In this episode, we’re talking with special guest Constance Mears—writer, artist and mystic—about developing your creative business in alignment with your values. We talk about fans, and how to lead them to you. Getting to know your own personality, and constructing a business style that works for you. We dig into the challenges of sharing yourself through your writing, the comparison of ourselves to other creatives and their accomplishments, and the ways we define success and wealth. Living within your means, and choosing a life of meaning and depth. And how we learn from our “mistakes” as we go.

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Connect with special guest Constance Mears

• Website: constancemears.com
• Website: dreamhatching.com

Visit our websites

• Crystal Hunt (Non-fiction)
• CJ Hunt (Romance)
• Michele Amitrani (Fiction)
• The Creative Academy for Writers (Community/Resources)

Transcript for Strategic Authorpreneur Episode 012: Aligning Your Values and Your Business with Constance Mears

Constance Mears: Hi, I’m Constance smears. Welcome to the strategic authorpreneur podcast, where we’ll be talking today about the intersection between your vision and your values in your business practices.

Crystal: Hey there, strategic authorpreneurs. I’m Crystal Hunt

Michele: And I’m Michele Amitrani, and we’re here to help you save time, money, and energy, as you level up your writing career.

Crystal: Welcome to episode 12 and the emphasis strategic entrepreneur podcast. On today’s show, we’re talking with special guests, Constance Mears about the challenge of leveling up your creative business while staying in alignment with your values.

So, first of all, we’re going to take a quick little detour and we’re going to talk about what each of us has been up to in this past week and share with you the most helpful resources and things that we have discovered. So my fine Italian friend, what have you been up to?

What has happened since the last episode?

Michele: Let’s do this. So I have noticed that it has become a kind of tradition for me to suggest a book, and I don’t want to break that tradition. So today I’m going to suggest you another shorter, but lovely read that I found very useful. The book is called Strangers to Super Fans, and is from David Gaughran. I really hope I’m not butchering his name. And I’m going to be very, very short on why I’m suggesting this book.

It’s the first book ever that I’ve seen an author describing from top to bottom what is the journey of the reader? So every single book that I’ve read so far, it’s always 100% from the perspective of the author or the writer. But this one, I found it super insightful because it’s really like a- it’s a probe inside the reader’s mind, and there are some steps that they undergo before finding your book and then finding you.

And I believe once you understand this kind of step by step, which if I’m not mistaken, are like five steps in the book described by David. You basically understand how people purchase this book and you can take actionable decision on how to change your cover, change the back matter, the internal matter.

It’s like really a flip side, a turning of the page from you, author to the reader. So I really, really, really, really liked it. It’s very short and it’s written in a way- endearing way. You’re say endearing like “it’s funny”, right?

Crystal: Endearing is like when it makes you like somebody,

Michele: I like this guy! I really like him.

I think I read it in like a couple of sittings and, after that one of my rules is if I come out from a book knowing one new thing, I’m good. Like the, the money I spent are completely worth it. I think I’ve learned a lot, 100 different things after reading Strangers to Super Fans, which subtitle is a marketing guide.

So the reader journey, so. That was my resources. I don’t know if you have something on that line, but really this book was good.

Crystal: Yeah, I love that book. It’s one of my staples that I recommend to everybody. Um, it’s, I also used it to reverse engineer the failure cycle. When you’re talking about where do people fall out of your sales funnel.

I found that book to be really, really helpful when I was trying to look at, okay, where do I need to make changes to keep people. Following along through my, my process as I’m an author and I, I really like how direct he is into the point and how just how much is packed into that little book.

So it’s very concise information, which is fantastic. So I would highly recommend that to anybody who hasn’t read it yet. I have been reading a book called Let Go By Pat Flynn, and I don’t have a physical copy, but I do have the digital copy so you can see there. And that one right at this very moment is free.

Actually, he’s got a promo on, but it may be back to being paid by the time you are watching this. But you can check the show notes. We’ll have links to any of the resources that we recommend during the episode underneath the episode on our website that’s strategicauthorpreneur.com and this book by Pat is- let me read the subtitle for you.

It is how to transform moments of panic into a life of profits and purpose. So Pat takes a deep dive into what happened when he lost his job originally. He used to work for an architecture firm and it tells the story of him switching from that to going into online business and how that all evolved.

And he’s done an updated version of it as well. So taking the original content and done some reflections. I’m only about halfway through, so I can’t tell you about the second half yet. So no spoilers. But it has been really interesting just in looking at my own business processes and seeing. You know, one of the things I love about Pat Flynn is he’s always very clear about where things didn’t go right, or where he would have done things differently.

And very good at asking questions to kind of get you thinking about how to apply that in your own business. So I worked through some of the questions that were linked from one of the sections this morning, and, and really just. Applied some of that to our current situation because everything is changing in the world right now due to the covid 19 situation and people being forced into working from home and a lot of industry shifts.

So I think it’s as relevant as ever it was in terms of helping people to work through a bit of a business evolution where you’re needing to transform. What your business used to look like to what it’s going to look like now. So I have been using that as a little bit of a handbook and would highly recommended.

It’s also very approachably written. It’s like having a conversation with Pat Flynn and, or listening to the podcast. If you’ve done that before, it’s always a good experience. So I would highly recommend checking that out. On that note. Another thing I would recommend you check out is our interview that follows with Constance mirrors, and our special guest today is an artist, a writer, and a mystic.

About Constance Mears

And I’ve known her for I think about five years now. But one of the things I have always admired most about Constance is her ability to live in her values even when it is not convenient, not comfortable, and not the easy way to take. And so she has made a lot of choices in how she’s developed her author business and how she’s developed and shared her products and her knowledge.

And is very intentional in keeping her choices within what she believes is her mission and her vision. So without further ado, we’ll give that a listen and then we will see you after, so we can break it all down and talk about it.

Today, we are talking about alignment between your vision and your values in your business practices. And so I thought, yeah, Constance would be an excellent person to talk to about this because I have had a front row seat watching her navigate the publishing world and some of this creative stuff along the way and kind of making decisions about what feels like a good fit and what doesn’t, and have just been very impressed with how you’ve navigated that. So I thought we could have a little conversation here and just talk about how that worked for you and some of the challenges you came across along the way and of how you found solutions to those in a way that resonated well for you.

So maybe you could start with a little introduction for folks who don’t know you quite as well as I do yet And just let them know a bit about who you are and what you do.

