I’ve got a CONFESSION to make: You know how Oprah has Dr. Oz and Dr. Phil and Lyanla and how Hay House has Deepak and Marianne and Wayne Dyer?
Well, one of my big dreams is to help make a handful or two of our authors into household names.
Back in April, I had this exciting plan to reach that goal in the next 5 years: We were going to launch our own reality TV show on cable TV.
We had a production team, interested networks, camera crews, shoot schedules, and days and days blocked off for shooting.
But as the filming grew nearer and nearer red flags and alarm bells started going off.
Energetically, I was not in alignment with the partners I picked to work with anymore. Something shifted and it didn’t make any sense why.
I KNEW in my gut something was wrong, but I didn’t have any “hard-evidence” so for a while I kept silent.
It’s hard to reverse course when you have made a massive investment of time and money and there is so much excitement.
I pulled the plug at literally the 11th hour.
It felt like cancelling your own wedding and announcing it at the Rehearsal Dinner.
It was my biggest financial loss in business and I lost face among friends and clients and colleagues.
But that wasn’t the worst part.
The WORST part was that I didn’t know what to do next.
Has this ever happened to you?
You have a dream.
You know how to make it come true!
It doesn’t work.
****CRASH*****
You are lost….
The dream is still there, but without the path the reach the dream, it’s hard to get excited.
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I spent the next 3 months in a daze. I would read, study, meditate.
Some days I thought about giving up or just scaling back my dreams.
I asked myself:
How can I realize the dream of helping to turn my authors into stars without compromising my values or losing myself in the process?
The answer came in the form of my word of the year for 2017:
INTIMACY
What I realized was I could not achieve my dreams alone. And not only that – I didn’t want to.
In July, I started a second company in partnership with my amazing CFO and now business partner, @Pam Prior. We quietly opened our doors on the first of this month and today I am thrilled to share with you our “STAR-MAKER!”
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!!! ~ THE AUTHOR ACCELERATOR ~ !!!
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Pam and I have created a brand-new model for investing in and accelerating expert businesses to take them from best-kept secret to household name. Our standards for entry were sky-high (because if we are going to do it, it’s going to work!)
We were absolutely shocked to have far more qualified candidates than spaces. The past couple weeks we have been filled with reviewing applications and making some of the hardest decisions we’ve made in our (eh-hmm “young”) lives.
We have the structure, the partnerships, the joy, the ease and, yes, the tactics and the budget all in place to rocket the experts inside The Author Accelerator faster and with much more autonomy and alignment than my reality TV show.
In short, my lesson here is this: You don’t have to control the “HOW.” Your dreams can (and will) come true in ways you never might have expected.
We’ve built the infrastructure. We have an amazing team. We’ve done the hard strategy work. We have moved through the “figuring it out” stage to the implementation stage and there is no turning back. As my former boss Todd used to say, “Failure is not an option.”
I want you to take a second and just see how fast life can go. I was totally lost back in June when I canceled the reality TV show. I was down $100,000 with nothing to show for it. I lost one of my favorite clients and jeopardized some key business relationships and friendships. I was thinking about giving up or at least giving in.
I was on a class 5 river rapid with no helmet and no oar.
And so… I STOPPED.
I asked myself: How can I realize the dream of helping to turn my authors into stars without compromising my values or losing myself in the process?
I prayed. I grounded myself. I worked with my coach. I coached myself. I felt the fear and didn’t try to fix a damn thing.
Oh… and I cried. A lot.
And now it’s less than 3 months later and the dream is not only alive again, it’s better than ever.
This is possible for you too. Here are my 5 steps:
- DREAM THE DREAM.
- TAKE INSPIRED ACTION.
- STOP WHEN YOU ARE OUT OF ALIGNMENT.
- STRAIGHTEN UP & FLY AGAIN.
- LIVE THE DREAM.
So… without further ado… we are so excited to announce the first 4 companies in The Author Accelerator.
Congratulations to:
Strategy Ninja – Amy Birks
Retreat Guide – Debbie Lazinsky
Weight Loss/Hypnosis Trainer – Erika Flint
Speaker Coach – Majeed Mogharreban
Look for more about each of these amazing visionary leaders in upcoming emails, guest blog posts, social media, and marketing campaigns and soon enough, EVERYWHERE!
The way we select authors to accelerate is through their participation in my book writing and marketing programs. Check out www.TheAuthorIncubator.com/apply if you think someday you’ll want us to accelerate your company too!
P.S. I’d love to hear your dream. What are you committed to making come true for you?