Invisible Stories: Write to be Seen

Today’s Invisible Stories guest is speaker, writer, scholar, and facilitator Dr. Joy Wiggins, who, through the company she founded, promotes racial and gender justice through compassion and open dialogue to ignite equitable, empowering and transformative practices. Joy Wiggins is the co-author alongside Kami Anderson of the book From Sabotage to Support: A New Vision for Feminist Solidarity in the Workplace. As CEO of Joy Wiggins, PhD: Equity and Inclusion Consulting, Joy provides speaking, facilitation, and mentorship opportunities on the topics of power, privilege, racial and gender justice and liberation. She has spent the last 20 years working on understanding our cultural identities and perceptions of how we navigate the world through our cultural identities.

In this podcast, Joy and I delve into the process she went through with co-authoring a book, coming from a mostly academic writing background. She discusses:

• What it was like to partner with seasoned author Dr. Anderson, and how she learned to adapt from writing academically to creating their joint book on intersectionality and female solidarity.
• How she was able to strike a balance between explaining concepts succinctly within her writing to guide her readers, while also learning to let go and not include every detail.
• The collaborative process of working with a developmental editor, and the flexibility that comes with getting to choose an editor.
• How Joy had to pivot in her ideas for a second book once COVID-19 hit, and how the pandemic has influenced the way she is researching and writing about women during this period of time.

Today’s Invisible Stories guest is executive coach, public speaker, and author Gerry Valentine. With 27 years of fortune 100 leadership experience, Gerry is a trusted advisor to corporate executives, entrepreneurs, and high performing individuals of all kinds. His book, The Thriving Mindset: Tools for Empowerment in a Disruptive World, was published in March 2021 by Publish Your Purpose Press.

In this podcast, Gerry and I talk about what it was like for him to publish his book during a global pandemic. He wrote the book prior to the COVID outbreak, but his work happened to be directly related to how to thrive through disruptive, difficult circumstances. Gerry discusses his emotional experience with writing, something he wasn’t expecting to have when writing a business book. We talk about:

• How Gerry rebranded his business and reworked his book so that it not only reflected his work, but also drew on more of his life, his personality, and his personal experiences.
• The ways in which Gerry drew on his personal experiences with adversity to write a book that would appeal to many people from all walks of life.
• How to take the words of destructive distractors, those people who sow doubt about what you can and can’t do, and turn it into fuel to push yourself to defy expectations.
• How Gerry changed his mindset about his dyslexia, recognizing it as a learning difference, not as a learning disability, and how despite the setbacks he was able to use this to his advantage when writing and understanding the bigger picture of his book.

Today’s Invisible Stories guest is Publish Your Purpose Press author Eileen Scully. Eileen Scully is an international keynote speaker, author of In the Company of Men: How Women can Succeed in a World Built Without Them, and founder and CEO of The Rising Tides, a consulting firm that makes workplaces better for women through assessment and advisory services. Eileen has been interviewed by Forbes, the Boston Globe, Standard and Poor's Global Market Intelligence, Thrive Global, Psychology Today, and Inc. She launched her book with PYP because she wanted to explore more deeply some areas that are very male dominated in the world and highlight not only women that are succeeding in those spaces, but the women that are changing those spaces from within.

In this podcast, Eileen talks about finding the motivation to get her book done, and how she put some of herself into her book despite it being a non-fiction book. She discusses

• How she overcame the imposter syndrome that so many authors face, and decided to listen to her editor and include more of herself and her own experiences within the book text. She was able to push past that panic that her story isn’t worthy, and instead own who she is and claim her story.
• How she focused her book content on sharing it in a way that every reader would see themselves on one or both sides of her examples of workplace interactions, and empathize and think more deeply about such situations.
• Learning to let go and be comfortable with the fact that even well-established authors will always find edits that they want to make to their book that is already on the shelf!

Today’s Invisible Stories guest is Pasha Cook, the founder of Pasha Cook & Associates, an International creative solutions consulting agency that helps professional athletes and executive entrepreneurs Build Brand Identity Stories. She has been on an unstoppable path to success ever since. Pasha made history in 2018 when she became the first female college outreach speaking ambassador for the NFL. In 2019 Pasha played an intricate role in art directing an international documentary launched by the Yao Ming and the Chinese Basketball Association.. Pasha is the author of Brand Yourself Like a Champion: Cultivating Brand Excellence From The Inside Out, which guides readers by defining what a personal brand is and assisting them in evaluating themselves through interactive self-reflection exercises, teaching best practices so that readers can add value and obtain clarity around their personal brand vision.

In this podcast, Pasha shares insights into how she defines success and what her process was when she decided to publish Brand Yourself Like A Champion. Pasha provides insight into:

• How her book stemmed from working with athletes to determine their transferable skills, and developed into how to make that type of content accessible for all people. She discusses how you need to look at your own strengths and weaknesses, identify what you value, and what your own personal mission is.
• Not every step of her process will work for everyone. Sometimes a formula will work for one person, but others need to just pull some advice from the pages to be their most authentic self. Everyone is different, so she recognizes that people will utilize her book differently to learn and grow.
• The intentional design of her book to look like a fashion magazine, drawing from her past in that industry, and how it links in unexpected ways to developing a personal and authentic brand.
• How to give yourself time with your work before you put it out in the world. When your story is no longer hurting you or a hindrance to you, then you are released to help to heal other people with your words.

Today’s Invisible Stories guest is Kristin Andree, a business strategist, speaker, podcaster, and author of You're Not for Everyone: But, You Can Be For Everyone. Kristen specializes in working with folks that own businesses, financial advisors, and powerhouse women looking to scale up their businesses and generate growth. An engaging speaker, Kristin’s goals are to Coach, Challenge, and Empower her clients.

In this podcast, Kristin and I delve into the details of how to market yourself and your book. She advises listeners about:

• Never compromising who they are, and to instead capitalize on their strengths to build an intentional life for themselves.
• The benefits of engaging with a beta reader group and other publishing professionals, which helped make the publishing of her second book a better, more organized, and streamlined process.
• Marketing themselves and their book using calls-to-action and online and social media marketing.