Dogs Are Smarter Than People: Writing Life, Marriage and Motivation

In Episode Five of our podcast, we get a closer look at the interpersonal dynamics of Carrie and Shaun and also insight into the ingredients of a White Russian, which is now called the Caucasian.

The subtitle for this podcast is Sometimes Even Those Who Lack Confidence Must Insist They Are Right

Sidenote: It’s hard to feel confident when people tell you that you lack something – confidence.  If you are worried about being someone’s confidence, give them a hug instead of a lecture. Always

This episode, Shaun ruins Carrie’s donkey farm dreams by mentioning that there is no money in donkey farming.

This sounds sad, right?

It’s not. Because we also talk about the three awesome elements of conflicted character. See Carrie’s blog post for a more in-depth discussion.

Writing Tip of the Cast: 

Conflicted Characters need objectives, motivations, and obstacles.

Blocking happens in life when we are afraid.

Writer Vasubandhu believes there are five main fears that all humans have:

I don’t have some of those fears, but I know that the fears I do have keep me from reaching out, stepping beyond my comfort zone. Like this podcast is hard for me because I had a teacher who told me I would never be successful or get married or get into college because my voice was so ridiculous.

I proved him wrong, but it still… Sometimes it makes me pause when I have to do something where people will hear me – my actual voice. I think it’s one of the main reasons I became a writer. Writing is quiet. Nobody hears you slur your s’s.

So, those fears? They block us. Don’t let your fear keep you from living your life, telling your story, being who you want to be.

Carrie is sadly solo in this podcast where she discusses how one of the weirdest book ideas ever came from Maine’s Common Ground Fair and a man who had a tail.

He also smelled like dead mice, but who is judging?

The book series made the New York Times bestseller’s list and was a best seller abroad, so weird ideas? Those are good ideas.

So, um… the title sort of says it all, doesn’t it?

This solo podcast talks about how I did, indeed, mess up my entire submission, but still (unagented) got out of the slush pile and had a book deal.

A much longer written version of this story is on my website here.

Podcast Two – It’s Hard Living With a Writer

Writers and over-thinkers like Carrie break down every word and symbol into multiple layers and levels. That’s because authors spend so much of their time analyzing interactions and sentences and people. We recreate the world into our story by building that story word by word and symbol by symbol.

Sometimes that’s hard to live with especially when the writer is (cough) sensitive (cough).

Life doesn’t go the way we want to a lot of the time. Your kid gets a speeding ticket. You can lose your job, your mom, your friend. Life is improvisation and yeah – the whole seize the day thing is a cliché because it’s important.

So to enjoy life you’ve got to be a good improviser. What does it take to be a good improviser?

Writing Tip – Say yes to experiences and to writing about them. When you look at the page, don’t see emptiness, see possibility.

Dog Tip – Say yes to every new experience! And don’t just say yes, SAY YES!!! Live your life with exclamation marks and joy.

Hey! There’s some bonus content over on my website with links to free things. FREE THINGS!

So, in this solo bonus podcast, Carrie talks about how she said yes to a really weird idea and how that yes turned into the internationally bestselling NEED series.

Hey! There’s some bonus content over on my website with links to free things. FREE THINGS!