, you have a podcast, so where can people find that as well?

[Thomas Umstadt Jr.]

Sure. So you can find [e-mail] if you're interested in some of the stuff I'm talking about around around how your creativity works and this up spiral concept of designing your business around your creative cycles. That's where that information will be. That's this year one of my things is I do a paid newsletter and each year I have 45 emails on a specific subject. And this year all the research I did last year on this is being pumped out in those emails where I talk about like, how do you honor your default mode network? How do you work on your executive function? How do you think about becoming a creative athlete? Oh, and then the Author Nation podcast, that's another thing since that's on all the major channels. We have a YouTube channel as well. That way you can watch the video.

[Joe Solari]

Well, thanks so much for your time, Joe. That was great.

[Thomas Umstadt Jr.]

Well, thank you. And I just want to put out a special thanks to all the folks in your community that came to the show and it's not lost on Suze and I, the time and effort it takes to come to an event like that and to feel that your community, I want your community that comes every year to feel welcome and that we really love having you there.

[Joe Solari]

Oh well, thanks so much.

[Joanna Penn]

So I hope you found the episode interesting and that you will schedule some time to fill your creative well and do whatever you need to to keep your creativity humm along this year and balance your happiness with what we need to do in our businesses. And I did re record my session for Authonation after I spoke to Jo. That should be up on the portal site if you have access to that digital ticket. And I'll be doing my live Q and A session for Author Nation on Monday 27th of January as and I have my ticket for Author Nation 2025. We will have another patron meetup then and hopefully I will be speaking. I have submitted my talk as I mentioned, so please leave a comment on the podcast show [e-mail] or on the YouTube channel, comment on X at the Creative Pen or email me joannathecreativepen.com and send me pictures of where you're listening or your favourite cemetery or churchyard next week. I'm talking about dictation, Kickstarter, and short story collections with Kevin J. Anderson, as well as how to survive a long term career in the author business. And Kevin has been doing this for decades, so I look forward to sharing that with you. In the meantime, happy writing and I'll see you next time. Thanks for listening today. I hope you found it helpful. You can find the backlist episodes and show [e-mail] podcast and you can get your free author [e-mail] blueprint. If you'd like to connect, you can find me on Facebook and X at the Creative Pen, or on Instagram and Facebook @jfpenauthor. Happy writing and I'll see you next time.