Lorna Faith

Clean Fiction Author

How to Not Quit and Other Lessons Learned from Walt Disney

by

“Mickey Mouse popped out of my mind onto a drawing pad 20 years ago on a train ride from Manhattan to Hollywood at a time when the business fortunes of my brother Roy and myself were at their lowest ebb and disaster seemed right around the corner.” Walt Disney

Have you ever had so many obstacles thrown at you at once that you felt like giving up and calling it quits? I know I have.

Recently I read about Walt Disney’s life. I was inspired by his persistence to keep going. He didn’t have it easy. There were many hurdles to jump through and tight ropes that he walked in his life. I was amazed that through it all he didn’t give up on his dream. 

How Walt Disney Learned Persistence

How did Walt Disney learn to keep at it when the going got tough?

He learned persistence.

Here’s a couple of road blocks that stood in his way, as he tried to establish Disney Studios.

At 21 years of age, while working at an ad company he discovered the world of animation and began making Laugh-O-gram ad reels and animation shorts. Soon the Laugh-O-Grams Films went bankrupt and Disney at 21 years old moved to California with $40 in his pocket. In California he hoped to find work as a director, but instead got a contract for his own work and launched Disney Bros. Studios along with his brother Roy.  

A year later he was focussing on story development and directing and wasn’t working any longer as an animator. However, after several business setbacks Walt and his brother were on the verge of bankruptcy. It was in this stressful time that Walt had the idea for Mickey Mouse. He made a plan to show his seven minute Mickey Mouse Cartoon to several movie executives. His hope was that he could secure a contract and have his short films shown in movie theatres across the US.

One of the movie executives who watched the short film, didn’t laugh at the cartoon, instead he laughed at Disney’s dream. The movie executive told Walt why his dream would never work out. Kids are afraid of mice and moms don’t love them all that much either. No one is going to pay to watch a silly mouse. This will never work. With those words, the movie executive laughed at him and walked out of the theatre.

“When you believe in a thing, believe in it all the way, implicitly and unquestionable.” Walt Disney [Tweet this]

Walt Disney didn’t give up. He kept believing in his dream. He worked hard and soon had his three Mickey Mouse films completed. Those short films established Disney Bros. Studio as the leading animation studio in the country.

After he learned more about animation he took a great risk and pioneered his first feature-length film Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs. Putting together this movie was tough. He had to direct the collaboration of more than 600 employees who drew, inked and painted the drawings. There was over 200 years (total) from employees – many of whom worked nights and weekends without extra pay. He managed to secure over $1 million dollars in funding. It took over three years of animation to complete the movie from start to finish.

Walt Disney persisted and believed that not only would people identify and connect with the animated characters, but that his hard work would pay off. When the movie was released on December 21, 1937, it was an amazing success. By May 1939, the movie Snow White, had become the highest-grossing film in American film, earning $6.7 million dollars.

Many times we give up just before there’s about to be a breakthrough. We decide to quit, just at the point when the water is rising high enough that it’s about to burst the dam.

Don’t give up on your dreams. Not when you’re so close to reaping the rewards of all your hard work.[Tweet this]

Be persistent. If you face financial setbacks or have someone whom you respect laugh at your dream, remember Walt Disney. And keep going.

Remember, not everyone will understand your dream. You need to believe in your dream even when others don’t. Having someone tell you that your dream sucks, is painful and for a few seconds you might feel like quitting.

Instead of letting doubt overwhelm you, focus on the people who are waiting for you to make your dream a reality. 

Find people who believe in you and your vision and surround yourself with them. That’s what Walt Disney did. He had people who worked for awhile without pay because they believed in his dream. 

Most importantly, believe in yourself.

Trust the gut feeling and the passion behind the desire you have to create this product, book, course or innovate or invent something new. That’s what you were made to do. It is the right thing. It might look impossible, but take another look. Dig deeper. There’s small steps you can take that will bring you closer every day to making your dream come true.

Don’t quit. Be true to yourself. Create from your heart. Do it in your own authentic voice and let it be about what you passionately believe in.

Have you had obstacles in the path to your dream where you’ve felt like quitting? I’d love to hear your story in the comments.

3 Steps to Start Tiny Habits that Help You Reach Your Goals

by

When you start Tiny Habits in your writing life, it helps you reach your goals faster.

