get a spark o’ the fire : the true strengths + the metrics of ease chapter

Would you rather be sufficient, or masterful?
Would you rather be bright, or a freaking supernova?
Would you rather be well-rounded, or
on your own leading edge?

"This chapter is a BEAUTY — such a kick start.
Your words give me permission to be awesome."
- Sas Lockey

True Strengths + The Metrics of Ease is Session 3 in THE FIRE STARTER SESSIONS. One of the most popular chapters, you can get it now as a mini-media sparklet, a warm up for the mondo inferno. It explores:

: clarifying your intrinsic strengths vs. weaknesses
: the dangers of being "competent." Being well-rounded is highly overrated.
: the game-changing practice of getting better at what you’re best at
: passion as your growth point
: the brilliance of approving of your weaknesses
: enthusiasm as a state of higher consciousness
: using grace as data in your decision making
: a list of personality tests and reading resources
: ...and a word on life purpose
: VIDEO: The Metrics of Ease with Danielle
: VIDEO: The Merits of Self-Centered with Danielle + Dyana Valentine
: WORKSHEET 4: Passion Play
: WORKSHEET 5: Very Strong Priorities

"[this] chapter...is blowing my mind. Amazing.
This chapter alone is worth way more than $150."
- Tim Murphy

All this for $20 bucks, baby. And when you're hot for more, you can put the cost of this chapter toward the full-tilt FIRE STARTER SESSIONS program. And! By owning the True Strengths chapter, you're able to become an affiliate.

** click here to purchase true strengths + the metrics of ease **

rave reviews

"Danielle LaPorte's passion for her mission leaps off the page, and reading a few chapters of this book will ignite you into action."
– Gretchen Rubin | Author, The Happiness Project

"The Fire Starter Sessions is the revolution you’ve been waiting for. It will shake-up and wake-up every aspect of your life."
– Kris Carr | Award-winning Author and Documentarian, Crazy, Sexy, Cancer

"The Fire Starter Sessions is the new, bad-ass Artist’s Way.”
– Linda Sivertsen | Co-Author, Harmonic Wealth and Generation Green

"The Fire Starter Sessions...is so good that I’m taking it slow. All meat, no filler."
– Nathan Hangen | Author, Beyond Blogging and the Webrepreneur's Guide to Funding Your Business

"No entrepreneur should make another decision about the direction of his or her future without reading this book and doing the exercises Danielle has included."
– Alexis Martin Neely | Founder, Family Wealth Planning Institute and The LIFT Foundation System

"I'm savoring my way through FSS and loving it. I've scheduled a standing weekly appointment to work through Danielle's ass-kicking, fire-lighting, stakes-raising worksheets until. I'm. done. I'm admitting, forgiving, clarifying, imagining, and (most importantly) becoming – and I've needed this for a long time."
– Dave Navarro | TheLaunchCoach.com

"Money, failure, power, appreciation – this doesn't leave anything out of the mix."
– Barbara Stanny | Author, Overcoming Underearning

"You know the acronym TABO? True And Bleedingly Obvious. The Fire Starter Sessions are the opposite of that. They're fresh, compassionate, practical, sassy, designed (and design is one crucial way that content becomes useful), wise, engaging and, above all, different."
– Michael Bungay Stanier | Author, Do More Great Work and Senior Partner, Box of Crayons

Or of course, you could just go for the mondo inferno right this minute and invest in the full FIRE STARTERS SESSIONS program. Click the orange icon:

$150 for the full-tilt love. And! $5 from every copy goes to the charity you choose:The Acumen Fund or Women for Women International

or...

click here and warm up for $20 with a sample Session.

With Love,

 

super hero syndrome + the practical response to crazy ambition

or, "How to Accomplish Great Big Stuff in a Short Amount of Time"

Technically speaking I created THE FIRE STARTER SESSIONS in under twelve weeks. The holy spirit of digital love and audacity entered my soul and MacBook Pro and said: GO FORTH AND CRANK IT, LAPORTE! Maybe it's Catholic residue, but I felt called. So I set an impossible deadline for myself and I declared that the e-book was done--that it actually existed somewhere on the cosmos already, and all I needed to do was pull it down from the ether into pixel form.

I was crazy. Ca-ra-zee. It's a good thing that I revere Crazy. Crazy gets stuff DONE. Crazy eats impossible for her afternoon sugar fix. And if I may use some Kerouac to pat myself on the back, "Here's to the crazy ones."

That said, having been around plenty of start-ups and politicians in my career, I've seen a whole lot of the stupid-kinda-crazy.

