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On today’s episode I’m going to be talking about how important it is to be part of writing groups and how to run them.

This is always true, but especially so when you’re working on your first book.

When you have the support and accountability, you will not only write more, but you’ll feel a lot better while doing it.

And who doesn’t want that?

For step-by-step support for your writing projects apply for Leslie's Your Words Unleashed Six-Month Program.

Check out Leslie's website at www.YourWordsUnleashed.com!

The three ways Leslie can help you in 2025:

#1: Six-month Your Words Unleashed signature book writing coaching program. Through 8 hour-long sessions tailored to your own needs and goals, we will pinpoint what’s keeping you stuck. We’ll figure out personalized solutions and strategies so you can create direction and lasting momentum with your book writing. I’ll also provide detailed feedback on your writing throughout

#2: Four-month Career Reset Program for Overwhelmed Academics who want to reconnect with purpose. Over the course of 6 hour-long sessions, we’ll clarify your personal career vision, create space for what matters, overcome internal obstacles to change, and define what success means on your own terms so you can work less and live more.

#3: Group Zoom Workshops that balance personal well-being with writing productivity. Topics include transforming your dissertation into a book; connecting to the deeper purpose of your work; as well as boundary setting.

Check everything out on my website and if you are interested in any of these, please shoot me an email at ...

Send us a text

On today's podcast episode I thought I would do something a little bit different. Rather than giving tips or advice about writing, I’d like to help you create a sense of internal calm with a short guided meditation.

When you’re in a calm, curious, and collected space, much more is possible in every realm of life.

In the days ahead, with their many challenges, you can use this technique at any time to still your mind, knowing that in a few simple moments you can feel completely calm again.

For step-by-step support for your writing projects apply for Leslie's Your Words Unleashed Six-Month Program.

Check out Leslie's website at www.YourWordsUnleashed.com!

The three ways Leslie can help you in 2025:

#1: Six-month Your Words Unleashed signature book writing coaching program. Through 8 hour-long sessions tailored to your own needs and goals, we will pinpoint what’s keeping you stuck. We’ll figure out personalized solutions and strategies so you can create direction and lasting momentum with your book writing. I’ll also provide detailed feedback on your writing throughout

#2: Four-month Career Reset Program for Overwhelmed Academics who want to reconnect with purpose. Over the course of 6 hour-long sessions, we’ll clarify your personal career vision, create space for what matters, overcome internal obstacles to change, and define what success means on your own terms so you can work less and live more.

#3: Group Zoom Workshops that balance personal well-being with writing productivity. Topics include transforming your dissertation into a book; connecting to the deeper purpose of your work; as well as boundary setting.

Check everything out on my website and if you are interested in any of these, please shoot me an email at ...

Send us a text

Today's episode talks about ways to befriend your inner critic and treat yourself with more compassion.

For step-by-step support for your writing projects apply for Leslie's Your Words Unleashed Six-Month Program.

Check out Leslie's website at www.YourWordsUnleashed.com!

The three ways Leslie can help you in 2025:

#1: Six-month Your Words Unleashed signature book writing coaching program. Through 8 hour-long sessions tailored to your own needs and goals, we will pinpoint what’s keeping you stuck. We’ll figure out personalized solutions and strategies so you can create direction and lasting momentum with your book writing. I’ll also provide detailed feedback on your writing throughout

#2: Four-month Career Reset Program for Overwhelmed Academics who want to reconnect with purpose. Over the course of 6 hour-long sessions, we’ll clarify your personal career vision, create space for what matters, overcome internal obstacles to change, and define what success means on your own terms so you can work less and live more.

#3: Group Zoom Workshops that balance personal well-being with writing productivity. Topics include transforming your dissertation into a book; connecting to the deeper purpose of your work; as well as boundary setting.

Check everything out on my website and if you are interested in any of these, please shoot me an email at ...

Send us a text

So in the last episode I talked about some of the reasons why transforming your dissertation into a book is an emotionally complex process. 

It’s possible you’ve outgrown your topic and need to find ways to reconnect to your original sources of inspiration to keep going. 

You also need to bid farewell to your earlier grad student self and move forward into the next stage of your intellectual journey as an expert, and I gave you a little exercise you could do to move this process along.

Today’s episode is going to be all about practical application. I’m going to give some really useful and specific tips and tricks that will help you revise your dissertation into a book.

For step-by-step support for your writing projects apply for Leslie's Your Words Unleashed Six-Month Program.

Check out Leslie's website at www.YourWordsUnleashed.com!

The three ways Leslie can help you in 2025:

#1: Six-month Your Words Unleashed signature book writing coaching program. Through 8 hour-long sessions tailored to your own needs and goals, we will pinpoint what’s keeping you stuck. We’ll figure out personalized solutions and strategies so you can create direction and lasting momentum with your book writing. I’ll also provide detailed feedback on your writing throughout

#2: Four-month Career Reset Program for Overwhelmed Academics who want to reconnect with purpose. Over the course of 6 hour-long sessions, we’ll clarify your personal career vision, create space for what matters, overcome internal obstacles to change, and define what success means on your own terms so you can work less and live more.