What are Tiny Habits? Dr. BJ Fogg – a Behavioral Scientist and originator of the term – says that a Tiny Habit is when you do something very, very small. Like floss one tooth, do two pushups or drink one sip of water. In his inspiring TEDx talk – Forget Big Change, Start With One Tiny Habit – BJ Fogg shares tips on how you can change your behavior for good.

Let me share with you what I’ve learned…

3 Steps to Start Tiny Habits…

I’ve needed to get out of what has seemed like a pattern of fear and procrastination. I felt like I was in Psychology 101 again, but this time I was Pavlov’s dog stuck in a repeating habit pattern.

Here’s what I’ve been learning and have come to realize about myself: Fear can be a habit. Left unchecked, fear can become a unconscious loop that goes round and round in our heads.

Many of our habits get triggered by things outside of us(smell, sounds, etc.). Each trigger in your brain results in a behavior and every behavior results in a reward. From a neuroscience perspective this is called a Habit Loop.

In other words, chances are very high that the fears holding you back from achieving your goals are possibly 10, 20 or even 30 years in the making. These fears have become a unconscious pattern that repeats itself over and over again.

Most of the time we have these fears and don’t know how to get out of it, which has definitely been my struggle. I had a elementary school teacher who told me that my writing was like chicken scratchings, and since he was the teacher I respected his opinion. I believed and accepted his words to be truth.

Since that time(many years ago), I’ve literally struggled and battled everyday to get words on the page. I’ve worked hard to push past resistance that showed up in the form of my inner critic. My negative habit loop has gone something like this: my writing isn’t good enough; nobody will read my books; maybe I should quit now, I’ll most likely fail anyway…. and much more.

I’ve had to consciously work toward getting out of this destructive habit loop.

Fear – whether conscious or unconscious – causes you to procrastinate and stops you from achieving your goals.

I didn’t want to continue to let procrastination or fear win, so in the last few months I’ve been learning more about how to get rid of both. 

I have taken steps to understand how to change my unhelpful habit loop. I’ve been choosing everyday to take work on Tiny Habits, and it’s been so encouraging. I hope it helps you too.

Here are 3 Steps to Start Tiny Habits that Help You Reach Your Goals:

1.Take a sheet of paper and write down One Fear you realize that has been holding you back from reaching your goals. Write down whatever the biggest fear is for you that you feel stops you from achieving your goals. For example: For this step I wrote down my #1 fear: I have a big fear that my writing won’t be good enough and that readers won’t want to read my romance novels. 

2.Write down One Tiny Action that you can take immediately – in the next 24 hours – that will move you AWAY from the fear you have and TOWARDS the goal you want to achieve. Think about a tiny step you could take that would move you in the direction of your goal.  Since my big fear has been that my writing won’t be good enough, it has caused me to procrastinate on writing my romance novels.

For example: My One Tiny Action that I’ve chosen to work on, is to write 250 words every single day – without judging my words, and writing those words wether I felt like writing or not. I’ve chosen to just do it.

Also, don’t forget to Celebrate your One Tiny Action 🙂

3.After you have done that One Tiny Action for 7 days, then ADD One More Tiny Habit to your daily goals. Just add something really small to the habit you’ve already started developing in your life. For example: When these 7 days are finished I will add another 250 words to the words I’m already writing everyday.

That’s all there is to it. Simple right?

Some Keys to Remember with Habits.

  • You can stack Tiny Habits on top of each other.
  • What puts most people in the fight, freeze or flight mode is when they think of the Big Goal and they think of all the things they have to do – and then feel overwhelmed. When we feel overwhelmed, our brain switches to fear of success, fear of failure, fear of embarrassment, fear of shame, etc.
  • What will happen as you build these Tiny Habits, is that you’ll start to become a person who feels the emotion of fear and then you take a little action anyway towards what you want to achieve.

Remember: Everyone feels fear. It’s normal. It’s how you handle it and what you do with that fear that matters. So take one small step anyway, when you feel fear.

You’ll be amazed and what happens as you take action on One Tiny Habit for 7 days. I hope you’ll be so inspired by your results, that you’ll want to repeat the process for another 7 days, and so on.

What’s One Tiny Habit you can begin in the next 24 hours that will move you toward your goals? Please comment, I’d love to hear your thoughts!