Constance Mears:  Well, it’s taken me quite a bit of time to kind of claim my title to sort of narrow down the choices of who I wanted to become in this lifetime. And I’ve narrowed it down to three: artist, writer and mystic. And all three of them are pretty low on the economic scale, generally speaking, in our culture.

So from my point of view, monetary compensation is not as high as doing something with meaning. And, and even in the artwork that I do there’s different kinds of artists. There’s some who are just, you know, they pick a style and they go for it and it really is a business, and for me it has always been, I hate to use the word ministry, or, I mean, it’s just sacred to me.

And I think that’s been my biggest conundrum. We’re a juxtaposition working out between making a living in the real world, but then also adhering to my values. Which right are other worlds. So the train does not always meet unfortunately. And, and I’ve experienced this from the very beginning. And it’s not unique to me.

I think every creative person throughout time has had to deal with how to fund their creative aspirations. And in the old days, they had patrons. You know, people who would support them through, you know, long expanses. However, there’s always that trade off. It doesn’t, that money doesn’t come without strings, and so you’re funded, you’re well-funded.

But you don’t necessarily get to choose the subject matter or, or this stylized, generally, they choose you because of the style. But so it’s that, that search for freedom expressed a little creative expression and freedom in that. And then also just, you know, keeping the lights on so you can, you know, see your paint, see your colours.

And for writing, it’s the same thing. You know, we’ve gone from the publishing world where there were gatekeepers and just a few got through, and they supported you fully and you can make a living back, you know, I’d say 20 years ago, maybe 25. Right about the introduction of the Macintosh and desktop publishing.

And it opened the world. It was, it’s more Democratic now. Any person can fund themselves somehow and, and get their work out into the world. So that changes the playing field quite a bit. But it doesn’t change the fact that you still have to fund it with real-world dollars.

Crystal: Right, and I think it puts us as creatives, it puts us into an interesting role as business owners when our inclination might not be that. So you know, the independence and, and options are there, but it does hand you another hat that you have to wear as you’re going through your creative process of. How if and how will I monetize this? And you know, what options do I have as far as payment processing and all of these kind of tools. Evaluations start to become part of the process.

And then, and then we go looking for help because that’s not necessarily our background or our training as artists to suddenly be business people. And so I think there’s some interesting things that we discover when we go out looking for help with growing our small creative businesses into something larger.

So maybe can you talk a little bit about what were the things you were finding when you went to go look at how do I monetize my creativity?

Constance Mears: Well, I guess I’ll switch to, since a lot of your viewers or listeners are inclined toward writing, I’ll switch to when I started writing a memoir and deciding about whether I was going to self-publish or try to pitch it two to a publishing company. It was so it’s a memoir, it was so personal, but I was reluctant to give away some of the creative freedom. Or creative rights, I guess. They can change the title. They can, you know, have you change endings.

And the subject matter was pretty far off the mainstream. So I didn’t want to compromise the message in order to get it out. And I know that in the landscape that we in publishing that we deal with now, the key word or the buzz word is platform. Building your platform. So even going to a publisher without that platform, the work can be stellar, but they are a business and if they don’t think that they can move that product that they won’t buy in.

And my influences, I guess, are or off the beaten path. In the old days, and I’m talking about old, old religion, Roman religion prior to Christianity even. So, I guess pagan Earth based religions. They had temples out in the middle of nowhere, and then surrounding that temple was a space.

Sometimes it was a sacred Grove, and sometimes it was a big meadow and it’s called a fanum. And that’s what I love, is that in order to get to the Holy place, you have to go through the fanum. And the people that hung out in that area, were called fanatics, and that’s where we get the term fan.

In our art common culture or vernacular, you know, they talk about get a thousand raving fans or whatever fanatics essentially. And so for me, I tune into that and say, well, okay, what is the message? Am I leading readers to the Holy place? You know, to me, if we’re moving people at a really deep level, I figure-

Whoever is pulled to that Holy place is going to have to come through me, how we use that particular, you know, there’s so many, there’s so many voices out there, um, who can lead you to a deeper place. But that was my primary goal. So, you know, whether or not it paid off, it wasn’t, it wasn’t so much my highest concern.

I did decide to go self-publishing. And the lucky thing, I guess lucky. I have a lot of the skills. I designed my own book cover and I do layout for other people’s books. I had a lot of tools myself. I turned to you actually for some of the strategy pieces, I turned to a common friend of ours, Amanda Bidnall for editing.

So I made sure that it was polished. I think that was the sort of the tradeoff when anyone could publish anything that a lot of some par work, got out there and flooded the market. So now the job is to help people, you know, identify where the good work is. So I don’t know if that answered your question very directly.

You were probably tuned into more, what are the tools? I use a sauna to help me, you know?

Crystal: No, no, it’s not. It’s not really about that at all. It’s, it’s more, I think. I mean your memoir is called the Bumbling Mystics Obituary, and you know who you are. You described yourself as an artist and a mystic, and you know, all of these things, they don’t immediately say like corporate processes.

That’s not an instant match. And so if we get who, who you are as a person, you talked earlier about your values not necessarily being in alignment or what you value, not necessarily being in alignment with that business culture. But maybe you could just elaborate a little bit, like what are the things that you do place value on?

Constance Mears: Well, definitely meaning and authenticity. And part of my discovery was that there are people out there who are publishing books about very deep and meaningful things that, you know, Brene Brown, for instance, Gabby Bernstein was another one that I admire. And at some point I have discovered that I don’t have that sort of front man, front woman type personality.

It takes a lot. I’m an INFP. If you get into Myers-Briggs typology. You know, the I part the introverted mess is like 90%. I mean, I’m an extreme in that realm. So I felt like in some ways I was swimming against the current a lot in trying to, or I felt like I was trying to be larger than life, larger than, you know.

And I had that same feeling when I was doing more painting as well, trying to get your name out there. I feel like it’s always, you know, sort of no puffery. I don’t know. But then, you know, I’ve been contemplating a lot. You could, you could see that my mind process right now, I can’t hide it, is I’m a contemplative mystic, so I think the modern term is overthinker maybe, I don’t know.

I think about the meanings and the why’s, you know, the deeper slant to it rather than more of a strategy. So I appreciate all of the help that you gave me in particular. Oh, in fact, I’m in the Bumbling Mystics Obituary, I listed you as the book coach because I honestly don’t think that I could have gotten through that entire process without some really specific guidance on the nuts and bolts parts of it.

