Laura Tremaine, SHARE YOUR STUFF. I'LL GO FIRST.

2021-02-01 · 33:02 · Laura Tremaine · Podcast Audio

[0:08]Hi, I'm Zibi Owens and you're listening to the award-winning podcast Moms Don't Have Time to Read Books.

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[0:32]Eastern Time until 3 p.m. and features half an hour of book club discussion followed by 30 minutes of Q&A with the author whose book we've just discussed.

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[0:53]Hi, I don't know if you guys know this or not, but I have an anthology coming out called Moms Don't Have Time to A Quarantine Anthology.

[1:01]And it comes out on February 16th and has essays by 60 plus of the authors who have been on this podcast.

[1:09]So, first of all, please pre-order this book. I think you will love it. I'm so excited about all the authors who are represented.

[1:16]Just to give you a few, Chris Bajillion, Jewel Parker Rhodes, Ashley Prentice Norton, Gretchen Rubin, Rima Zaman, Eileen Zimmerman, and that is just from the first page of the multi-page table of contents.

[1:30]So, please pick up this book. Moms Don't Have Time to A Quarantine Anthology. It's available anywhere you buy books, Amazon, bookshop.org, and your local independent bookstore.

[1:39]So, please pick up a copy. And also, I want to invite you listeners to my fundraiser slash launch party, the night it comes out on February 16th, the Tuesday at 7 p.m.

[1:53]Book Hampton and the Children's Museum of the East End are co-hosting it for me.

[1:58]And 50 of the authors who wrote essays in this book, as well as many of the amazing authors who blurbed this book,

[2:06]who wrote little praise worthy quotes at the front, will be there. And you can be there too.

[2:12]So, if you go to my website, zibbyowens.com and just click on Anthology and go to Book Tour.

[2:18]You will see a whole fundraiser section. And for $50, you can attend. You'll get a copy of the book.

[2:27]And you'll get to Schmooze on Zoom with all of these amazing authors. This is like going to be the literary happening of February.

[2:35]So, please come. I would love to see you all in person on Zoom, I guess. But even see some of your faces.

[2:43]I know so many of you are really loyal listeners and that makes me really happy.

[2:47]All proceeds of the book and the fundraiser are going to the Susan Felice Owens program for COVID-19

[2:54]vaccine research at Mount Sinai Health System. And it is named after my husband's mother

[3:01]who passed away from COVID over the summer, which many of you followed along on Instagram as I

[3:06]recanted that horrific experience. So, all the proceeds are going there. The cost includes the price

[3:12]of a book. So, thank you for supporting this effort. And for supporting my book, I can't wait to see

[3:18]you there. Today's episode has been sponsored by This Is Everything with Ali Levine, a podcast

[3:24]hosted by Hollywood mom, celebrity stylist, influencer, and Bravo Reality Star, Ali Levine.

[3:30]On her podcast, you'll get a mix of, well, everything from motherhood to fashion, lifestyle,

[3:36]spiritual, being all totally real and raw. You have to listen. Ali interviews celebrities,

[3:41]experts, entrepreneurs, and so much more. Tune in weekly to be uplifted, empowered, inspired,

[3:47]and truly entertained. Hi, everybody. Every so often, I end up with so many amazing episodes. I

[3:52]just have to release them all at once. So, this week is going to be a book blast week. And it starts

[3:59]off with today, memoir Monday, and then goes to nonfiction Tuesday, literary fiction Wednesday,

[4:05]new novels Thursday, and family themed memoirs for Friday. So, I hope you all enjoy and welcome

[4:12]to day one of the February book blast, February 1st, memoir Monday. Laura Tremaine is the author

[4:18]of Share Your Stuff, I'll Go First. 10 questions to take your friendships to the next level.

[4:23]You can also find her every week on her podcast, 10 Things to Tell You, where every episode

[4:28]provides a prompt for you to take to your journal or text to a best friend or use to start a deeper,

[4:33]more meaningful conversation. She also sends out a monthly email called the secret posts with

[4:38]personal thoughts and reading recommendations. Laura lives in LA with her husband, Jeff,

[4:43]and their two young children. Prior to this book, she wrote regularly for Hollywood Housewife,

[4:49]which was a blog that opened doors of friendship around the world. And eventually, she closed

[4:53]that down and became a co-host on the girlfriend chat show, Sword of Awesome. And is the creator

[4:58]and host of the top-driven smartest person in the world. Welcome, Laura. I'm so excited to welcome

[5:04]you to mom. Don't have time to read books. I am so excited to be here, Sivi. Thank you for having me.