039 How to Become a High Performance Writer with Nina Amir

by

Subscribe: iTunes | Android

Writers have so many things to do now on top of writing their book. Plus in today’s culture with social media and email there are more distractions than ever before. How do we level up our productivity as High Performance Writers and stay inspired and creative at the same time?

This is what Amazon bestselling author and certified High Performance writing coach Nina Amir talks about in today’s show. In the introduction, I share how important it is as writers to find

inspiration daily – like blogposts, podcasts, books, audio books, writing groups, etc. I love to listen to podcasts, read blogposts and plus read many helpful books on writing, self-publishing and book marketing.

I mention three books that have inspired me lately like: 1)James Scott Bell’s newest book, Marketing for Writers Who Hate Marketing – lots of practical tips for writers here. 2) I’ve also been re-reading Ryan Holliday’s book, The Obstacle is the Way: The Timeless Art of Turning Trials into Triumph – lots of success mindset help in this gem. 3)And I’ve also been working my way through Nina Amir’s newest book, Creative Visualization for Writers: An interactive Guide for Bringing Your Book Ideas and Your Writing Career to Life.  The practical exercises and step-by-step guide has helped give me clarity on my current books as well as to see the big picture goal in my author business 😉

Watch the Video Interview

Interview Summary…

Nina Amir helps creative people combine their passion and purpose so they move from idea to inspired action and Achieve More Inspired Results. She is a 11-time Amazon bestselling author, award winning blogger and also is one of only 300 elite Certified High Performance Coaches in the world.

She is passionate about helping writers to achieve their potential to fulfill their purpose so they can make positive and meaningful impact in the world with their words. For more details on her next High Performance Writers Group Coaching click here. 

Nina’s newest release is Creative Visualization for Writers: An interactive Guide for Bringing Your Book Ideas and Your Writing Career to Life. 

She shares her story of wanting to write from a young age. Well meaning people in her life at that time, told her only really good writers can make a living writing novels. So Nina got a degree in Magazine Journalism.

Eventually, when someone asked her to edit a book for them, she did and that book sold 300,000 copies. Another self-published book she helped edit, sold over 200,000 copies. So she started to work with other authors on their books.

Nina was inspired to write her own book and sent a proposal to one of the big agents in one of the New York publishing houses. They called her and told her they loved the book, but that she needed a bigger platform.

This was when Nina decided to blog and build a platform on blogging, writing nonfiction, spirituality and personal development.
After about 8 years of blogging steadily, she thought I haven’t sold any books yet, maybe I should just quit. At this point she had already written some self-published books. It was here she came to a turning point and told herself: No. I’ve come too far. I refuse to quit!  

Four years later she held her first traditionally published book in her hands.

When I refused to quit, my mindset shifted. I told myself, that no matter what it takes, I will fulfill my purpose and my potential. As writers, when you start seeing what you’re called to do like that, you feel connected to it. ~ Nina Amir

On Roadblocks Writers face…

These are mostly self-esteem issues. As writers we think: I’m going to be judged; I think I can’t do this; I’m not a good enough writer.

All that’s stopping writers is mindset issues. As a writer – no matter where you’re at on your writing journey – you have to stop blaming outside circumstances. These are just excuses that stop us from doing what we really want to do.

What goes along with mindset issues, is the need to change our habits. We have to level up and master our Psychology, Physiology, Productivity, Persuasion, Purpose and Presence.

Specific things writers can do to help change their habits to be more productive:

  • Don’t get stuck into email and social media first thing in the morning. Your email is a convenient organizing system for other people’s agendas. Studies show that some of the most productive people do not check their email or social media until later in the day.
  • Come to your desk with energy. Do some deep breathing, run on the stairs or go for a walk. Don’t work more than 50 minutes at a time. Drink more water.
  • Block your creative time. First thing in the morning work on your stuff. Remember that writing is a habit. Develop this habit of writing on a consistent basis. Decide who you want to be as a writer and as a person and ask yourself everyday if you’re living into that.
  • Sleep 7 to 8  hours a nigh to function at your best. Drink water and breathe because your brain and body need it.
  • Challenge yourself regularly. For example, if you’ve ever joined NaNoWriMo, you know you are challenged to write 50,000 in the month of November. Give yourself regular challenges similar to that.

Nina shares the pillars on how you can write more and live everyday with more energy and passion.