I had a mission, I had a vision of the story that I felt needed to be out there that could help people navigate this crazy world and get to the end and not regret. Why didn’t I go for it? You know? Why was I was living someone else’s version of my life.

Again, circular. I don’t think I answered your question.

Crystal: It’s a winding road to wisdom. It’s all good.

So I think an interesting next question is just one thing I noticed, like out there you’re like okay, I’m going to be strategic about business side of things and I’m going to learn about sales funnels and I’m going to learn about, you know, email list building and I am going to build an audience and I’m going to write sales copy and all of these things.

So for a lot of writers out there who are with you on the introvert scale and also just not loving marketing as a thing. And feeling when what you’re marketing is something that you created from your own self. I think that’s extra hard because the more people who see it, the more exposed you feel.

So let’s talk for a second. I mean your book is your story I mean, you’ve got multiple books, but the Bumbling Mystics Obituary is about your life. And so I’d be curious to hear what kind of challenges you found with marketing that book kind of inside yourself or in the context of that business stuff.

Challenges Constance found with marketing her books

Constance Mears: Yeah. Challenges is a good umbrella word for that. I think I have to reveal just a little bit, but in the book, I had a premonition of my death, and so I’m outlining that, which is out of the mainstream kind of, you know, process, but it’s the dance between life and death.

You know until it happens, it’s really speculative. You know, it could just be the ravings of a crazy woman, essentially. She’s had a little too much time alone. I’m all in, let’s say that. That’s a gambling term where you’re just investing at all.

For specific purpose, not just recklessly, but to help people realize that we can interact with the other realm in this realm.  And I don’t think that’s a message you get very often, unless it’s really compacted in the structure of religion. But I’m just talking about any normal person just with a direct connection. And that’s the terminology for mystic or the definition for mystic is my definition, anyway. So I’m reluctant to you know, blast it out there. I feel like, well, I guess one of my favorite books is The Alchemist. And it did not sell well when he published it. In fact, I think it’s sold a hundred copies for many years.

And then someone found it, and it might’ve even been Madonna who mentioned it on Oprah, and then it just blew up. I feel like I have planted a seed, I guess. This is not business terminology, no bullet points. This is not a funnel. I feel like I planted a seed. I did the work that I was called to do. What becomes of it isn’t necessarily my work. I do have to, I have put it out on the interwebs. I’m not hiding it. What’s the term? Hiding it under a bushel. I’m not hiding or hiding it on a drawer.

Crystal: The manuscript under the bed is a recurring theme for people who’ve written something that they’re just not quite sure. It’s not quite ready to be out in the world.

Constance Mears: Or they’re not quite ready for it to be out in the world. And I get that for sure. I mean, it is exposure to the maximum and as kind of a weirdo, you know, just someone with some, offbeat thinking. I hid that aspect of myself for a really long time.

So to be so public about this or that, and I unveil a lot of my big mistakes in life. I felt like if I didn’t tell them the whole truth, that I would be less believable when I tell some pretty, extremely incredible stories. So I took that risk of, you know, kind of exposing me as a human being.

I was going to say, well, I haven’t killed anybody. That’s kind of a low bar, isn’t it? And there may be people who’ve killed somebody and it’s still redeemable, so I kind of want to get off that. I’m sorry I’ve diverted into a tangent.

Crystal: These things do happen. I think you bring up an interesting point though, like you said earlier that authenticity and vulnerability are kind of themes for you, and they’re built into your work. They’re built into the way you approach your business model as well. And in terms of the things you choose to do or not do, you aren’t necessarily walking the beaten path that is what everyone else has done, but you’re choosing things along the way.

That fit with your vision and your values. So, you know, I think value for people in that, just hearing the fact that you decide what’s important in your publishing journey, which was telling your story, planting the seed, making a thing that’s going to last.

If you’re, if you’re right about this, if that vision is true, that will last beyond you. And so you are basically just building a legacy. And I think that’s what all writers are doing, whether they’re consciously addressing that or not, they are taking their thoughts and their experiences and their ideas, and they’re putting them into a format that will outlive them.

And so that is an interesting way to build a legacy. Because I know you, I know a few things from your background that I think have kind of set you up in a really interesting way to do this work. So if you’re willing to talk a little bit, I know that you wrote obituaries for a while.

And so I would love just to, for you to talk a little bit about like, how did that inform how things developed for you on the publishing side and how you chose to frame your life story the way you did?

Constance Mears:  Yes. And I guess I’ll even go back a little bit further. I didn’t go to, you know, writing school. I didn’t even go to art school, actually. I had been trying to be known as an artist for probably five years, and I was at a midlife point and I decided to do a vision quest. I mean, literally go to the mountains for four days and fast. I recognized that I’d been given some gifts, like talents towards communication of ideas and imagination, I guess, ideas that are beyond what’s accepted now.

I think there are visionary, for lack of a better word, which means, if there’s a great Oscar Wilde quote. I’m gonna butcher it. Never mind. Just that the ideas that I propose aren’t necessarily accepted at this time, but I feel like it’s the edge of where we’re evolving to or where we could evolve.

Maybe that’s a better way. So while I’m up in the mountains, I get this message that was, if you’re going to be a writer, you need to. I haven’t even intended to, to follow that as a path. I had intended to be doing painting. And at the moment I heard that, then I looked back on my life and recognize that writing had been, there all along.

One of my first memories was picking up a pen and just the power of- I realized that my mom could take a piece of paper that had writing on it and she would know what to get in the store or she would know how to make a cake. I mean, it had so much power to it and I wanted to understand it.

Another quote, writing is sort of like creating a spell. It’s the words have power. It can be entertaining, but you can also help form reality through ideas. I mean, nothing in this world has been created without having the idea of it first. So I mean that is the power of the world to create, is ideas.

So I like that realm and I’ve liked that realm from the beginning. So during this vision quest, I get a message that writing is what I had come for. Wow. Okay. So then right after that, I had been working a newspaper doing the graphic design for the newspaper. I had been doing that for quite some time.

And somehow, I don’t know, three months, I think of that. Maybe less. A job opened up on the writing side. And newspapers are really particular about crossing over that line of, you know, creating advertising. Imparting information.

Advertising is persuasive information. And then the editorial side is just imparting the truth as objectively as you can see it. And that job was where I learned how to write obituaries. And I was fascinated by the choices that people make. I mean, I have a curious mind. So it was like wow.