STUPID CRAZY is the unrealistic, delusional, (and often inflated) thought that you can accomplish big, fast, amazing professional things while keeping the rest of your life in a state of "balance." Young dudes/dudettes in Silicon Valley and other such wanna be's have this one down--and they get dumped by their fiancees, quietly deal with anxiety, and know little about life outside...their life.

It's the Super Hero syndrome: I can do it all! I can squeeze more hours out of the day; keep up my exercise regime, be romantically attentive; well groomed n' stylin'; AND! launch a brilliant, brain-powered innovative, substantive product in record time. Nothing will change. I'll just fit MORE in.

Of course you have to do MORE. You have to expand in order to reach new heights. But that critical more-ness needs to be poured directly into your project, not spread thin amongst a bunch of pre-existing obligations and habits. Focus your moreness.

AT THE START OF YOUR CRAZY AMBITIOUS PROJECT:

1. Ask yourself what you're going to have to give up in order to pull it off. It's a total downer of a question and Super Heroes hate this part of strategy. In order to launch THE FIRE STARTER SESSIONS on time, I gave up: most all TV, a lot of sunny weekends outside, about a 40% of my monthly income (I had to cut back on clients to have more creative time,) and pretty much all socializing. You cannot pull off energy intensive big-wins in a state of harmony. It happens in bursts and fits and pushing and grooving--innovation by nature is disruptive, not easy going.

Something will have to give so greatness has room to emerge. So give it up before it takes you down.

2. Line up some "multi-dimensional" support. When it's nose-to-the-grindstone time, we tend to get the grindstone kind of people on board--suppliers, designers, editors, marketers, "work/task" people. But this is precisely the time when you need some spiritually-informed intelligence to back you up. Within the first two weeks of starting on the e-book I worked with Bindu Wiles for writing coaching; I signed up with Dyana Valentine; I plugged into a wonderful Naturopath, Dr. Diane Chung, who works virtually; I had a session with Hiro Boga; and then I consulted with astrologer Ophira Edut about the best or worst time to launch. All that woo-woo love and insight helped me navigate the heavy-duty logistics on a daily basis.

3. Declare your intentions as widely as possible. Announce that you're going "away" for a while. When you're proactive about announcing your short term, utter neglect and blatant unavailability to the rest of the world, you solve some problems before they start. I told my friends that I was going into the creative bubble and would be up for air late May. And so when I missed a birthday, and when I had to repeatedly say "no thanks" to tea dates, it was not only cool, but I didn't feel guilty and anti-social. I felt responsible and supported. Bonus!

Half of getting where you want to go is KNOWING WHAT IT TAKES TO GET THERE. Crazy ambition requires radical practicality. Otherwise, it's just stupid.

. . . . . . .

INTERVIEWS

: $11K in 11 Hours, a tell-lot's interview on how I launched with The Launch Coach himself, Dave Navarro. READ HERE
: My take on "burnout", an interview with Rock. Paper Scissors. READ HERE
: The truth never attacks, an interview on My Courageous Life. LISTEN HERE
: The effect of social media on marketing with MacDonald Marketing. READ HERE

. . . . . . .

LOVE FOR THE FIRE STARTER SESSIONS

"Blown away. Energizing, motivating, authentic, relevant."
- Lori Race

"Every page is rich, rich, RICH in intersecting resources, ideas and strategy. Glorious multimedia: audio, videos, workbooks, oh my. And the words….poetry in power. Truth bombs rang in my ears long after I put it down."
- Tanya Geisler

$150 for the full-tilt love.
And! $5 from every copy goes to the charity you choose.

Click here to view the Table of Contents!
Click here to watch the video!

. . . . . . .

GROUP COACHING WITH LIANNE RAYMOND

Lianne Raymond is kicking off a program to support women who are ready to step into the "ring of fire" with a group coaching program designed specifically around THE FIRE STARTER SESSIONS.
GO FIND OUT MORE FROM LIANNE.

 

the sacred yes we wish for…and warrant

I used to think I was weak n' needy for wanting my "big break." I dreamed of being discovered. I toyed with the willingness to enter some Svengali deal where an agent dude or silver foxy dada would see my raw talent and shape me into a formidable star--a fresh new voice on the scene. I longed for Someone Really Important to give me a Yes that would change my life.

One day, that Yes came.

