Zibby Owens & Silvia Vasquez-Lavado: Women on a Mission to Scale New Heights

Explicit content warning

08/16/22 • 54 min

New York's # 1 book influencer, author, DAILY podcaster, and publisher, Zibby Owens, is here! Joining her is Peruvian mountaineer, humanitarian, and social entrepreneur, Silvia Vasquez-Lavado, the first openly gay woman to climb Everest and all seven summits (who happens to be one of Zibby's favorite writers). Welcome to another literary love-fest!

Hello! With only seven days until pub day for my Beautiful Writers book, I couldn't help myself. I had to record a podcast with these fantastic authors and miraculous human beings. Why now? Because I couldn't get their missions or memoirs out of my mind. Zibby's Bookends: A Memoir of Love, Loss, and Literature and Silvia's In the Shadow of the Mountain: A Memoir of Courage (Selena Gomez will soon play in the movie) stole my focus and my heart.

Sometimes the best thing to do when you're busy is dive into a great book—or TWO! I'm so excited to share this episode of the Beautiful Writers Podcast with you, where we get honest about the magic and mayhem of taking our work and manifestations to new heights.

From overcoming extreme shyness, abuse, loss, and addiction and channeling our pain into healing words (and, in Silvia's case, trekking to help victims of sexual violence find a sense of peace and closure), you could say we're women on a mission. One of surpassing our limitations, living large, and changing the world—one step, one reader, one beautiful book at a time.

We're so happy you're here. Write on! ✍️ xo

We're so happy you're here. Write on! ✍️ xo

Previous Episode

Danielle LaPorte & Book Mama Pod Reunion, Post Deadline Truth Tellin’

We’ve missed you, Danielle LaPorte & me! Our season of book delivery kicked our asses. (How to Be Loving for Danielle and Beautiful Writers for me, both available now for preorder.) But that’s what it takes, often, to create our best work. So, since we know we’re not alone in this endeavor to leave a legacy, we’re back together to dish, deal, and laugh about the absurdity. The hours! The focus! The OMG never-ending details! Now that we’re on the other side, mostly, we couldn’t wait to share the backstory with YOU!
Because, like us, you’ve been trying to write something valuable, right? Something that, dare I say, stands the test of time?! (That’s the hope, isn’t it?) We know you know. We raise our glasses to you for endeavoring to attain such a lofty goal:).
Thank you for listening, sharing, commenting, preordering, and helping us celebrate this milestone on the platform that started so much for us both. Dig deep with us as we cover: Networking chutzpa (naive much?). Wrangling celeb permissions & blurbs (when to push on; when to give up). When Oprah doesn’t call (or, rather DOES, but whoops... Lol).
DISTRACTIONS. REJECTIONS. DISTRACTIONS. REJECTIONS. The backstory of why this SuperSoul 100 Leader and author of a heap of bestsellers left the podcast—and how I nearly bailed myself but instead went ALL in. The reason we called each other sobbing over past books. And why Danielle opted out of the testimonial game for this new book. Plus, eleventh-hour miracles. And more.
We’re keepin’ it raw & real for you. Open books, as they say.
Write on!
L&D xo

Next Episode

Pub Day Celebration! A Writer's Roundup w/ Martha Beck, Steven Pressfield, Elizabeth Lesser, & Aditi Khorana

It's finally here! Pub Day for Beautiful Writers: A Journey of Big Dreams & Messy Manuscripts—with Tricks of the Trade from Bestselling Authors. To celebrate this happy day, I invited a few of my fave writers to join me for a writer's roundup for good vibes as we talk about the things we did that WORKED. The details we want to remember to do next time. There’s always resistance, sure. But so much magic, too, and that's what I wanted to focus on today.
You'll hear on the show why I chose this group of brilliant humans and what they've each meant to me on my writing path.
For the quickie bios, we've got Martha Beck, NYT bestselling author of a bunch of books, the most recently, The Way of Integrity, a 2022 Oprah Book Club pick.
There's the legendary Steven Pressfield, author of a bible in our field, The War of Art, and other massive hits, including his new riveting read: Put Your Ass Where Your Heart Wants to Be, and a few movies, too.
The incredible novelist, writing teacher, and ex-Hollywood marketing mind Aditi Khorana is here (and promises to blow your mind with her cutting-edge thoughts on time and the creative process).
And we're so blessed to have New York Times bestselling memoirist Elizabeth Lesser who co-founded the famed Omega Institute, where she's been supporting creatives and leaders like Oprah hands on in a big way for decades.
We had such a blast together. (I might have to schedule roundups more often!) I think you will find that whatever stage you're in with your writing, they will bring you ah-has and RELIEF. As often as I've had them on the show or read their work, they continue to surprise me.
THANK YOU for celebrating with me, with us. Thank you for being part of my cherished writing community. I have felt your love and cheerleading at every stage.
And thank you for buying my sweet book baby (and hopefully recommending it to your people). In so doing, you’ll be supporting sustainable paper choices, my greatest writerly dream. How cool is that? I hope that the information in the book will likewise make it easier to realize whatever dreams you are holding close. That would make my heart so happy.
Go to BeautifulWritersPodcast.com for all the links to this episode. And, of course, you’ll find all sorts of book buying links over on BookMama.com or BeautifulWritersPodcast.com.
LOVE you, beyond. Write on!
Lindagrateful x