You know, so many different paths that people took. And not second guessing, but curious. You know, they majored in music and, but now they’re an insurance salesman. How did that happen? And what were the compromises that they made? You know? And that is what we have to navigate as creative people is how to hold on to that spark of our creative ambition, if you will. To, to the purest degree, I might’ve taken a bit, a little too far. And, and the, the downside of that, if you will, is skating the poverty level for most of my life. You know, the buzzword is always six figures, you know, that seems to be the bar that makes you successful or it makes you, you know, one of post on Facebook more or whatever.

And there have been expanses of my life where I did do corporate work or work that was less satisfying. I always found out creative, that aspect of it. A lot of graphic design, a lot of publishing type work. I’m still writing, still playing with colors and composition, but it didn’t have the meaning.

That is so important to me. So it looks, it looks creative on the outside and it pays the bills. So there’s that. There was a deep place in my soul that was just like, Oh, really? Are you going to get to the end? And you never really went for it.

So that had been, you know, sure. Bubbling up or percolating for quite some time.

Crystal: So let’s just dial back one bit there. So you had said something that kind of caught my attention, which was. You know, all these people posting about six figures and blah, blah, blah, and like the Facebook world, like that reality is kind of what we’re seeing is what people are choosing to post on social and the people who are posting those things there are generally doing it with an agenda, right?

They’re usually selling a course or they’re selling some sort of training thing that will help you get to six figures as well. But yeah, if getting to six figures is not your end goal, then the methods that they’re teaching you are not going to be necessarily in alignment.

There might be some useful things in there, but if that isn’t your raison d’etre, that’s not what you’re all about. Then it makes those things that they’re telling you to do feel very uncomfortable and in opposition to the authenticity part, which is interesting.

Writing and publishing for YOU

Constance Mears: Oh, not for the lack of trying. Oh my gosh. I tried to shoe horn my foot into that glass slipper and it did not fit. I just couldn’t do it. I couldn’t push the button. And I has been looking at that really at a deep level type shadow work. What is it? Yeah, that transactional relationship in terms of speaking to someone’s soul. I mean that’s the level that I want to interact with people.

Something about it being transactional bothers me at a really deep level, and yet I see people successful at it that I know that it’s resolvable, and yet I just personally couldn’t do it. At this moment, I’m in a cycle where I’m kind of stepping away and easy enough on asking why I guess mystical, the soul focused part not to have to pay the bills, not to be the cash cow.

But I can still be that in the world and express that in different ways without, you know the barcode. It’s such black and white terms. I know that there’s some, some psychological block, but I haven’t worked through, or this is just who I am at a very deep level.

I’m going to claim a victory. So this is my type of success, I guess, cause I haven’t buckled at this point. Not for lack of trying. Who doesn’t want all of it, the goodies and the accolades and all that. But it’s like chopping off an arm or something. It just feels like too big of a sacrifice. I don’t know. Wow. That’s not helpful in the real world.

Yeah. I make compromises. Oh, well, I guess one of the other aspects of my life that have allowed me to do this is I have some sort of gift of manifestation. So I am able to, out of the blue, get situations that use drop in my lap that absolutely fit the desires that I’ve had.

What I need. No, not necessarily. It’s the rolling stones. Not everything you want, but definitely what I need. And it’s all tax free. Not all of it, but you know, situations that work in your favor that are not in the mainstream economy, let’s put it that way. A gifting, barter, that type of thing.

I’m a creative thinker, so, you know, I can do a run around that also. And I feel like there aren’t that many venues for a woman in particular, woman mystic. We’ve got the patriarchal religions. There aren’t that many, you know, ways for a woman to express the deep spirituality that is not necessarily gender based. But also recognizes the sacredness of the feminine. I’m getting a little off here but-

Crystal: I think what you said, it really does make sense and there is a lot of value in people remembering that what they have to offer has value, even if it’s not attached to a dollar sign.

So, you know, when we talk about bartering, you know, there’s this, like, it’s kind of like, Oh, should I talk about that when I get in trouble? But bartering is a legitimate economy. You can trade favors with friends for anything at any time. There’s no rules against that. Right? So I think there is a lot of value. And what we tell people to do in their startup phase is to try and keep your overhead low and your costs low. And you know, if you have a day job, like you’re a graphic designer as a day job and you can trade, maybe you meet somebody who needs their book, they need a cover for their book.

But you need editing for your book, you can trade that. You can trade those skills, and then that helps everybody move forward quicker than they would have been able to had they had to have that dollar figure in their bank account.

You know, there are a few things you cannot barter for sure. There’s some stuff that actually requires the exchange of cash.

But there are various ways to go about raising that cash. And, and I think, you know, when you’re talking about people who were an insurance salesman but were passionate about their music and they played in the symphony orchestra, and that’s really what they live for. Like their job was to pay for the rest of their life.

That does not make them necessarily less happy. And I think that’s one of the things that that happens when we take our passion and we turn it into a business, it becomes a lot more pressure on it. And we do have to make choices in different ways than we would if that’s what our sole income stream depends on.

And so I know myself for sure, and that lots of the other creatives that I’ve talked to have made very specific choices about. Not actually switching to full time too soon or right away, or for some people even at all that that their strategy of keeping their creative freedom is that they don’t have to put that much financial pressure on it.

And I think this isn’t something that we hear about, those people selling the courses and people talking about their six figure incomes. They did make that jump and they are for the most part dependent on it. Or maybe those numbers actually include a lot of other side hustles they have, but they’re just not saying that.

Like a lot of people say, Oh yeah, I make six figures as an author. You know, and I could say that, but my consulting is what brings in a good amount of that. And my nonfiction sales brings in a good amount of that. And the workshops and conferences I teach at is another income stream and my fiction, you know, it does decently well, but it’s not the thing that is paying for my entire lifestyle.

I also have a patron of the arts, so you know, my husband kicks in as well. So there’s, there’s all of these things that go in the mix, and so you can say, well, I’m a full time creative. But the backend of that looks completely different for different people.

And you know, I think, we don’t talk about that as much as we maybe need to because it creates these expectations that I should be able to do this, or I have failed.

And I know that’s very, very challenging. So, yeah, I would just be interested to talk a little bit about that, like what is that like navigating through other people’s expectations and the Facebook life that we see?

Constance Mears:  Yeah. Well, I think, distilling things to a commodity or a dollar figure, is a handy way to help measure, and yet I think it, Oh, needs to often a competitive or comparative relationship with other creatives. I, somebody who’s on there and it’s like, wow, they’re doing so well. Why am I struggling? And yet I think there are our broader definitions of wealth. Personally, I’d rather have, break bread, literally only have enough to share bread.