[5:10]So, as I was just saying before the podcast, I feel like I know you because of your amazing

[5:16]podcast and your new book, Share Your Stuff, I'll go first. 10 questions to take your friendships

[5:22]to the next level. And the best part about this book was all the stuff that you shared. I think

[5:27]I just wanted to know more and more about you. I was like, forget the questions. Tell me

[5:30]more about Laura. So, congratulations on the book. Thank you very much. I'm super excited. My first

[5:37]book, even though I've been writing for like all this time, I feel like finally I get to have

[5:42]something I hold in my hand that's not just on the internet. And that must feel amazing, right?

[5:46]It feels amazing really good. So, tell me about the inspiration for this book. What made you

[5:53]write it? Why did you, and why did you sort of package it up this way with questions for other

[5:57]people to ask? It has a little self-help component to it in the midst of the memoir, I would say.

[6:02]It's a lot of, you know, an assortment of like bullets at the end and you know, 10 funny things

[6:08]or things you wouldn't know about you. And then questions you can ask your friends. So,

[6:12]tell me about the format choice. Well, it's funny because I always pictured and always wanted to

[6:18]write more traditional memoir or at least personal essay. Like, just I thought that was the more

[6:24]literary sophisticated thing that a person should write. But I did try to do that and it just

[6:32]felt forced. It felt like I was trying to be a sophisticated writer when actually everything flowed

[6:40]a whole lot easier when I just did what I really do, which is just share my story and

[6:47]talk the same way that I would if I was talking to an audience on my podcast or, you know, on

[6:52]Instagram or something like that. And when I changed up my mindset around it and stopped trying to be

[6:58]like an essayist and just decided to just share the way that I am comfortable sharing. It just

[7:05]came out in this format because on my podcast, which is called 10 Things to Tell You, I ask a question

[7:09]every week and then you're supposed to answer the question. And they're often either introspective

[7:14]or you're supposed to take it to a friend and sort of do it as a get-to-know-you conversation

[7:18]starter. And so it made sense to structure the book that way. I came up with 10 questions that

[7:25]first of all, I actually wanted to answer. But also 10 questions that I felt like come up a lot

[7:33]on my podcast or from my audience that they want to hear more about from me or from their friends

[7:39]or that they want to share about themselves. So I came up with these 10 questions. Some of them are

[7:43]some of them are not so deep. And just structured the stories that I wanted to tell within the

[7:49]format of those questions. Instead of trying to make this like meaningful, thoughtful essay,

[7:57]I really just wanted to tell you about the story that happened in my life. You know what I mean? And

[8:02]it just came out that way and it felt very natural. It felt much more natural. And as I've gotten

[8:07]older, I've realized that like what seems to flow is what you need to go with instead of trying

[8:12]to like be this other thing. So that's how we got here. It's amazing. The story that I have actually

[8:18]already retold now twice is when the scary van pulled up at the house when you were inside and you

[8:24]were so scared. And then the neighbor comes walking down the street and you like throw yourself

[8:29]into his arms. And maybe you should tell the story like a synopsis better than I just did,

[8:36]but why and how that played into your anxiety, which you also talk about in a really

[8:42]impactful way throughout this whole book starting like in the very beginning and coursing through

[8:47]from your hair pulling to all these things that were manifestations of your anxiety. And then

[8:53]this one moment I felt like was like the pinnacle of everything you've ever worried about

[8:59]and the break it. But we could talk about that after. It was a huge moment in my life. I was a super

[9:03]anxious child. I write about that a lot. My childhood anxiety and I talk about that online. I

[9:09]pulled my hair out. I had bald spots. I had a lot of coping mechanisms like growing up in the 80s

[9:15]in a tiny town in Oklahoma. There was no like help to be had. I didn't see a therapist. I didn't

[9:21]you know, there was I was just a little quirky kid, but I what it really was is I had a lot of

[9:27]anxiety and a lot of ways that that sort of manifested. And I was also a latchkey kid, both of my

[9:33]parents worked. So I was at home alone for hours every day after school starting in like the second

[9:40]or third grade. And we lived out in the country in the middle of nowhere. And so I would ride

[9:45]the bus home and then be home in the woods for hours. And I was a little bit older when this story

[9:53]happened. And I put it in the framework of the the question the chapter that this story falls in

[9:58]is what are you afraid of?