6 Pillars to Become a High Performance Writer

1.Psychology. Your mind is this powerful took, but you have to know how to train your mind to the thoughts and beliefs that serve you the best. As writers we need to get past these limiting beliefs and negative thoughts. You develop this as you develop mastery over your mind.

2.Physiology. You need endurance and stamina to do what you want to do in life. It’s this ability to bring energy to everything you do: exercise, eat right and make sleep a priority. Then you’ll show up with more energy and stamina.

3.Productivity. We all want to be more productive, to make more money and get more done. You can do that when you’ve actually mastered your mind because you have more ability to focus your mind on what you need to do. We only have 24 hours in a day. You can change your schedule to your writing needs and manage your attention so you can be more focussed and present in that time. Your ability to serve your readers comes from the ability to be productive.

4.Persuasion. This is not the used salesperson approach. Persuasion is influence and persuasion in a positive way. To learn to develop that know, like and trust factor that is so important. The people that resonate with your words, you are an influencer in their life. You need a persuasive ability and to learn how to master influence.

5.Purpose. This goes back to your BIG Why. High Performers revolve all their productivity around their purpose. If you can stay on purpose, you’ll achieve your potential as well as fulfill your purpose.  Ask yourself why you feel compelled to write more books? This is for both writers of nonfiction and fiction books. Stories have a benefit to the readers.

6.Presence. Being present in the moment. Be consciously aware in the moment. It takes focus to get the results you really want. If you’re focussed in the past of the future, how are you going to get done what needs to get done right now?

Plan ahead for challenges that will come up in your life, to take you off your goals you’ve set in your writing. Ask yourself, what typically hangs me up? What can I do to plan for that if it happens again?

Being part of an accountability group of writers – like a coaching group – is super helpful for writers. You’re accountable for what you did that week as well if you invest not only time, but money and have more skin in the game, you’re more likely to do it.

Some of the most successful writers will tell you they invest in themselves in many different ways so they can level up.

Writers have to learn to think of themselves as Author Entrepreneurs who write books that are planned well. If you haven’t gone through a planning process, you end up with a book that doesn’t sell well. And if you want to reach readers and affect their lives, you need to plan your books.

Sometimes all it takes is a tiny shift in your mindset and habits to become more productive as a writer. Become a High Performer so you can succeed in writing as well as in life 😉

Links mentioned in this interview:

www.NinaAmir.com/high-performance-writer-group-coaching/

www.writenonfictionnow.com

www.howtoblogabook.com

www.nonfictionwritersuniversity.com

www.booksbyninaamir.com

If you want to connect with Nina, you can also find her on Facebook and Twitter.

7 Steps to Accelerate Your Writing Productivity [Infographic]

by

All successful writers are super productive.

They don’t work a gazillion hours a day/week/month(well, not all of them do)… but instead they have learned to work smarter.

Successful writers, become role models for others as they continue to level up their writing craft as well as their income.

I used to think that successful writers were lucky and that being successful as an author wasn’t something I could do.

However, I’ve changed my mind. As I’ve continued to read blogposts and listen to podcasts on what successful authors like Mark Dawson, Bella Andre, Barbara Freethy, Susan Kaye Quinn, JF Penn, Monica Leonelle and others are doing everyday, I’ve realized they’ve developed specific success habits in their lives.

Those habits and productivity tips are learnable for all first-time writers, through practice and repetition.

It all starts by making a decision to really go for it.

I hope as you read through the 7 steps to accelerate your writing productivity listed below, you are able to jumpstart your own author success.

I hope by reading through the above 7 steps, you’ve been inspired to get started on your writing goals today.

Choose to write everyday and make yourself do what you know you should do – whether you feel like it or not(this is something I’m still learning to get better at). It’s only when you force yourself to do something anyway, that you really move your life and writing career onto the fast track.

Since I’ve started writing down my goals everyday, and making a list the night before of what I need to get done the next day, I’ve been amazed at how much my productivity has increased.

So, I want to encourage you today. No matter what mistakes or challenges you’ve faced as a writer before this, that you can decide today to accelerate your own success. You can do this!

Get a clear vision of exactly what it is that you want in your writing life, and then follow the 7 steps listed above to make it happen 🙂

How do you boost your writing productivity?  Please, leave your ideas in the comments, I’d love to hear from you!

 

 

 

Malcare WordPress Security