Influential Reading

Like many readers, there are stand-out books that have influenced my life significantly. Ignoring the obvious answers of In Deep Dark Wood and Harry Potter and the Philosopher's Stone (my first favourite book, and the first book in a series that would get me hooked on books), the fiction options dwindle significantly.

Darren Shan's Cirque du Freak threw me into his books quickly, which lead to his overall influence on my life. That was important for me, at age 12, to find a new series that I could read, a new author whose books I adored.

But the non-fiction is where the biggest changes have occurred in the past few years.

When I got my hands on Tim Ferriss's The Four-Hour Work Week, it opened up my mind to the idea that I didn't necessarily have to live a standard life. I didn't have to restrict myself to the idea of working a 9-5 job, if it ever came down to that.

However, it wasn't a full set of answers.

It was Americanised. It presumed prior knowledge or prior work experience. It presumed that I wanted to live my life in a particular way, and it avoided one very important issue: how did I want to earn a living?

While Ferriss's idea of a four-hour work week was appealing (except, you know, if you get paid by the hour), it wasn't for me. I didn't want to set up or own a business I didn't believe in. I would rather work 40 hours at something I loved and could talk about passionately than to do four hours of maintenance per week on a business that was just a source of income.

I couldn't sell the idea to myself.

When I read Nicholas Lovell's The Curve, things changed. I had a model to follow a little more closely. I could see how I could run a business I loved, on a time-scale similar to that Ferriss presented. I could see the value of free, I could see how what I wanted to do in life could be both fun and profitable.

I was almost there.

I had a near-ideal model. I had an explanation of how that model might work for me. All I needed was something to make that model make sense to me passionately.

Enter Syd Field's Screenplay.

I know what you might be thinking. That's not a business book. Hollywood is incredibly competitive. Blah-blah-blah. It's a dream. It's an aspiration. It's something to strive for. But that wasn't all I got out of the book.

I could see myself using his teachings. I could see my craft explode in front of me - not into nothingness, but into something more. It was like a new beginning, and it gave sense to the model. I worked it out.

You see, I want to work in publishing. But publishing is a big business, and a loaded term. It could be my own business, or it could be for one of the biggies, but it's the dream. It's also not a great way to make money.

The only way I see this working is to combined writing and publishing, and the writing can't just be fiction. It needs to be non-fiction that seeks to help others. It needs to be screenplays that, if they're lucky enough to make it to cinemas as a finished film, will give people a sense of joy. I need to be able to teach people about the world in some way, shape or form. Movies change lives. They can show people something with just enough reality that the message gets through.

That's the passion - the message. That's what Ferriss couldn't show me how to deliver. That's what Lovell was guiding me towards. And Field, he finished the job, by going back to the basics, back to where my dreams started - with writing, and with the business of it.

The thing is, I didn't go looking for change. I went looking for an interesting read. The books that influence us most aren't the ones we expect to change our lives. The books that influence us just happen, mostly by accident, and that's where the pleasure lies in them. While there are other books that have helped shape my life in different ways, like Brendon Burchard's The Millionaire Messenger, there's less than a handful that actually piece together to form a cohesive model that I can follow - one that requires my own input in the making. Those are the books I'll cling to, the ones I'll return to for advice and wisdom, again and again.

Subject to Change

I have dreams. I have big dreams, and I have little dreams, and I have dreams inspired by books that I read. I aspire for things now that I didn't think I would ever aspire to ten years ago, and almost every new book I read makes me want to do something else amazing. My dreams are subject to change.

When I read The Millionaire Messenger, I decided to become an expert in writing. I made a conscious decision to publish an article a week on my website on the subject, and I've been keeping to it. I built a schedule to publish new material across my three main sites regularly: my writing website, my personal blog, and my poetry and prose blog. I haven't missed a day all year. I'm still on the path to establishing myself in the field.

As part of this, I wanted to write and publish three books on writing that go a step above and beyond Planning Before Writing and 25 Ways to Beat Writer's Block. I planned all three, and I still intend on writing them. Today, I drew up the schedule for completing a novella, and then beginning the first of these three books.

When I read The $100 Start Up, I decided that it wouldn't be too difficult to start a publishing house. I drew up lists of ideas to get things off the ground. I drew up lists of what people I knew had experience in. I ended up with two potential publishing houses that I could, in theory and with some persuasion, follow up on.

One of these has been on my mind for a long time. The other first came to mind last summer. I still haven't followed through on either idea beyond the lists, because I have to acknowledge something: there's a time to start a business, and a few months before planning to begin a one-year, full-time Masters is not that time. In the interim, I still have books to write and publish myself, giving me a full 18 months to develop:

- My publishing prowess
- My ability to market, including cover design and through video
- My plans for publishing
- My audience
- My ability to guide writers in the right direction

The dream job of working in publishing still exists, and there are some things I can only learn through experience. That said, there's a lot to learn before I start out trying to publish others on a regular basis. I don't know that I would do anybody justice taking control of the publishing of their books right now, not on a professional basis. (I can offer help, or give it if asked, but I can't be The Publisher.)

When I started reading Teach Yourself: Make Money From Freelance Writing, I decided that I could build upon existing ideas, and work from previous research. The world of established publishing is looking more appealing. It's also reshaping the three books I've planned. By the end of the month, I intend on having an established plan set out - or at least a new name for the first of the three books I have planned on writing. (I need to re-visit the plan before making a decision on whether to change it entirely or not.)

When I read The Curve, I had an idea of how to actually do all of this in a changing world. A publishing business can't exist in a vacuum. If I pursue digital publishing, I need to be prepared to offer alternatives, and I need to find ways to make everything more appealing than just another ebook on the virtual shelf. I decided I wanted to be more than a publisher, and more than a writer. I wanted to be the go-to guy that The Millionaire Messenger was encouraging me to become, but with a more direct focus on how to it in the face of the future.

I have big dreams, and I don't know how long it'll take until I start ticking them off the proverbial list. I aspire for great things, and all the time my aspirations are subject to change. Every book I read, every experience I have, that's relevant involves a degree of fine-tuning, or gear changing, or adding a whole new perspective on the unseen potential at hand.

I'll talk a lot about how I want to do X, Y and Z, but you've probably noticed by now that a lot of the time the talk remains that way until I'm actually ready to do something about it. I know how quickly life can change and how that affects even the simplest ideas, and I'd like to say I'm doing everything I can to anticipate those changes before they do any real damage.

Here's how I see things right now: I want to write professionally, and I want to do it as a hybrid writer - part Indie, part Traditional. I want to see a novel in the bookshops, a book on writing on a nearby shelf, and articles in the media, and I want to put more work online by myself, managing those decisions myself until or unless someone else decides they look like something they want to publish. I have dozens of ideas to work with, and I don't want to limit myself.

By mid-April, I'll have a lot of freedom in my life, and a lot more time to spend on different tasks and challenges. Between now and then, I need to finalise the next step. I let life get in the way a bit too much, lately - life and procrastination - and I think it's about time I did something about it. I have a book to publish in the next couple of weeks, another I want to write - both novellas - and a third, a book on writing, that I need to get a start on, bit-by-bit for the next few weeks.

Everything is subject to change, and that's the challenge of trying to write for a living. But like anything that involves money, starting out is often the hardest part.