But if the table is full with a bunch of creative people who are talking about ideas and you know what they’re working on and that life force, I’m an introvert, so I don’t have very many of those parties. What I’m saying is there are other things besides having, you know, the fancy car and what a hundred figures? I don’t even know what I would spend a hundred figure- six to eight years on.

Oh, actually I’ve been playing a game. The group, it explores that. I’ve been looking at this issue from so many different directions. Trying to kind of piece it together. Yeah. And I may get to the end and still not have figured it out, but I still hold fast to that mystery of it, the contemplation of it, the holding it as important is a pathway. But maybe you don’t ever come to any, you know, sure-fire conclusion that then I can sell to other people going, I figured it out, you know. I haven’t figured it out, so, you know, I have nothing to package with bullet points or whatever.

But I feel like the path that I have taken is so authentic and rich and interesting. You know, and not having resources, symptoms were dependent on Providence. And, you know I’ve been privileged to experience things that I probably wouldn’t if I followed what it says on the dollar. It says in God, we trust the people who have the most dollars, that’s the opposite.

If they really believed in power that is benevolent and it’s like as benevolent as nature is, nature’s like super abundant. If you look at one tomato, and how many seeds are in that one tomato, and then how many tomatoes are on one bush. I mean, it’s just. That is mind blowing when you think about it.

And yet, when you get into the dollar, if you define well, by sheer dollars, this paper and it’s a construct, it’s, it’s really not even, it’s not even based on, you know, real value. So it’s ineffective.

Crystal: I think it’s really interesting looking at, wealth and the idea of money, because money’s never about money.

Like everybody has these super strong sort of visceral reactions to money. It’s fascinating when you  look at why relationships break up or people fight or whatever, money is one of the most common reasons actually. And, and money is never about money. Money is energy. You can use to make other things happen, the things we make happen that are where that conflict comes from. But I, I think one thing, like you can say, Oh, well, you know, I’ve, I’ve not really hit that abundance, but if you look at what the average person owes. Like the debt ratio for most people, I believe it’s about $250,000

And they’re averaging out everyone, so like some people are way higher than that, and I think that includes mortgages, but if you like average, the amount of debt by the population, it’s about, and I’m going to have to check this figure, but my brain is telling me it was around $250,000. It was high enough that I remember feeling physically sick when I saw the number.

And just thinking like, Oh, wow, okay. So even if that is your mortgage, just makes sense. I mean, around where I live an apartment costs usually between about 400 and a million and something dollars, like 400,000 and a million something. A house you pretty much can’t buy for like less than $750,000 in this area where I live.

So like all of Vancouver kind of area, we’re known for our expensive housing. For those of you out there listening and feeling horrible. It’s very beautiful here, and very expensive. So I think it’s, it’s interesting to think about that. All of these people we see living in abundance may actually owe three or four or five times the amount of what their income is.

And so is it more abundant to live beyond your means or to leverage the incoming current dollars against your future? Or is it more abundant to actually live with what you have and make choices that do not put you in debt? So I don’t know. I think that has to be factored in if we’re talking about authenticity and realness and actually examining the hard truths of some things.

I think that as a business person and as and author, I mean, so many people are willing to leverage their current life for what is a possible income stream in the future. And so I know I harp on this a little bit cause I’ve been one of those people who did that and then paid the price, is just making choices that don’t mortgage your future self-freedom.

Basically as we go into these decisions and I think you’ve been very creative about how you’ve done your publishing business and you have not incurred any debt to do that, which isn’t, I think that that’s a very hard thing to do. And I think you’ve done that amazingly well, but I just think it’s, it’s a good thing for people to be aware of that that is possible to do. And you know, something to shoot for.

Constance Mears: Yeah. And I take it for granted actually, because I’ve been doing it for so long, 20 years ago. I decided I didn’t want to be in debt. I felt so locked in from, you know, into the future mortgage essentially. And I didn’t even have a house, but the debt alone, and it wasn’t that much, you know.

But for me it felt like, yeah, I might need to compromise choices. So for my value system, staying out of that prison is, the word keeps coming, that’s dramatic, but that’s how it feels.

Crystal: Debtor’s prison is a real thing, right? Like that was a real place. And it’s, it’s a metaphorical place too.

Constance Mears: And I think it’s, it’s a metaphorical place for how people feel. They’re not locked behind bars, but they’re locked in a cubicle, often. But they made choices prior. So for 20 years, I’ve lived in with no debt, no credit card, which means I have learned to live within my means. And I know for a lot of people, they’re agast at that, they can’t even fathom what that looks like.

It just resonates more truly with my value system. And that’s a big choice. It does limit what I’m able to get sometimes. Sometimes I have to, you know, work with something funky for a while. It’s not the worst thing I gotta tell ya. When you look at the lifestyle that we enjoy in Western culture, that’s a huge generalization and I’m already regretting saying it, but, just the lifestyle, the benefits that we have. I mean, if you have hot water running out of your tap and food on your table and friends, and there’s so much more to life than the square footage.

I feel the same way about life. In fact, I’d rather go for a juicy, compact life that has so much Gusto. I’m not going for longevity. Let’s put it that way. I’m going for meaning. You know, there’s a same as within, so without, so I think what our values are really does reflect out in how we live our life.

And you can, you know, justify it rationally, but at some level, there’s a subconscious desire to play it out the way that we do. And I love that we’re, we’re free to make those choices. And I’m not going to say suffer the consequences. I live the consequences of, of choices that I make.

And I could have done a bigger splash. It could have been done a big launch when I put my book out, but I’d rather- and this is what’s happened, actually. People will read it and go, Oh my gosh, you know, I’ll get an email, thank you for writing that. It touches them in some place and then they buy it or, or, you know, share it with somebody else.

And I’d rather have it trickle out that way in an organic way. That’s fine. It’s not the road to riches for sure. But you know, to me it resonates with my desire for meaning. Authenticity.

Crystal: Well, and I think you’re not building a sales funnel. You’re building a movement like you know, your book as much as it’s about you, isn’t it really about you. It’s about drawing people’s attention to the fact that we don’t have all of the time. You know, a lot of other things are renewable. Time, not so much.

We have what we have and we don’t know exactly how much that’s going to be. And so, you know, making our choices now as if we don’t have all the time in the world is a very valuable exercise.

