100: Lessons I've Learned As A Writer + Editor After 100 Episodes

 

It's the 100th episode of the Blank Page to Book podcast! Thanks to everyone who has listened, reviewed, and shared the podcast :)

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Lessons I've Learned As A Writer + Editor After 100 Episodes

Hi, friends, welcome to a very special episode of the podcast. This is the 100th episode of the Blank Page to Book podcast. So I thought I would do a little bit of a celebratory episode and share what I've learned as a writer, what I've learned as a creator, and entrepreneur, and editor, coach, all the things from doing this podcast for so long now. It's wild to think it's been, you know, almost two year coming up on two years and 100 episodes of this podcast. And I'm recording this in early September, I believe it will come out end of September, right? A few weeks before I start my maternity leave, knock on wood hoping that baby doesn't come soon.

 

So I've been in this period of reflection just generally about my business and about what I want it to look like moving forward, what I want my content to look like going forward, the podcast, all of that. And I'm not going to make any decisions about anything until after I come back from maternity leave, because I'm about to go through a massive life change. And I want to give myself an opportunity to just do that and try and you know, try and let myself be present as much as possible once I have this baby. And I'm on leave. And I'm hoping I'll have some clarity on things when I come back. So yeah, I'm really excited to talk about what I've learned because doing this podcast has been such a good experience for me. And hopefully, it's been helpful in a good experience for you listening as well. And if you are one of the OGS if you've been listening since the beginning, thank you so much. It means the world to me that you download, that you listen that you share any episodes that resonate with you, if you message me about an episode, like leaving a review on Spotify or Apple podcasts. Thank you so much. I really really appreciate your support. And I am so happy that I get to create the that I've had the ability to to create these episodes for you.

 

Okay, so let's get into what I have learned. Number one. Eliminating friction is key making it as easy as possible, is key when doing something that has to come out weekly like a podcast. And I think this is a lesson that can apply to anything that you would do regularly or anything that you want to make a habit. Anything that you can do to make it easy or easier. Anything that you can do to streamline the process to simplify it, to eliminate resistance is going to help you do it and show up and be successful in creating the thing or doing the thing. And with this podcast, I knew from the get go from starting this that if I did 45 minute podcast episodes, it would be very draining and very challenging for me to put out an episode every single week. I also knew that it was going to be very challenging for me if I tried to have a guest based podcast where every week I had a different guest and it was more of an interview style show. I did not want to do either of those things.

 

And I still don't to be honest, I don't want to have an interview style show. I don't want to do super like the episodes because doing it this way where my episodes are, I don't know 10 to 20 minutes is so much more manageable for me in terms of workload and just output and my brain. It's overwhelming to think about doing like a 45 minute or an hour long podcast. And if I happen to be at a point where I'm making lots of money for the podcast, and I have sponsors and it's, you know a good revenue stream for me then sure I could see maybe doing a longer episode, but right now like it's, I don't make any money on this podcast. It's just me and my microphone. And you know, it's not, it's not at that point. So yeah, so that helps it feel less overwhelming and much more manageable.

 

And another way to eliminate friction is to just batch record episodes. Like I tried to do at least two or three episodes every single time that I record and edit so that way I'm getting a few done at a time. It's just again, all about making it more manageable. So lesson two that I've learned from doing this podcast is kind of an awareness of how easy it is to slip into qualifying a statement that I make because of people pleasing tendencies that I have, Meaning that when I say something like, I think this thing about writing, I think it's best to do this way. I think it's best to develop characters in this way, I think it's best to work towards your rough draft by doing this process. And then not getting into 100 qualifying statements after that, and not saying, well, of course, you know, best and like, this isn't going to be true, if you have any sort of like ADHD or, you know, if you if that doesn't work for you, that's fine. Like, I also know writers who do this other methods, you can try that.

 

And, you know, this might not apply for you, if you're writing like one of these genres. And just, I can just let the statement stand, because I'm not saying this way, is the only way to do it. And if you do it the other way, you're wrong. I'm simply saying, based on my experience, I usually recommend this way, or this method. That's all I'm saying. And I can let that stand on its own, or I should be able to, I don't always do that. And part of it is from a desire to genuinely not want to make any writer who's listening feel bad if they do something different, or if they decide not to take, you know, a recommendation, or they're like, oh, what's wrong with me, that doesn't work for me.