#3: Group Zoom Workshops that balance personal well-being with writing productivity. Topics include transforming your dissertation into a book; connecting to the deeper purpose of your work; as well as boundary setting.

Check everything out on my website and if you are interested in any of these, please shoot me an email at ...

Send us a text

Recently I was asked by a large research university to put together a workshop for junior faculty about transforming your dissertation into a book. 

It’s made me reflect on the very long and painful process I went through writing my first book, which I started working on soon after I graduated with my PhD in 2010.

In this episode I’m going to focus on WHY revising your dissertation is such an emotionally fraught process. 

I’ll give you an exercise at the end to help you reflect on your journey from graduate student to full-fledged expert.

And in the next episode, I will give some specific and practical tips and tricks to help you as you work on revising. 

 For step-by-step support for your writing projects apply for Leslie's Your Words Unleashed Six-Month Program.

Check out Leslie's website at www.YourWordsUnleashed.com!

The three ways Leslie can help you in 2025:

#1: Six-month Your Words Unleashed signature book writing coaching program. Through 8 hour-long sessions tailored to your own needs and goals, we will pinpoint what’s keeping you stuck. We’ll figure out personalized solutions and strategies so you can create direction and lasting momentum with your book writing. I’ll also provide detailed feedback on your writing throughout

#2: Four-month Career Reset Program for Overwhelmed Academics who want to reconnect with purpose. Over the course of 6 hour-long sessions, we’ll clarify your personal career vision, create space for what matters, overcome internal obstacles to change, and define what success means on your own terms so you can work less and live more.

#3: Group Zoom Workshops that balance personal well-being with writing productivity. Topics include transforming your dissertation into a book; connecting to the deeper purpose of your work; as well as boundary setting.

Check everything out on my website and if you are interested in any of these, please shoot me an email at ...

Send us a text

In the last episode I talked about when you should start reaching out to scholarly presses and setting up meetings with acquiring editors to talk about your book project. 

The moral of the story is that there is no one-size-fits-all model to getting your book published. As I’ll tell you about later in this episode, even my own two books had vastly different journeys to publication. 

Therefore, today’s episode builds on the last one, by answering another set of pressing questions that first-time authors often have: 

How do you determine the best press for your manuscript? And, once you decide that you are ready to contact editors, how do you actually do it? 

For step-by-step support for your writing projects apply for Leslie's Your Words Unleashed Six-Month Program.

Check out Leslie's website at www.YourWordsUnleashed.com!

The three ways Leslie can help you in 2025:

#1: Six-month Your Words Unleashed signature book writing coaching program. Through 8 hour-long sessions tailored to your own needs and goals, we will pinpoint what’s keeping you stuck. We’ll figure out personalized solutions and strategies so you can create direction and lasting momentum with your book writing. I’ll also provide detailed feedback on your writing throughout

#2: Four-month Career Reset Program for Overwhelmed Academics who want to reconnect with purpose. Over the course of 6 hour-long sessions, we’ll clarify your personal career vision, create space for what matters, overcome internal obstacles to change, and define what success means on your own terms so you can work less and live more.

#3: Group Zoom Workshops that balance personal well-being with writing productivity. Topics include transforming your dissertation into a book; connecting to the deeper purpose of your work; as well as boundary setting.

Check everything out on my website and if you are interested in any of these, please shoot me an email at ...

Send us a text

Publishing a book involves a hidden curriculum of knowledge that some have more access to than others—especially those who went elite institutions or whose advisors are well-known and well-connected.

One of the primary goals of this podcast is to help equalize the playing field for academic authors by creating more transparency about each step of the book writing and publishing process. 

I want to shine a light on areas that are often obscured from public view and that you can’t find satisfactory answers to just by googling. I wish it could be that easy! And in fact, it should be that easy, but I digress.

 My hope is to give everyone—particularly folks from marginalized communities and first-generation scholars—the tools and information to fulfill your book writing dreams.

So today I’m going to address one of the most common questions I get asked as a writing coach, which is “When is the best time to contact presses and start talking to editors?” 

On this episode I’ve got answers to this burning question and more! 

For step-by-step support for your writing projects apply for Leslie's Your Words Unleashed Six-Month Program.

Check out Leslie's website at www.YourWordsUnleashed.com!

The three ways Leslie can help you in 2025:

#1: Six-month Your Words Unleashed signature book writing coaching program. Through 8 hour-long sessions tailored to your own needs and goals, we will pinpoint what’s keeping you stuck. We’ll figure out personalized solutions and strategies so you can create direction and lasting momentum with your book writing. I’ll also provide detailed feedback on your writing throughout

#2: Four-month Career Reset Program for Overwhelmed Academics who want to reconnect with purpose. Over the course of 6 hour-long sessions, we’ll clarify your personal career vision, create space for what matters, overcome internal obstacles to change, and define what success means on your own terms so you can work less and live more.

#3: Group Zoom Workshops that balance personal well-being with writing productivity. Topics include transforming your dissertation into a book; connecting to the deeper purpose of your work; as well as boundary setting.

Check everything out on my website and if you are interested in any of these, please shoot me an email at ...