[10:00]And I feel like when you ask someone what they're afraid of,

[10:03]like what their deepest fear is,

[10:04]like who wants to talk about that?

[10:05]Why are we sharing about that?

[10:07]It seems like such a scary thing to talk about.

[10:09]But for me, when I talked about things that I'm afraid of,

[10:12]it makes them less scary.

[10:14]Like the more that I can kind of drag this dark thing

[10:16]into the light, it makes it less scary to me.

[10:19]It takes the power away from it.

[10:21]But when I was a little kid and I was at home alone,

[10:24]like the creepiest, most after-school special thing happened

[10:28]where a van, a rusty, white van,

[10:33]pulled into the driveway where I was playing outside.

[10:35]And we were out in the country.

[10:37]And I just knew it deep inside my soul

[10:40]that there was something not right about it.

[10:43]And spoiler alert, nothing happened.

[10:46]I was not kidnapped by the way.

[10:48]You're still here, that's not where you're here.

[10:49]So it all worked out, okay.

[10:51]It all worked out.

[10:53]But it really did kick off for an anxious child,

[10:56]the scary thing that happened.

[10:57]I just intuitively felt like it wasn't evil thing.

[11:01]And I guess we'll never know.

[11:02]Because again, I wasn't kidnapped.

[11:03]But it really did kick off a lot of things in me.

[11:06]Like I sort of became really obsessed

[11:08]with true crime after that.

[11:10]And I was young.

[11:11]I was pre-teen probably when that happened.

[11:13]So then into my teenage years and into my college years,

[11:16]I got really into true crime before that was popular

[11:20]as it is now.

[11:21]I really got very fearful.

[11:24]It was like where my anxiety took a turn.

[11:28]And also a deeper layer to that story,

[11:31]but nothing ever actually happened in.

[11:33]But a deeper layer to that story was

[11:37]I told everyone around me that there was something evil

[11:40]about that van.

[11:41]And again, I was 11, 12.

[11:43]I've been staying home for years.

[11:44]Things that happened, people had rang the doorbell,

[11:47]people had stopped by the house strangers.

[11:49]And I had never felt this kind of deep inner fear.

[11:53]So it really bothered me when my parents

[11:56]or my siblings, no one believed me

[12:00]that there was something different about the situation.

[12:02]And so I felt like in that moment,

[12:04]not only did I have a real twist and turn towards,

[12:08]you know, my fear took a real turn,

[12:10]but also maybe that's the moment

[12:13]when I kind of became like a self advocate or something.

[12:17]Like I realized like no one is gonna believe me

[12:20]just on my word of it, just on my own intuition.

[12:23]And I really changed my life.

[12:26]Like after that, I stopped staying home alone.

[12:27]I would go to the library after school or other things.

[12:30]But I had to make all those adjustments

[12:32]and all those changes like myself.

[12:33]Like I had to be like, okay,

[12:35]if no one's gonna believe me

[12:36]that I'm in danger out there in the woods,

[12:39]I'm gonna have to take it on.

[12:40]And I talked about that story in my family.

[12:43]It's sort of a family lore story.

[12:45]Like we talk about it all that we still joke about it.

[12:47]No one in my family still to this moment believes

[12:49]that there was anything wrong with that van.

[12:51]But for me, when I sat down to write my book,

[12:53]it was one of these like primary stories of my life

[12:56]that I wanted to share when I'm thinking

[12:58]of the 10 stories I wanna share in my first book.

[13:01]Like it was one of the major ones.

[13:03]And I think that this happens to a lot of us

[13:05]in our childhood.

[13:06]We have this pivotal moment.

[13:09]And maybe it is a truly tragic moment

[13:13]or something really huge that you can point to.

[13:15]Or maybe it's a nothing story like mine.

[13:18]Scary van pulled in, a scary van pulled out.

[13:22]And that's the story.

[13:24]But it was like a big thing for me.

[13:26]And I wanted to share it also as a way

[13:28]to give the reader permission to take those kind of quote

[13:32]unquote nothing stories and say like, yeah,

[13:35]this has some weight for me.