My first literary agent is one of the most powerful people in the business. With an agency roster like Malcolm Gladwell, Al Gore, Camille Paglia, Michael Moore, Jane Fonda, Anderson Cooper, even Danielle Steel...publishers and producers trip over themselves to take her her call. The day she signed me, my life changed. I was in bed for the teleconference. 10am EST, 7am PST. It was snowing out. She was extolling the merits of the book proposal, and in my state of stunned glee, I had to interrupt. "May I ask a question?" I said. "Does all this meaning that you're taking on the project?"

She laughed. "Yes!"

I had it. It felt like someone had lifted the red velvet curtains to my heart. I hung up the phone and cried. And I thought to myself, "God really wants me to do my work, 'cause this is it."

It's natural to crave the sacred Yes. Ideally, you give yourself the Yes first. That self-love methodology is all neat and tidy and evolved. But I think you still get evolution bonus points even if it takes a dozen power people to convince you that you are fabulous. Neil Young said that he didn't know for sure if he was talented until his albums sold. Fair enough.

It's the kernel of our humanity to want to be seen, recognized, understood--celebrated, even. And when that kernel is watered, magic tends to proliferate.

The sacred yeses you get don't have to be exceptional or prestigious or catapulting. The yeses can be votes of confidence, offerings of counsel, connections, a bitta cash when you need it most.

And you don't need to be a big league power broker to give someone a sacred affirmative.

We are all power brokers. Yes?

. . . . . . .
"If you haven't heard, or you've been on the fence about pre-ordering Danielle LaPorte's FIRE STARTER SESSIONS for entrepreneurs, run, don't walk. You will not be sorry. The first chapter is brilliant and I am sure the rest to come will be. just. as. amazing."
- Nona Jordan, business & life coach

"I quickly downloaded the first chapter and it's blowing my mind. Amazing. I can't wait to get the rest. This chapter alone is worth way more than $150."
- Tim Murphy

"After The Fire Starter Sessions, you'll stop thinking of yourself as a 'little entrepreneur.'"
- Abby Kerr

. . . . . . . .
ANNOUNCEMENTS
Master speaking coach, Gail Larsen as a spot left in her May 13-17 Transformational Speaking Intensive on Whidby Island. Her work is life-changing.

The very smart chickas at Freak Revolution have pulled together a great roster for the World-Changing Writing Workshop, which will run every Thursday from June 10th through July 15th. I'm going to jam about some creativity + publishing nitty gritty and I'm really excited about it. CLICK HERE to get on the "tell me more list," registration opens May 11th.

. . . . . . . .
INTERVIEWS
Hiro Boga is a cosmological gem and my favourite find of 2010. We talk about creativity and conscious business: LISTEN HERE.

Alexandra Franzen is the firecracker behind "Unicorns for Socialism" - smart and sassy. We talked about sleazy networking and word association: WATCH HERE.

 

part 1: lifeblazing interview

This is Part 1 of a 3-part interview that life coach Erika Harris, did with me. It's fabulous...not because of moi-moi-moi, but because Erika asks thoughtful questions. The result: some really useful (and hopefully inspiring) material for both business and life. I felt like I'd just cozied up with Charlie Rose. But better.

PART 1

This segment is particularly useful if you're interested in publishing - online or traditional. I give a zip-zap run down of what I think is up in the industry right now. I also talk about generosity + entrepreneurship, and the power of telling your own story.

. . . . . . .

THE FIRE STARTER SESSIONS ebook is open for pre-orders, don'tchya know!

. . . . . . .

FIND Erika Harris
Erika Harris is an empathic coach specializing in the needs and gifts of Introverts, Empaths and Highly Sensitive People (HSPs.) She works with individuals and pioneering companies to brainstorm the ways that skillful sensitivity can be mastered and monetized.

site: Joyful-Work-For-Sensitive-People

 

if you rec’d an email from me…

...that SAID:
"CONFIRM White Hot Truth and away we go!"
please please open it and click on the link to update your e-subscription.

I'm changing the program I use that manages all of my fabulous e-subscribers. The new program will allow me to send out my posts so they're stylin' and pretty.

(FYI, for anyone who cares, I'm switching from Feedburner, ugly and controlling; to A-Weber, which is customizable and flexible.)

Since I'm tryin' to, like, build an empire of conscious multi-media and rocking wisdom, every subscriber who cares about my content is precious and deeply appreciated. So check your email and click the link.

Or better yet - go to the upper right of my home page where it says GET HOT, SUBSCRIBE - and do just that.

With Love,
Danielle
xo

PS... you may receive two WhiteHotTruth identical daily emails from me for the next few days - one from the old system, and one from the new (which will look way better.) SO sorry for the potential annoyance. Change can be a bitch and technology can be even bitchier.