Send us a text

Today I’m going to talk about something that affects nearly all book writers—and let’s be honest, pretty much all people—at one point or another, and that’s overwhelm. 

 I’ll be giving you four tips to help you overcome these feelings when they arise so that you can feel calmer and more confident to move forward with your writing.

 To find the full transcript of this episode, go to YourWordsUnleashed.com/5.

So, onto overwhelm. You definitely know what I’m talking about. This was always a tough issue for writers, but it’s gotten a lot worse during this seemingly never-ending pandemic.

This is especially true for women who generally have to give much more of their time and energy to care for their families and their students’ emotional needs, leaving them with almost nothing at the end of the day for themselves or their own work. 

Overwhelm is not quite the same as burnout, although it’s related. But for scholarly authors, it’s that feeling like you’re drowning in too many ideas and too much data and you have no clear path forward. It can make you feel panicked and like time is running out. 

And these feelings, which are based in fear, often slow your writing way down or can even cause you to avoid it altogether. 

When you’re feeling overwhelmed, the idea of finishing your manuscript or getting a contract with a press you admire or having your book be published and read by people out in the world can seem like a distant dream. 

So, with all of this in mind, I’d like to offer four tips to help you navigate your way out of overwhelm so that you can stop spinning your wheels and start moving forward again in a way that feels good—and not like torture.

For step-by-step support for your writing projects apply for Leslie's Your Words Unleashed Six-Month Program.

Check out Leslie's website at www.YourWordsUnleashed.com!

The three ways Leslie can help you in 2025:

#1: Six-month Your Words Unleashed signature book writing coaching program. Through 8 hour-long sessions tailored to your own needs and goals, we will pinpoint what’s keeping you stuck. We’ll figure out personalized solutions and strategies so you can create direction and lasting momentum with your book writing. I’ll also provide detailed feedback on your writing throughout

#2: Four-month Career Reset Program for Overwhelmed Academics who want to reconnect with purpose. Over the course of 6 hour-long sessions, we’ll clarify your personal career vision, create space for what matters, overcome internal obstacles to change, and define what success means on your own terms so you can work less and live more.

#3: Group Zoom Workshops that balance personal well-being with writing productivity. Topics include transforming your dissertation into a book; connecting to the deeper purpose of your work; as well as boundary setting.

Check everything out on my website and if you are interested in any of these, please shoot me an email at ...

Send us a text

In this episode we're going to dig into a topic that is critical to your success in getting your book published, but it's also something that's really difficult for a lot of first-time authors to achieve--and this is how to develop your own distinct voice and writing style in your manuscript.

You can find the full transcript for this episode at YourWordsUnleashed.com/4.

For step-by-step support for your writing projects apply for Leslie's Your Words Unleashed Six-Month Program.

Check out Leslie's website at www.YourWordsUnleashed.com!

The three ways Leslie can help you in 2025:

#1: Six-month Your Words Unleashed signature book writing coaching program. Through 8 hour-long sessions tailored to your own needs and goals, we will pinpoint what’s keeping you stuck. We’ll figure out personalized solutions and strategies so you can create direction and lasting momentum with your book writing. I’ll also provide detailed feedback on your writing throughout

#2: Four-month Career Reset Program for Overwhelmed Academics who want to reconnect with purpose. Over the course of 6 hour-long sessions, we’ll clarify your personal career vision, create space for what matters, overcome internal obstacles to change, and define what success means on your own terms so you can work less and live more.

#3: Group Zoom Workshops that balance personal well-being with writing productivity. Topics include transforming your dissertation into a book; connecting to the deeper purpose of your work; as well as boundary setting.

Check everything out on my website and if you are interested in any of these, please shoot me an email at ...

Send us a text

Wouldn’t you agree that these days boundaries have become such a buzzword? All the time, we hear experts talking about how we need to maintain strong personal and professional boundaries if we want to protect our limited time and energy and put it towards the things that matter to us most. But, on the other hand, I’ve noticed that there’s very little good advice or practical strategies on how to actually do this.

On today’s episode I’ll be giving you an exercise with an exact formula that will help you create bulletproof boundaries with your job.

For step-by-step support for your writing projects apply for Leslie's Your Words Unleashed Six-Month Program.

Check out Leslie's website at www.YourWordsUnleashed.com!

The three ways Leslie can help you in 2025:

#1: Six-month Your Words Unleashed signature book writing coaching program. Through 8 hour-long sessions tailored to your own needs and goals, we will pinpoint what’s keeping you stuck. We’ll figure out personalized solutions and strategies so you can create direction and lasting momentum with your book writing. I’ll also provide detailed feedback on your writing throughout

#2: Four-month Career Reset Program for Overwhelmed Academics who want to reconnect with purpose. Over the course of 6 hour-long sessions, we’ll clarify your personal career vision, create space for what matters, overcome internal obstacles to change, and define what success means on your own terms so you can work less and live more.

#3: Group Zoom Workshops that balance personal well-being with writing productivity. Topics include transforming your dissertation into a book; connecting to the deeper purpose of your work; as well as boundary setting.

Check everything out on my website and if you are interested in any of these, please shoot me an email at ...