[13:36]And it doesn't matter if no one ever understands why

[13:40]that this was like a real moment for me.

[13:41]Well, I think that's something just so relatable

[13:44]when like you have any sort of fear or doubt

[13:48]and you can't get people on your side about it, right?

[13:50]Like, or people say like minimizing the worry,

[13:54]which never helps, right?

[13:56]Like, oh, I'm so worried about you'll be fine.

[13:57]And we thought like that makes it worse.

[13:59]That always makes it worse.

[14:00]So yeah, it was a really big deal to me

[14:03]that I wasn't believed.

[14:05]And it's also sort of sat me on this path of listening

[14:09]to my intuition or not, which no one

[14:11]talked to use that kind of language with me, back then.

[14:16]But really, it is a thing of you.

[14:18]I have to you have to trust yourself.

[14:20]And if you sense that something is not right here,

[14:23]you have to believe that.

[14:25]You have to go with it.

[14:25]And yes, that's how you got all that time in the library.

[14:28]And perhaps that's why you even wrote this book

[14:29]and why we're on the Zoom together.

[14:31]Thank you for connecting all the dots.

[14:33]Thank you.

[14:34]Anytime.

[14:35]My pleasure.

[14:37]I also loved like all your delving

[14:39]into your past relationships and how like each chapter,

[14:42]not every chapter, but many chapters

[14:44]had like little like, you know, scattered,

[14:47]Hansel and Gretel type crumbs of your past relationships

[14:52]from the past, or like coercing your husband to marry you

[14:55]to your first boyfriend, like all these broken hearts,

[14:58]everything.

[14:59]It was, I don't know.

[15:00]I felt like the way you kind of unveiled

[15:03]your relationship history was very, I don't know.

[15:07]I almost felt like voyeuristic, like I'm like snooping

[15:13]here into her private life the way.

[15:16]Anyway, I found it just like so entertaining and awesome.

[15:20]Well, thank you for saying that because I will say

[15:22]that is something I'm like, I don't want to say embarrassed about.

[15:25]But I have like some vague vulnerabilities

[15:27]that I'm a 41 year old woman, married happily, mom of two.

[15:33]And I am still writing about like ex-boyfriends

[15:37]and things like that.

[15:38]I was like, am I, I got to the end of the first draft

[15:41]and I was like, did I write too much about my ex's?

[15:44]My publisher was like, maybe, right.

[15:47]Did you take it out?

[15:48]Did you take some out?

[15:49]Is this the edited down version?

[15:51]Yes, it is actually, I don't know.

[15:56]I really like those parts, you know,

[15:57]because I feel like once we're all married and boring

[16:00]and all the rest, it's like, it's nice to hear

[16:03]about what we, what the before was, you know,

[16:06]it's similar to how I feel about like meeting brothers

[16:09]and sisters and friends I made as grown-ups, right?

[16:11]Whereas when we're kids, you know everybody's family.

[16:14]And it just gives a context to everything else, right?

[16:17]It just gives more context to a person

[16:19]to hear about how they kind of got where they are.

[16:22]It does.

[16:22]And in some ways, the same as the white van story

[16:25]being a childhood story, in some ways,

[16:27]those early relationships, your first love

[16:29]or your first heartbreak or the person you almost married

[16:32]but didn't, like all of those people,

[16:35]if you're lucky enough to have had such a trail,

[16:39]then, you know, they do matter to your life.

[16:43]You know, like one really bad heartbreak

[16:45]will probably affect how you interact

[16:48]in your next relationship or whatever.

[16:50]You know, there is like a connection to all of these things

[16:53]and after a certain age or after you've been married

[16:56]a certain length of time, you're not supposed to talk

[16:59]about that anymore.

[17:00]You're supposed to think that that is all dumb

[17:03]and young, immature stuff and doesn't really matter.

[17:07]And that's just not true.

[17:09]Those relationships meant a lot to my life

[17:12]and they definitely affected the relationships after them

[17:17]which then, of course, became a marriage.

[17:19]And so, I don't know, I don't think you should dwell on them.

[17:22]There's obviously an unhealthy toxic place

[17:24]you can get with fixating on past relationships.

[17:27]But I have tons of girlfriends.

[17:28]And like you said, I could hear about their ex-

[17:31]right?

[17:31]Oh, that's amazing.

