Stories Mean Business - Nick Warren

Absolutely love this from John Swartzwelder's recent interview with the New Yorker.

"But I do have a trick that makes things easier for me. Since writing is very hard and rewriting is comparatively easy and rather fun, I always write my scripts all the way through as fast as I can, the first day, if possible, putting in crap jokes and pattern dialogue—“Homer, I don’t want you to do that.” “Then I won’t do it.” Then the next day, when I get up, the script’s been written. It’s lousy, but it’s a script. The hard part is done. It’s like a crappy little elf has snuck into my office and badly done all my work for me, and then left with a tip of his crappy hat. All I have to do from that point on is fix it. So I’ve taken a very hard job, writing, and turned it into an easy one, rewriting, overnight. I advise all writers to do their scripts and other writing this way."

Episode home:

See also:

Show notes:

Yesterday, I was a guest on Hannah Power's podcast.

She and I met in 2019, and that meeting was one of my triggers to start creating content (including this podcast).

During the interview, she asked me the how it was that I'd kept going when so many people grind to a halt.

In some ways its a tough question to answer, but in others it's easy.

I think of myself as someone who finishes things.

That's the 'story' I tell myself, but it's not just a story.

I can look back over the past 20 years and pinpoint the moment that triggered that belief.

Even though I'd built a business with clients around the world, I became 'someone who finishes things' when I completed my first novel.

That was the hardest thing I've ever done – professionally – because there was nowhere to hide.

Just me and the manuscript and no one else to blame.

Finishing that changed me, and that change is only compounding.

Episode home:

https://StoriesMeanBusiness.com/podcast/714-Building-a-body-of-proof

Side notes for this podcast:

In some ways, todays world feels like the world we all experienced as 3 or 4 year-olds, before we understood the people around us were ... shock horror ... people like us.

With hopes and dreams and tempers.

The world is like that now, with most of the people who come across our path little more than wraiths.

A comment. A like. A spam email.

There's a real person behind that, but we take away only the barest hint or shadow.

Our job, as storytellers, is to become real to the people who matter – to the people we can serve.

That's the job of story.

Episode home:

https://StoriesMeanBusiness.com/podcast/713-Becoming-real

Side notes for this podcast:

The people you are selling to don't know what you know.

They don't know that you are a good person, that you understand what you are talking about, that the testimonials you claim are ... really are true – or that you'll be there for them when things get hard.

They also don't know whether the results you promise will be true for them, or what it will mean for their lives if they are.

Lastly, they don't know if a better offer or opportunity will come along tomorrow.

Our job is to patiently, carefully, tell the right story to the right people – not just through our words, but our actions. Again and again and again.

In 2008, Derren Brown created a thought provoking TV special called The System.

In some ways, it changed the way I thought about the path to success.

We all crave the shortcut, but there is a longer more certain path.

Episode home:

https://StoriesMeanBusiness.com/podcast/711-Leveraging-the-System

See also:

https://derrenbrown.co.uk/shows/the-system/

Super quick podcast because I'm under a heap of deadlines.

Big exciting news is that I've booked an awesome guest for the 1,000th podcast – yep, the one that won't come around until early June 2022. (That's forward planning for you.)

I'm not saying who it is until the interview is done, but I'm really excited.

But most of all I'm excited because this proves that Level 3 works! The best way to tell a better story is to BE a better story.

I've no doubt that my guest gets hundreds of requests like this ... but how often do you get to be on someone's 1,000th podcast?

That's the story I was telling.

What about you?

Episode home:

https://StoriesMeanBusiness.com/podcast/709-Level-3-Works!

Our Cognitive Unconscious processes around 11 million pieces of information every second, but it's more than just a gatekeeper.

There are fascinating experiments that show how even subconscious cues affect our interpretation of events AND decision-making.

This is huge, because the stories we tell about ourselves will not only affect the way people perceive us, but the way they perceive what we subsequently do ... AND the offers we make.

Episode home:

https://StoriesMeanBusiness.com/podcast/708-Not-just-a-gatekeeper

Or check out the Story Science page.

Maki Kaji died yesterday.

You may not know his name, but he was the man who took a simple game called Number Place ... and renamed it Sudoku!

He's the reason that it exploded on to the scene 20 years ago, that and the games beautiful progression of Simplicity > Depth.

This is the signature of great writing, great stories and great businesses. From a simple seed grows something amazing.

Episode home: https://StoriesMeanBusiness.com/podcast/707-From-simplicity-to-depth

I used to think that swearing was just lazy language, but I was wrong.

Swear words can improve our tolerance to pain, bind us closer to our friends and co-workers and ... sometimes ... just be exactly the word we need.

Episode Homepage at:

https://StoriesMeanBusiness.com/podcast/706-Bad-Fucking-Language

See also:

https://storiesmeanbusiness.com/bad-language/

https://www.nationalgeographic.com/science/article/science-swearing-profanity-curse-emma-byrne