 

But I have to trust that people are smart enough to know when to take advice and when to not take it. Like if I recommend something and you don't agree, you don't think it's going to work for you, then that is totally fine. And you can just disregard it. And that's it. That's all it has to be. And it's so difficult to do that. And I don't know that I've gotten better at it. I think I've gotten a little bit better. Actually, no, I want to give myself some credit, I have gotten better. But it's still something that I'm working on particularly because the longer that I do this, the more nuanced I realized there is in writing, like we're all approaching it from different lived experiences, and lives and temperaments and schedules. And it's like, I don't know it, things are rarely so black and white, as I maybe once believed they were when I first started writing. So it can be challenging sometimes to create content that says something decisively. Because it's like, well, there's nuance to it. So anyways, I think I think doing this podcast for this many episodes has really made me aware of where I still have some work to do in that respect.

 

And it's also, like, I'm really in awe of content creators, or just people online who have podcasts, or maybe even if they don't even have podcasts, they just create content, people who can just say things so confidently, and let their statement stand and not feel the need to defend it or explain it. Obviously, assuming it's nothing harmful or hurtful, like it's just like, they're stating an opinion or a preference. And they don't go into like all of this explanation and defense and like, it's okay, if you don't agree and blah, blah, they just let it stand. I'm really in awe of that. So I'll keep you know, keep coming back. Keep working on that. The third thing that I have learned and really discovered in this process is that articulating my thoughts the way that I do in the podcast, and especially in in episodes where I have to do some prep work to decide like, okay, what points am I going to make? What tips am I going to share? It's really helped me become a better coach in a better book editor.

 

I think because I have to articulate why I believe something like if I'm recommending something, I need to go into it and give you all an explanation of why I think that or why I'm recommending that or go into an explanation about different methods that I might be sharing to accomplish certain things in your writing, like developing characters or writing your first chapter, or writing or not writing a prologue whatever it might be. It's forced me to kind of get clear on what I think, you know, based off of my experience and figure out a way to articulate it, which I think is made me particularly I mean, yes, a better better editor but I'm particularly a better coach because I can more clearly articulate things to my clients, if that makes sense. So yeah, it's been, it's been a good experience for me, of learning how to communicate a message to people and articulate my thoughts, which I think is helpful, you know.

 

The last thing I have on my list here is, the more fun that I have, the better the product. And this is something that's so funny, I really feel like I've been encountering this more and more in the content creation process, in the process of creating this podcast, just anything that I'm creating my own writing, even, like, the more that I enjoy the process, the more that I enjoy what I'm doing, the more fun that I have. The more the better it is like, the better the outcome is. And the more I want to do it, it kind of goes back to that first point or first lesson of like, eliminating friction and eliminating resistance. If I force myself to do episodes that I don't care about, and I'm not interested in and they don't want to do, then it would be really hard to sit down and record this podcast, it would be very difficult to kind of work it into my schedule. But if I create episodes that yes, I think y'all will enjoy that are going to be helpful for people but also aren't that are based on topics that I want to talk about. That's the sweet spot. That means I'm so much more likely to have fun recording the podcast and putting it out into the world and sharing about it. And then in turn, I think that helps the quality of the podcast, I think that the episodes are better when I genuinely am enjoying the stuff that I'm talking about.

 

And that kind of, you know, I mentioned at the beginning of the episode about potentially thinking about new directions or my business or maybe not new directions, maybe that's too drastic, but just thinking of asking myself, like if there's anything I want to change or rebrand, or tweak when I come back from maternity leave. And a lot of it comes down to that, like what am I feeling called to do? What am I feeling a pull towards? Because the more that I can honor that, and the more that I can pay attention that to that as a business owner and a content creator, I think the better my messaging is going to be, the better my energy is going to be, the more I'm going to be able to help people and show up. So that's something that I'm really paying attention to with the podcast as well. I don't know what the answer is, I might do nothing different when I come back. But just continue to create episodes on topics that I think will be both helpful and interesting for me to talk about. But who knows, we'll see.

 

I think it's always a good idea to pay attention to how things are going for me as a business owner and do a gut check and assess like, is there anything that I want to change? Am I feeling fulfilled by what I'm doing? Is there anything that that might be more exciting, you know, just kind of assessing. So that is our 100th episode. Again, thank you so much for listening. I have loved doing these, these episodes for you. And I'm excited to do a few more. Like I mentioned in this episode, I'm batch recording a few. So there are going to be a few episodes that come out once I'm on maternity leave that I'm recording now so that we'll have a few ready to go while I'm out so that way I don't have to create any new episodes. All right. Well, thank you for listening to this. I hope you have a fabulous week. Thank you so much for tuning in.

Katie Wolf