[17:32]Like, tell me, right?

[17:35]They're funny, it's interesting.

[17:37]Like, tell me all the ex-stories.

[17:38]Yeah.

[17:39]Plus, you included so much about what it feels like

[17:41]to be sort of a transplant in LA

[17:43]and sort of making that into your home

[17:45]and your whole blog, which of course is how you have turned

[17:48]this whole thing into the thing that it is.

[17:51]In fact, I want to hear more about that.

[17:52]So you started the blog, Hollywood Housewife.

[17:55]Right, I guess I'm right, Hollywood Housewife.

[17:57]By the way, do you know the author, Helen Ellis?

[18:00]Do you know who she is or have you read her work?

[18:02]Is she the American Housewife?

[18:03]Yes, she wrote American Housewife

[18:05]in Southern Lady Code and has a new book coming out.

[18:07]And I think she's from Kentucky, but lives in New York City.

[18:11]Anyway, I feel like you have sort of like, you know,

[18:13]you jumped off from different places

[18:15]and then blended on different coasts,

[18:17]but you're both very funny and witty.

[18:18]And anyway, if I were still doing all my events,

[18:21]I would do one with the two of you

[18:22]because I feel like you'd have such an interesting conversation.

[18:25]Maybe I could just introduce you.

[18:26]I feel like you would be friends.

[18:27]But anyway, I would love that.

[18:29]She has been in my to read stack for ages,

[18:32]I feel like because I also sort of felt like maybe

[18:35]we would have something in common,

[18:36]but I haven't gotten to her yet, but I will.

[18:38]Well, I don't know why I'm plugging another author

[18:40]in the middle of our interview.

[18:40]I'm sorry, I just,

[18:41]I'm just trying to connect you and not in this negative way.

[18:44]No, I love it.

[18:45]I love it.

[18:46]Anyway, so, okay, so Hollywood Housewife,

[18:49]you start the blog.

[18:50]How does the blog become the podcast becomes the book?

[18:54]Tell me that whole story.

[18:56]Well, there are a lot of steps in between,

[18:57]but I started the blog when my daughter was just

[19:02]a few months old, so it's 2010.

[19:05]I'd been reading mommy blogs in the years

[19:08]that I was trying to get pregnant and then while I was pregnant

[19:11]and the internet, not the internet as a whole,

[19:16]but blogs and personal sharing and all of this kind of thing

[19:18]was still like a real novelty.

[19:21]And I loved it.

[19:22]I've always felt like I was a writer in my soul

[19:24]and this removed all the gatekeepers.

[19:27]There was no publishers.

[19:28]There was no, you could just share your stuff online

[19:31]and I was obsessed.

[19:33]And so I actually started the mommy blog

[19:36]because that's what people were doing.

[19:37]I don't have a whole lot of interest

[19:38]in like actually writing about motherhood.

[19:40]I still don't have a lot of interest in writing

[19:43]about motherhood in general,

[19:45]but that was like sort of the avenue, I guess,

[19:48]for me to be able to write immediately.

[19:52]So I started that in 2010 and I was able to build

[19:56]a little bit of an audience and a lot of the feedback

[19:59]that I...

[20:00]thought from people was that they loved reading blogs,

[20:04]like I did, and they loved reading my blog,

[20:06]but they would never share themselves.

[20:10]Like they just wanted to read other people's stuff.

[20:12]They wanted me to keep doing it,

[20:15]but they would never.

[20:16]And that's a very strange backhanded compliment

[20:19]because I think they actually did mean it as a compliment.

[20:22]But actually what they were saying was

[20:25]they would never be so tacky as to put themselves

[20:29]on the internet.

[20:30]And I just kept receiving that message,

[20:34]some version of that message, like over and over.

[20:37]Then when social media started,

[20:39]there was all this shame around people posting selfies.

[20:42]And I just kept seeing this message of women who liked

[20:50]other people to share, but they could never share themselves.

[20:54]And it wasn't because they were deeply insecure

[20:56]or anything, like there was all these reasons,

[20:58]these cultural reasons.

[20:59]Maybe there was some insecurity, but I just was like,

[21:03]it felt passive aggressive and it felt like,

[21:06]I don't know, it felt like people needed a permission to share,

[21:09]but not really, they didn't necessarily want to be on a stage,

[21:13]but they did want to share themselves.