PPS... if you're getting me via RSS - you're free and clear, no changes required. Fhew.

 

burning questions with jonathan fields: family, leadership, and the passion-drive

Hedgefund lawyer turned yoga teacher.

I could stop there, because that's one impressive conversion that would make me instantly love anyone.

But there's so much more...Author of Career Renegade; featured in USA TODAY, Newsweek, Forbes; founder of Tribal Author - and I can tell you this man knows publishing inside and out, and is riding the edge of it; and the voice behind Awake At the Wheel - one of the most highly read blogs for entrepreneurs.

Jonathan Fields starts most of his days on Twitter with, "Good morning, how can I help today?" I was suspicious at first (but I'm like that,) but the man's plan is to truly be of service, and it rings through all of his work. Must be all that yoga.

1. What are you positively addicted to? (Note: my shrink defines positive addiction as “a healthy high, it makes you stronger. As long as the craving for it doesn’t take you over, then it’s, like totally cool.”)

Learning. I once took the famed Signature Strengths survey run by U Penn professor, Martin Seligman, and it identified "knowledge acquisition" as one of the 5 things that makes me come alive. And, yeah, it was dead on. I devour knowledge and love, love, LOVE to create. Especially things that impact peoples' lives in some positive way.

These healthy addictions have manifested themselves in businesses, books, painting, music and a voracious desire to help others succeed in similar endeavors. I'm also fascinated by the human body and the intersection between the way the East and West look at both the human body and spirituality.

2. What do you know the most about?

How much I don't know. Seriously, I consider myself early into the learning curve of pretty much everything in life. Probably has to do with my love of learning. I always see the body of knowledge to be learned as being vastly larger than the nuggets I've stumbled upon to date.

Beyond that, though, if you look at the lists people add me to on twitter, I guess I've become known for launching, building and marketing passion-driven life-enhancing businesses and books and helping others do the same.

3. What was the dumbest thing that you used to believe in?

Conventional wisdom. (more...)

 

the first questions of publishing pursuits

I get a lot of email and questions in my Fire Starters about the publishing scene. Here are a few hard facts and beautiful possibilities of realizing your dream in the printed book world.

In the immortal words of Johnny Cash, "I've been everywhere, man." In terms of the book industry, I've agented books, I've designed books, I've helped a dozen authors self-publish their own books ... and I've advised hundreds of others not to self publish. I've worked on publicity campaigns with major publishing houses, I've done grassroots and highbrow marketing. I've had my own book go to auction to earn a six figure book advance, get published and make it on to the Amazon bestseller list. I'm currently in the glorious, grueling process of writing my next book: The Fire Starter Sessions.

So, naturally, I'm jaded. Really jaded.

And yet! I remain ever devoted to the art of the book and the game of publishing. I'm a romantic. Just like Johnny.

Creating a book is an intimate experience. You give shape to your innermost feelings, you share them with critics and other lovers of ideas and story. And then you shop that baby until the cows come home. How you do it is a very personal decision.

To Self-Publish or to Sign with a Publishing House? It depends how you define success. It depends what your motivation is ... profit or creative gratification? It depends on how talented you are and how timely your material is. It depends if you're really crazy, or just a little bit crazy.

The Pro's and Cons and the In's and Outs of Self Publishing and Publishing Houses:

DISTRIBUTION
Let's start with the most important aspect of making a book. Forget content and design, forget marketing and PR...for a moment. Getting your product into the hands of booksellers and book buyers should be your A#1, paramount big daddy priority.

Self pub: If you choose to self publish, distribution will be your greatest hurdle. In the eyes of major book chain buyers, you're a nobody. The head buyer at CostCo or Borders has established relationships with sales reps from publishing houses. They have buy-meets at book shows and scheduled times where they order dozens of titles at a time for the upcoming season. They won't even take your call. You will have to hire an independent sales rep to pitch your title.

Or...you can go to local bookstores and pitch it yourself. It's hell - a hell possibly worth walking through, but put your armor on, wear your lip-gloss and best smile, and be prepared to schlep books in your car trunk for weeks, months even.

Pub house: distribution is done for you. That simple. This is the single most important reason to try to get your self a book deal. Publishing houses have tentacles that reach far into book shows and bookstores across the world.

THE DESIGN PROCESS
Self-pub: guess what? You're now a book designer, content and copy editor, color expert, typography and paper specialist ... and you thought you were just a guy with something important to say. Even if you hire out your book to a graphic designer (and you probably should, for anywhere from $500 to $20,000 in design fees depending on the type of book you're producing,) the aesthetics of the book rely on your approval. Do you know what cover will appeal to consumers next season? Do you have access to the recycled paper printer you want who can print in bulk? For better or for worse, you will have total creative control. Could be a beautiful thing.