And I think, you know, sort of that is the legacy that comes with the Bumbling Mystics Obituary. So now that we’ve piqued all of your curiosity, where can people find that book if they want to go read it.

Constance Mears: Well, my first choice would be for them to go to their local bookstore and ask for it, because I love that sort of a human scale economy.

Of course it’s available also on Amazon. Let’s see if that’s even available as an ebook on my website. The fact that I don’t know that, and I don’t have a, you know, that strong call for action. It’s so funny. I mean, I studied sales funnels. As you know, from every angle. I get the psychology of it. I totally do.

There was a quote that I had when I was writing, “don’t be a writer who needs readers, be the kind of writer that readers need”. And the focus on, I feel like from the publishing, the commercial end of it, or the business end of it is about, you know, getting those readers, you know?

Volume and I’m not about volume, I’m about depth, I guess. And, and you know, I’d rather reach three people and have it be something that they keep turning back to when they have a big choice in their life. And you think I can do this differently. And my hope is that when they get to the end of their life, they do not have a regret that they did not go for that soulful path.

And do the short term vision. But they went for the vision that’s going to get them closer to who they are that can be, or who they came here to be essentially.

Crystal: Okay. So speaking of making choices and branching points and everything else, I have one challenging question for you to wrap up with, which is, if you could get in a time machine and you could travel back to any period in your life and give yourself a piece of advice, when would you go? And what would you say as far as like helping your current creative self become what you need to become.

Constance Mears: I think that’s pretty easy. There were quite a few turning points that, you know, one decision either way really could change the trajectory, but I think way from the beginning, when I was 13, I took off to the mountains 80 miles from my house. To go contemplate the meaning of life.

This is not a shtick. This is who I am. And I was so lost because you know who does that? I was so out of step with my family that I had no sense of belonging. And you know, if you look at Maslow’s hierarchy of needs, that belonging is right in the middle, and you can’t go for your dreams until you figure out that piece.

[00:56:18] And it took so long. I mean, one of the archetype stories that I really resonate with is the Ugly Duckling. Just really suppressing that mystery side of me because I was not accepted. And seen as strange. So I would take her in my arms and say, you’re okay. And it’s going to be okay.

It’s going to be rocky. It’s going to be a wild ride. Let me tell you that. But, well, the whole truth to that, you know, looking back at my life, I feel like that is the most tenderest part of me and also the most precious. And I guess that that is the aspect of myself that I am not willing to sell on the marketplace.

And unfortunately, so much of my work comes from that place, so it’s all attached. So I don’t know where the mark, you know, I can paint, I can paint any subject. And I could probably make a really good living if I would do sunsets or just, you know, something everybody understands. But I often just want to go into the esoteric and you know, that’s, it’s not blockbuster material general.

Crystal: As you said, it will attract the right people and it is who you are. And for that we are thankful because there is only one Constance Mears in the world.

Constance Mears: There is! And I guess one of the reasons I don’t sell a package of, Oh, follow me. Oh, I would not, you know, don’t follow in my footsteps.

I’ve done a lot of the transformations organically. Not with mentorship, which, you know, that’s a whole another podcast. Right. So, you know, my advances are hard won. You know, that’s the one thing is folks selling programs and stuff.

A lot of times they’re implying that they’re going to give you a shortcut to save you, you know, years and years of mistakes or whatever. I feel like every mistake, if you really want to call it mistakes, I’ve learned something from those. And for me it’s the difference between moving through a city in your car versus walking, walking, you are not moving so fast that you can see butterflies, which probably is not that compelling to other people, but you can see what it’s appealing to you.

On a really micro level, I guess. And being present in the moment, I feel like we’re on such a hurry to get to that pinnacle, whatever that idea of success is we’re such in a hurry, you know, 30, under 30 or whatever, and, and that we hear about prodigies and all that, but you don’t really get a long life, and that’s all part of life.

I don’t want to get to a part and go, I made it, and then I’m going to coast the rest of my life. It’s appealing, I guess. I actually enjoy the discovery of Oh, I thought I wanted this. What was that about? What did I really want you? I thought he wanted this thing, but what was the quality behind it I felt somehow was missing in me that I wanted to ingest it in some consume, I guess.

And all our consuming behavior, I think is at some level we need to feel something within us. That’s the other thing is, at the times where I have made the most money, I’ve spent so much of that money consoling my soul for not getting to do the thing that I really want to do.

But so for me, it’s kind of a tradeoff. I think that’s why. A lot of people do go into debt is they want it so bad and I get that, you know? So I, yeah, I just, I support everyone and just living their most authentic life. Whether that includes six figures or not.

No judgment if that’s your thing. I, you know, I have a best friend who wants to win the lottery. She just wants to be filthy rich. Go play that game. That’s a fun, interesting you know, realm to play in. It’s like a big sandbox and you get to pick which, or not sand- play playground pick whether you’re on the sandbox or the swing or the slide or whatever.

Okay. Now if totally have not answered your question.

Crystal: On that note, I am conscious of the time, in fact ticking by and all the living that needs to be done in the remaining time. So we are going to let you get to that. So thank you so much, Constance, for sharing all of our winding, adventurous explorations into the ideas and business stuff. I think it’s been a really great look for people into other ways of doing things and the value of trusting yourself and feeling comfortable in the choices you’ve made and really owning that.

So thank you for opening up about all of those things and sharing that with us and your bravery and putting your story out there in such a beautiful package.

There are links in the show notes to her books and websites and art stuff and all of the things. She may not market herself, but I will market her for her. Benefits of being on the podcast. And I look forward to talking to you again soon.

Constance Mears: I always enjoy talking with you, Crystal.

Post interview discussion

Crystal: Welcome back.

And I’m curious to hear, what are your thoughts on that interview? I was there, so I got to see it first hand, but I’m curious to know, what did you think?

Michele: Now I get to talk.

Crystal: Now you get to talk.

Michele: So I have to say, Constance was the first person that approached writing in a very peculiar, fresh way. Different from everything I thought. It’s an approach to writing that it’s very inner based. So it just, we were talking before offline about like something feeling more like a mysticism and religion and philosophy. It’s all attached together. When you listen to what she’s saying, but also the way she moves, the way she sees that the works and add the world.

It’s very, very, very particular and I found it useful because there are several things that she says you have to listen to it twice in order to gather what’s the message in? There is some of the things that I wrote that I had to write to read like a couple of times and then I was like, wow, I didn’t think about that that way.