[21:14]They did want to have connection with other people.

[21:18]My time at Hollywood Housewife,

[21:20]like writing that particular blog,

[21:21]which was very family focused as my kids got older,

[21:24]and I also started to tire of the name and the branding.

[21:28]You know, it was like, didn't really fit.

[21:30]It sort of meant to be tongue-in-cheek

[21:32]during the Real Housewives franchise, that boom.

[21:35]But then it started to just sort of be like,

[21:36]I don't, I'm sort of embarrassed to say this.

[21:39]This is the name of my blog.

[21:42]So like, I started to phase that out

[21:44]and decided to close that actual blog.

[21:47]But by that time, I was a co-host on a podcast called

[21:51]Sort of Awesome, which I had kind of done as a favor

[21:53]to a friend, to be honest.

[21:55]I didn't know anything about podcasting,

[21:56]but I was like, fine, whatever.

[21:58]And I just loved it.

[21:59]Like, as you might have experienced,

[22:01]I ended up loving using my actual voice.

[22:05]I loved having the good conversations.

[22:07]And I'd been trying to make this writing thing go

[22:11]in a more serious way,

[22:12]like, and I've been trying to use the blog to do that.

[22:15]When I closed the blog and started talking,

[22:18]is when I felt like I really found my voice,

[22:21]it then became so much easier for me to write.

[22:24]Like, because I didn't have all these hang-ups

[22:28]about the perfect sentence structure or anything.

[22:32]I felt like when I was actually talking

[22:34]and I was getting a response, I found a groove.

[22:38]And so I sort of took what I had learned

[22:41]during that blogging time, that mommy blogging time,

[22:44]of just sort of seeing how lonely women were on the internet.

[22:49]And they were turning to the internet.

[22:50]They were turning to blogs and then eventually social media

[22:53]to watch women share themselves.

[22:56]But they weren't actually sharing their own selves

[23:00]and they didn't know how.

[23:02]So I hosted a few of these challenges

[23:05]to get people to share because what I learned,

[23:08]this is still true to this very moment,

[23:10]is that if you give people an assignment,

[23:12]like if you're like, okay, we're all going to share this thing.

[23:16]We're gonna share our favorite reading share.

[23:18]We're gonna share a selfie.

[23:19]We're gonna share what we learned this month,

[23:22]whatever, give them any kind of assignment

[23:25]that people will share.

[23:26]They feel a permission when they say,

[23:28]well, I'm participating in this online challenge.

[23:30]So I can share this.

[23:32]Whereas they would never in a million jillion years

[23:34]just say, hey, everybody, this is my favorite reading share.

[23:37]They just wouldn't do that.

[23:39]But if they have this thing that they're participating in,

[23:42]they will do it and they want to do it.

[23:44]And so I love that.

[23:46]I'm like, great, I will give you all the prompts.

[23:48]We will do all the prompts if you will share.

[23:50]If it will get you sharing,

[23:51]if it will get all of us sharing.

[23:53]And so then I started and I had done this challenge

[23:56]called 10 Things to Tell You.

[23:57]That's what I called the challenge.

[23:59]It was so successful and made me so happy

[24:02]but then I decided to make that a weekly thing

[24:05]and make that be a podcast

[24:06]because by then I had discovered that I loved podcasting.

[24:09]So the podcast was called 10 Things to Tell You.

[24:11]The challenge online that I still do is 10 Things to Tell You.

[24:15]And then when I pitched the book,

[24:16]I pitched it as 10 Things to Tell You.

[24:17]but it became, share your stuff, I'll go first.

[24:20]And I like that title better.

[24:22]Well, there you go.

[24:23]Or so we're going to tell the publisher.

[24:27]That's right.

[24:29]Well, I love the title.

[24:31]I would have loved the other title too,

[24:33]but it's great.

[24:34]It just totally tells you what type of person the author is

[24:38]and the willingness to be open.

[24:41]And then that's when people want to be open back right away.

[24:45]Like, you go first, you know, we're in.

[24:48]So.

[24:48]Exactly.

[24:50]I hope that it gives people permission

[24:51]and there is a tiny bit of a self-help element to it.

[24:55]I just, I don't like, I'm not an expert in that.

[24:58]Like I don't have any degree or like I don't,

[25:01]you know, I hold all that stuff lightly.