Pub house: I know more than a few authors who didn't know what their book cover was going to look like until they saw it for the first time on Amazon -- tragic but true. You may have zero say in how your baby is dressed. Could be a disaster. Could be a beautiful thing.

TIME TO MARKET
Self-Pub: The turn around time with a self-published book can be as fast as you can drive the process. Once it's written and edited, you can have a book in your hands in as little as two months. Zoom.

Pub house: Prepare to go gray before you see your book in stores. Unless you're writing about a time-sensitive topic of major cultural relevance (like, a meteor drops to Earth and you happen to be working on a book about How To Survive A Meteor Crash,) then you're likely looking at eight months to two years from the time you sign your publishing contract to the day your book is in the Barnes & Noble window. It's a long time.

Traditional publishing is a lot like the fashion industry. There are a lot of players involved and they each need lead time to do their job: the editing department, the foreign rights department, the designer, the offshore printer, the marketing team who is selling to stores a two seasons in advance, the publicity team pitching to magazines three to six months in advance, and the warehouse who needs time to ship to stores.

THE MONEY
Self pub: If you do it right, you can be earning as much as $10 bucks a book, perhaps more. Yipee! Hopefully that'll be enough to re-coup the capital you put in to fund the book ... graphic design, perhaps an indexer, various registration costs, marketing, a hefty Fed-Ex bill... It could all add up to thousands of dollars -- easy.

Pub house: A book advance is an incredibly civilized concept. You get paid in advance to write your book. Wow. You typically get a third of the advance money when you sign your contract, a third when you deliver your final manuscript, and a third when the book is off the printing press.

Most authors never see a dime after their book advance ... simply because they need to sell enough copies to "earn out" their advance. After you've sold the amount of your advance in books (essentially paying the publisher back for their investment) then you start to realize a royalty on books sold after that ... which is usually in the low range of a whopping $2 per book.

PUBLICITY
Self-pub: Got contacts? You better have. Facebook friends may not get you on the bestseller list. You need editors' emails and TV ops. It's timing consuming and critical. Not your thing? You're looking at a minimum of $5000 to hire a publicist to run a decent campaign for you.

Pub house: They've got contacts ... oodles of them. Media editors and producers are used to being pitched by publishing house staffers. But don't think for a minute that your publisher will take your book to the mount and flog it. It's a rare exception that any book is nurtured beyond a very concentrated, one-time push to the media that lasts about three weeks if you're lucky.

Whether you self publish or land a book deal ... publicity and marketing will ultimately be fueled by your stamina.

It takes a village to raise a book. But it takes your creative genius to make it, guide it, and carry it to the world ... whether that's with a prime-time media interview or small book signings where only two people show up ... and one of them is your mom.

Johnny Cash lasted so long in the music business not just because he was a pure talent, but because he was a remarkable combination of tough-as-nails and romantic. Either direction you take -- self publishing or landing a book deal -- you will need to be steely, you will need to embody passion, you will need to take your show on the road...everywhere, man.

May applause follow wherever you go.

 

letting go of cleverness makes room for true art

{This lovely little animation of The Golden Mean / Rule of Thirds is breathtaking and descriptive. I felt like my heart rate slowed down while I watched it inner-fold. Click here to view it's movement.}

The best writing advice I ever received was this: "Sometimes you have to let go of the jewels."

You have to cut out the best part.
You have to detach from your brilliance.
You have to trust that the whole piece is better the individual shiny parts that make you seem clever or wise.

So that sexy slogan ... That rapier wit one-liner ... That fancy feature or added customer service ... if those gems are throwing the whole package or project or intention off kilter, then they probably need to be slashed.

Final works of art find harmony. In even vulgar, dramatic, and absurd works of art there can be a high degree of cohesion and that's what accounts for it's impact. That's where skill comes in. You can be as wildly inspired and as daring as you want, but if you don't know the rule of thirds, or a bit of colour theory, or how to help the members of your jazz trio be heard in fusion, then you run the risk of tampering with the objective, which is to create art that conveys.

It's easy to get attached to our inspired moments and what they produce. Those a-ha's are a rush. And the rush is goood, it's essential in fact. Let it move you forward instead of rooting you to one place, or one ray of light. Let your clever bits and genius fuel your courage rather than your ego. Diamonds shine only after they've been cut.