So there’s one thing that I wanted to leave last, but I’m going to tell you now, that really made me stop. And there is a sentence she says, I’m not sure if she forged the sentence or she took it from somewhere else, but she says, don’t be a writer who needs readers. Be the kind of writer who readers need.

And that made me pause for like 30 seconds. And I was like, there is so much in these two sentences that probably in most of the books that I read about like self-help and, bettering your or yourself. It’s just, it’s so condensed. And so I will say like all this interview, you have to really listen to what she says to gather it.

That’s like what I thought and that’s why these things that I’m saying it, it’s point, point number 11 of my list of things that I wanted to say, but because it fits so well. I need to say like, just right there. Did you like that sentence?

Crystal: Yeah. I love that. That, I mean, that’s one of the things that I sort of believe as a mission statement is, you know, share what you think people need and then they’ll come find you. I totally agree with that.

Michele: It wasn’t like a, like a punch in the face. You’re gonna say a punch in the face, but in a good way. So it made you pause. But going back to the beginning, um, she really starts the conversation from a, like a low place and then she kind of build up on the thing she said.

So there is, the way she started the conversation is by like kind of asking a question, how to fund like fund like money wise. Also the creative endeavor. And now what nowadays with desktop publishing and stuff like this, she mentioned it’s more easy than previously doing that, but so many things that are out there that distacts us.

You know, the Facebook society or the Facebook economy. Also, if you want to, there are so many things, and we discuss about these things a bit more in previous episodes, I’m thinking about the Liza episode, like she was very good in saying that how disconnect yourself from Sonia could actually be one of the best things you can do for a limited amount of time for your writing career.

She basically doubled that. Because she’s really outside of that, she doesn’t use, my understanding is that much, social media. Even at her website, like it’s used more like a business card, I guess from people that want to find her. But it’s really more an approach based on passion for what she’s doing, the why.

And she has a very strong sense of the why her, why, which is not something like that very many people have. And you can say your writing is wrong. So she says like, I don’t want to make a six figure income, like I’m not interested in that kind of thing. I’m more interested- my why is that my message is delivered to that person in a very, very genuine way.

I can’t say like my why or your wife’s better than her. So it is a very particular way of seeing the world and the craft. So we’ll say that’s basically the point from all of the rest of her philosophy or mysticism, takes place. That’s the point where all the conversations spawn afterwards.

There are another couple of things that she says that I found very useful. And she says, are we moving people to a Holy place in a deeper place? Are we building fanatics? Now the way she explained the concept of fanatics is exactly how I expect a person like Constance would explain it to you.

She explained the origin of the name. Me, myself, I don’t fanatics was something related to, I don’t know in the past. I know, but maybe not more than two or three centuries. In the past. But she’s basically taking, yeah, the root of the word and explaining why.

And that made me think like, well, she says of the people that in the past had to wait in a particular place before entering at the shrine or temple or whatever it was. It is emblematic. And at the same time, if I tell you, what do you think of fanatics? You would think of maybe, yeah, as followers on Instagram or somebody that really likes your book, but the sense  Constance was trying to explain. It’s much more deep. It’s much more in line with what she thinks of the message. So I found that interesting.

There are different things that you can think of with fanatics. You can think of him or her as a, the famous article, a 1000 true fans might be, or you can think as a fan, as a person that is reading your book and he’s transformed.

So I found that particularly useful. And then there was like a shift. I mean, a shift when you ask her, why did you self-publish? And that spawned so many other things. And I don’t want to dig too much into that because like Constance was so, so good in explaining it. There are just a couple of things that I want to say about that.

Her way of self-publishing is in line with her why. Two of the things she said is, I want to be meaningful and I want to be authentic. That’s paramount for her. Like she doesn’t care that much about the money kind of things. And it’s completely fine. We, I want to be paid for our things.

This podcast is called the strategic authorentrepreneur also because we want to create like a stream of revenue for this. What she says, I think profound in a way. That I found that written only in one other book, which is the War of Art from Steven Pressfield. If you think about that, he says, Steven accepted the same thing.

Plant a seed. Do the work you’re supposed to do in the legacy for your work. These are her words. This is something that also Steven was saying. She spoke about that authenticity, meaning plant the seed, do the work. I was like, this is exactly the message that the other person was conveying.

And I was reminded of the fact of why I perceived it to be so powerful. So plant the seed, authenticity. And, the other thing that I wanted to point out was when she related to the writing as like creating a spell. Again, if you think about that mysticism of philosophy.

She says you can create the reality through ideas. And she got this idea from a quest. I think she went into the mountains when she was 13 if I’m not mistaken, and later on. But it’s true. If you think about that, writing is like creating a spell.

You can create it reality through ideas. That’s why people love them. That’s why people can get to love a person that doesn’t exist that is just in your mind and you as any other author that has been able to move people. People connect with authors that can deliver a message through character.

And I think that was, was exactly what she was meaning what she meant.

You have a really great superpower. Or you can bend reality. You can change ideas. And you can write a romance, a serious novel that will make people question the way they are dealing with a partner. I’m sure 100% that you get emails of people that were moved from what you said, and even if you just give them a good time in that moment, you create a product that is just for entertainment.

It relates to the fact of creating the spell. And you know a lot about creating spells, Crystal, because your Oona was like a witch of sorts. But if you think about her also as a character, she stopped, inside me and I still remember her because like, she was compassionate.

And she really was trying to make the best out of her life. And she wanted to make the relationship with the other significant other that- I don’t want to talk about because I don’t want to spoil it, but she wanted to make things right. So that’s why I connected with her so much.

And I do believe that Constance was mentioning that. The power of creating characters. It’s something we, as an author, wise authors, have a deep responsibility. Of doing as best we can. And again, doesn’t matter if we’re doing that because we want a money in the stands. He want something a bit more tangible, or if you want to just be remembered.

Or if you want to make a person feel okay in that particular sense. It’s just important that you follow your calling. And I don’t know what you came out to from the conversation, but I think these three to four points are that I mentioned were the most significant for me and I was very happy to eat them to this, I’m saying peculiar, but I will say more like fresh approach to writing. What do you think?

Crystal: I think- do you know Miss Peregrine’s Home for Peculiar Children Do you know that book? Okay. So it’s a YA book, and it is sort of magical realism, sort of stuff, but ‘peculiar’ can also mean special or, or different or whatever.