[25:04]I enjoy self-help books and stuff myself.

[25:06]Like I love them.

[25:07]And so I love to talk through what I'm learning

[25:09]and how I'm growing.

[25:10]And that comes out in the book a lot.

[25:12]I think what I'm trying to encourage people to

[25:14]is how they can think about this question or this prompt.

[25:16]But I also just want to be really clear

[25:18]with everyone that I like, this is no expertise.

[25:21]I'm a self-help hobbyist.

[25:23]I think when I mentioned self-help in the beginning,

[25:27]I didn't mean to scare anybody that this is a true expert.

[25:31]I hope that you didn't take it, you know.

[25:33]The stuff with genre these days is so,

[25:35]there's so much overlap, right?

[25:36]But I feel like anything that can help somebody else,

[25:39]I consider sort of self-help, right?

[25:41]When they're totally so, you know.

[25:43]But I don't think you cannot know.

[25:44]I'm all about self-help.

[25:46]I love all of that stuff.

[25:47]But like you said, you know, I don't know.

[25:49]And I think this is, this is categorized

[25:51]as self-help or motivation or some kind of thing like that.

[25:54]But there is a lot of personal,

[25:57]a lot of it's my personal story, you know, in the book.

[26:00]So, well, I mean, personally,

[26:02]I find that a lot more compelling than more research, right?

[26:05]I mean, research is really interesting as well,

[26:07]but not if you're trying to like spark a conversation, right?

[26:11]That's not totally so.

[26:13]Yeah, perhaps.

[26:14]So do you have more writing aspirations?

[26:17]What's coming next?

[26:18]Like what do you wanna do?

[26:19]What's your game plan here?

[26:21]Do you have one or?

[26:23]I do, this is a two-book deal.

[26:25]So I am starting a second book in 2021 sometime.

[26:30]I don't know exactly.

[26:31]I don't know totally no, the angle,

[26:32]but it will be in the same genre, I guess we'll say.

[26:35]I do love sort of mixing this personal essay

[26:39]with other kind of non-fiction elements.

[26:43]It's a funny hybrid that seems to have sprung up out

[26:46]of internet culture, you know, really maybe

[26:48]speaking directly to the reader,

[26:50]but then also sharing personal things.

[26:54]And then like I said, it just feels comfortable for me.

[26:56]I do hope, as I've, you know,

[26:59]try to hone right my writing skills on and on.

[27:02]I do hope that I may be writing something different

[27:05]in 10 years, but I've really enjoyed.

[27:08]It has been a process to not be embarrassed,

[27:11]to be a blogger, to not be embarrassed,

[27:13]to be a, you know, self-help hobbyist.

[27:17]Like to kind of get where I am and own it

[27:19]and be like, oh, this is actually my sweet spot this year

[27:22]and where I am right now.

[27:23]And like maybe I'll be a serious writer in the future

[27:27]or maybe like this is what my talent is.

[27:31]And that's been a process.

[27:34]I think that was a process all through my 30s.

[27:36]And as we slide into my 40s to be like,

[27:37]okay, no, actually, like what is prestigious anymore?

[27:40]You know, I mean, like it's kind of just

[27:42]what connects with people.

[27:43]Only one book a year can win the national record.

[27:46]So, like let someone else win that book board.

[27:50]Like that's not what, in other words,

[27:53]like there are authors who that's their go-to

[27:56]is that style of writing and the like obsession

[28:01]with form and intricacy and sentence and all of that.

[28:04]Like let them have that if that's their thing.

[28:07]Like that might come as easily to them

[28:09]as you speaking from the heart comes to you

[28:10]and everyone can tell when someone's trying

[28:13]to be something that they're not, right?

[28:14]So maybe, I don't know, this is like how I felt

[28:17]in business school and there are people there

[28:19]who are like dying to get jobs and marketing.

[28:22]And I was like, oh, marketing is like a fallback for me.

[28:25]Like this is how I knew I didn't really wanna do that.

[28:27]Right?

[28:28]Like it's the same kind of thing.

[28:31]Like, you know, the people who really wanna write

[28:34]literary fiction can write literary fiction.

[28:36]Like, it doesn't have to be you.

[28:37]That's totally cool.

[28:38]That's my philosophy.

[28:40]I love to read it.

[28:42]Like I love to read it.