So, I think peculiar is actually a good word in that it’s not in a negative way, it’s just in a different, and it’s, it stops and makes you think, I think about things in a way that you maybe weren’t, and I think it’s very easy to get so wrapped up in the author business stuff and when you start treating it as a business, which you need to, and that is good, but I think it is possible to lose sight of the readers.

Like when you were talking earlier about the resource books that we read and all of the how to stuff, is all focused on what the author is doing and what you’re pushing outward into the world. It’s not focused on what you’re drawing into you. By the actions that you’re taking. So I think it’s an interesting combination of the strangers to super fans book.

And Constance’s interview where we’re looking at the same thing we’re looking at how do we create a situation that invites people in and then makes fanatics of them right in a good way. So fanatic we talked about as the source of, or the root of the word fan, which we use now very commonly, but I think really that is what we’re doing.

I mean, that is our ultimate goal is to create our own tribe of fanatics. And I think what you were mentioning around the power we have to create reality. I mean, we are word wizards. It’s what we do. So we make, we cast spells with our words. We create new realities and possibilities. And when we’re talking about how does that impact people, or what effect does that have on readers in terms of actually also rippling out into the real world.

Our characters can model change and growth in a way that people might not be able to see if it’s too close to them.

When we’re looking at a character who has been in a bad situation, they’ve maybe learned a certain way of dealing with something. Current circumstances are challenging, the beliefs they have about themselves, and they are changing how they think, changing how they act.

They’re coming to some realization as they overcome the obstacles in the story that have them grow as people. So I’m a health psychologist by background. I worked as a counselor for many, many years and it’s an interesting opportunity, that I look at my stories as a way of showing people they have options in how they stay or don’t stay in relationships in how they choose to interact with people that they know and love and or hate and, or don’t understand.

And so I think, for me, that’s where the power comes in and where I look to connect with the audience is that you do as a storyteller, have the option to effect change on the real world. And I think looking at building your audience. From that sort of magic point of view or mystical point of view.

There is a certain magic that happens in the, in between space between you and that story and that story and the reader and the world that you all kind of live in together. There is a real magic there and there is a legacy to be left. You know, when I think of all the most important or memorable moments in my life, so many of them are connected to stories in some way, whether it’s, you know, curled up with with my mom reading me a story, or, you know, my, my grandma buying me, my first Nancy drew book for my eighth birthday, or whatever it is. There’s so many things that are tied, to stories and stories that have changed the way I think about the world.

And so I think, you know, it is extremely. Powerful and it is something we need to be conscious of using our powers for. Good. If we’re going to be word wizard. So we need to cast the right kinds of spells on people. And, and I think it’s really just a fabulous reminder that there, there are more than one way to do the things that we have a choice.

We are people, we are authors, we are business owners. And we can choose two. You know, stick with our ethics and stick with business methodologies that feel good to us. Because if we feel like we are authentic in our choices as far as our business models go and the way that we implement some of the tools and some of the processes that people recommend.

That authenticity is going to be higher. It’s going to feel like us more. Our readers are going to make a more genuine connection and that is going to both ripple out over time and it’s going to make you less tired because when you were pretending or editing yourself or trying to be like somebody else, instead of being like you, it’s hard work and it’s often not very comfortable and everything feels just a little bit off and-

I, you know, to go back to the Wizarding, I don’t think you can cast a really good spell. If things are off. You need all of the elements working together and you need all of that in alignment. So I think it’s really important to just to be aware that you have choices. You can always take the best of what any opportunity has to offer and adjust things to fit what feels right for you.

And I think Constance is an excellent example of a way to do that. And no, your goal might not be making six figures. It doesn’t mean you can’t make money doing that. I think you absolutely can. And maybe you’ll feel better about the money you are making if you are sticking with your values in your business.

So I think that’s really, really important to consider is your why and how your, what is going to support the why, not compromise it.

How old were you when you first met someone who had written a book?

Okay. Speaking of compromising. Let’s see what we can do in terms of damage with our curious jar today.

Yes, there are still some left, but you should send us more. We would like more. So for all of listeners out there, the curious jar is getting a bit low on questions. We need to refill it. So please send us in your ideas and you, sir can tell me when to stop.

Yellow one. Okay. Today’s curious question. Oh, this is a fun one. Okay. How old were you when you first met someone who had written a book?

Michele: Okay. Like met personally?

Crystal: Yeah.

Michele: Okay. So I think I have the answer to that. I was 26 or 27. No, scratch that. 27 or 28. Yeah. And she was Evangeline Lilly, which is one of the stars of Lost.

She wrote a kids book, which I don’t remember the name. But she was presenting the book, she was the author of this book. I met her and I spoke with her briefly, of course.

And, actually this is funny. One of the characters in Onniologos which is my first time fiction book. She’s called Evangeline because of basically her, because I liked her character in Lost. So that’s weird. I didn’t know, like you see these weird questions got me like bumbling and suffering, but this is a true story. That’s the first time I met actually a celebrity and an author at the same time, and it just happened a few years ago. That’s interesting. I want to hear about your experience.

Crystal: Yeah, I was trying to think of when the first time I met and author was, and I know I didn’t know anybody who wrote books in school.

My grandma wrote a book actually, and that was part of what got me into publishing. And so that was an interesting start. I didn’t it meet any authors in college? That wasn’t a thing. I thank you was probably, I joined CWILL BC, which is the Children’s Writers and Illustrators of BC and so I think probably the folks in CWILL were the first authors that I met, and they were all children’s writers who had been published.

And I may have actually published a book before I really met published authors, actually. But once I did, then I met a ton of published authors and I joined all the things and went all the places. I think that was my, my introduction to most folks, but I do remember the first time I met and author who was on my own bookshelf that I’d had at home, and that was pretty memorable.

That was at the Surrey international writers’ conference. Which was actually the same year that I joined CWILL, so it was a big year. I went from not knowing a single author to suddenly knowing dozens and dozens and dozens of authors, but I met Jack White and Diana Gabaldon at the Surrey international writers’ conference, and both of them had their own shelf on my bookshelf growing up.

So I was very, very excited about that and it seemed very surreal. Very, very surreal. So yeah, there you go. But I was 26 or 27 I think.

So we would love if you would tell us how old were you when you met your first author and what was that experience like? If you drop by strategicauthorpreneur.com and check out this episode, you will be able to post in the comments, your story so we can get to know you a bit better. And our jar is low on questions as we mentioned. So if you can send a curious jar question to ideas@strategicauthorpreneur.com then we’ll add it to the mix for next week.

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