[28:44]I get it really high brow things and I like,

[28:47]and I love it and I feel smart and I'm like,

[28:48]amazed that people can do it.

[28:51]But like, it's taken me a long time to be like,

[28:53]but I'm not gonna do it.

[28:54]You know, yeah.

[28:55]And that's okay.

[28:56]You wrote a whole book and it's a great book

[28:58]and it makes everybody who read it wanna be your friend

[29:01]and how cool is that?

[29:03]I mean, I hope so, Zippy.

[29:05]Thank you for saying that.

[29:06]Let's hope so.

[29:08]I think so.

[29:09]Well, now that I've pinned you as some sort of an expert

[29:12]in some way, what advice do you have to aspiring authors?

[29:15]Perhaps aside from not, don't try to,

[29:18]well, that was my advice.

[29:19]Don't try to win the national book award

[29:20]on the first try.

[29:21]Anyway, go ahead.

[29:21]And you should try different avenues to find your voice

[29:26]because I knew I was a writer,

[29:29]but when I was writing, you know,

[29:31]and they say it was to write every day

[29:32]to become a better writer and everything.

[29:34]And I did that.

[29:35]I wrote every day on my blog for years and years.

[29:37]And of course, it was an amazing discipline.

[29:39]And I did learn a lot in writing for an audience

[29:41]by doing that.

[29:43]But I had to take a few years and do something else,

[29:47]which was podcasting, which was using my physical voice.

[29:50]And then when I came back to the actual page,

[29:53]I was a much stronger writer.

[29:57]So I don't think that for aspiring authors,

[29:59]you have to be.

[30:00]scared of taking some time to do something else, you know, to try painting, to try singing,

[30:05]to, to, you know, you're not losing your writing muscles when you go to try to find yourself

[30:14]or try to find a way to express yourself with a different medium. But if writing is really what

[30:20]you want to do, it will come back to you like tenfold. And I really worried when I gave up my daily

[30:26]writing habit that I was sort of giving up that dream. And it was like the complete opposite.

[30:33]It was because I, I don't want to go on a tangent here, but I tried to get a book deal with my

[30:38]blog and all of that kind of stuff. And it didn't go anywhere. I didn't get it. And so when I

[30:42]closed all of that up and I thought that was sort of the end of a chapter, it was like the opposite

[30:47]was true. I needed to go sort of do this other thing for a couple of years. And then when I came back,

[30:51]and I was like, I really want to be a writer, I was shocked at how much more easily it flowed

[30:58]then from just taking those, the years of the discipline, but then taking the time to, to do

[31:04]something else. I hope that that makes sense to an aspiring writer because I know that it's scary

[31:08]and that I, I definitely did not know that in the moment. This is me in hindsight, but it's really

[31:13]true. I love that. And I totally relate. So that's awesome. And relate to how much, how much fun

[31:20]podcasting is and all the benefits. It's, it's like a writing adjacent activity in a way.

[31:25]It is. You're still having to express yourself articulately. I mean, you're still having to,

[31:31]you know, it is. It's a, it's a thing. I mean, I'm hoping being articulate is not a prerequisite

[31:36]every day because I'm, I'm like struggling just string sentences together today. But you know,

[31:41]in general, you know, self expression and all that. Well, Laura, thank you so much. Thanks again

[31:47]for this awesome book. Share your stuff. I'll go first 10 questions to take your friendships to the next

[31:52]level level. And I'm just like wishing you all the best. I'm so excited. She came on my podcast.

[31:58]Thank you. I loved it so much. I love that you're holding it. It makes me so happy. Okay. Bye.

[32:06]Today's episode has been sponsored by this is everything, the podcast by Ali Levine.

[32:11]And just a reminder, again, please preorder a copy of my book, Moms Don't Have Time to

[32:16]a Quarantine Anthology and go to my website under the anthology tab for the fundraiser. And I hope

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[32:29]research. So please join me for the fundraiser. Thanks so much. Thanks for listening to this episode of

[32:35]Moms Don't Have Time to Read Books. Don't forget to follow me on Instagram at ZB Owens

[32:40]and at Moms Don't Have Time to Read Books. Also sign up for my newsletter at ZB Owens.com

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[32:49]Thanks so much to Steve and Ryan at Textures Sound for the Sound Editing. And thank you to

[32:53]Morning Moon Productions for providing this fantastic intro and now trim music.