TRANSCRIPT

Hello and welcome to the finding Elara Podcast, building worlds with words and sharing those words with the world. A podcast for writers, worldbuilders and Artists that would like to take a mindful look inside their creations. Join me as I dive into the depths of mindfulness and explore worldbuilding in all its diversity ever searching for Elara.

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Hi Guys this is episode 12 of the show. My name is Dianna the host of exploration into your mindful creative. In this episode I am talking about my plans for the show next year. These are not my goals at this stage, more of a blueprint of what I am planning on doing. I am pretty excited about the response that I gained from putting the show out there so we are going to talk how I have actioned that response to set up 2019. 

This  week has simply flown by. For most of it my hubby was home which gives me a sense of grounding that I otherwise seem to lack. We attended my youngest daughters end of year concert and she was named student leader for next year, which I am really, really proud of. I am also a member of the district high school P&C committee and helped organise the year 6 transition party. So I helped the year 7’s coordinate a pool party for the year 6's and we put together boxes to the future. It was pretty exciting I think that they all enjoyed themselves. I am also a member of the local theatre group the Yilgarn Entertainers and we had a christmas bonanza and membership drive over the weekend an that was really quite exciting, lots of laughs. I also had my last book club of the year. So we got to exchange a few secret Santa's at that. My other two children had their end of year concert and I recently started playing basketball. It's only a social baskeball and it turns out I am not that good, I have never been that good and it's still a lot of fun. So I quite enjoy the sport itself. I have spent most of the rest of the time in my office or cleaning the house. Mess seems to come out of nowhere at this time of the year kids bringing back extra things from school and it's all a little bit crazy. But I am glad that with the kids concert the other night that was the last commitment that I had. 

My Christmas story is doing much better. I did manage to get more words on the page, thankfully before the pool party. If you remember last week I set some goals and I wasn't allowed to go to the pool until I met a certain word limit and I am really quite happy that I made it so I could swim at the pool party. I am still waiting for the cover designer to get back to me but it is looking better. There was a couple of tweaks but I'm more content with where she's going with the cover now and I will talk about that another day. 

I decided that I needed to create a map of the town that the story is set in, Gum Valley. I wouldn’t normally do for a short story and you can definitely call it procrastination but I like to think of it as creative realisation. It helped me quite a bit to have someone physically in front of me. and just because I am in the editing phases make sure that I don't have my characters turning the wrong way down streets and such.

It is the last day of school tomorrow which means it is my last bus run. I am pretty happy about that, I love the holidays and having the kids home and just relaxing. Not having to get up at a certain time and kids can do their own thing.

I want to shout out to all the members of the Finding Elara Facebook Community which has been growing which is fantastic. Thank you for being there and sharing your ideas and thoughts. It's been really active, people have been getting involved in the conversations. I have daily threads and a lot of people have been answering the questions that I have been putting up. Also I have had people add a few of their own posts here and there which makes me really happy. The point of the facebook group is to give people  a space that you can share and have like minded people together in a community. All of the previous guests so far have become members of the group So if you have any questions for some one I have interviewed in the past you can come in to the comunity and ask questions there as well. 

My Ko-fi page is still there if you want to buy me a cuppa. That’s ko-fi.com/findingelara I love the idea of it It's just so sweet when I get an email saying someone's bought me a coffee, I do a little happy dance at my desk It's really cool. I may have to look in to getting sponsors of affiliate partners in the next year I will probably talk about that in future episodes I just want to cover the costs of what I am spending on the show so we'll hace to see how that goes. 

So that was my week and we can talk more after the show.

Music

So this week I wanted to talk to you about how I went with asking other creatives about coming on to the show. I put a call out on facebook and twitter about looking for guest in 2019. I didn’t really get a response from twitter but I think I need to spend more time building that platform and learning how to use hashtags and such properly. I know that there is a whole bunch of training and I have actually down loaded a book so maybe on the Christmas break I can do some reading to earn more about my twitter handle and stuff.

I am a member of WA writers on facebook so I put a call out there saying that I had 26 interview spots available on my podcast if anyone would be interested in coming on the show to contact me. I am also a member of Romance Writers Australia and put the same call out there.

I received an amazing response, more than the 26 spots that I have available. I contacted all the people that showed interest and put together a spreadsheet. I kind of love spreadsheets so it was kind of fun putting all together and putting all the data into the cells. I included all the information that they sent me, their email and social media profiles I stalked all their web pages so I could get their short bios and just get a feel for who they were. If they wanted to come onto the show to talk about mindfulness or to talk about worldbuilding. and I wanted to make sure that they would be a good fit for the fining elara podcast. I needed to know if they had any releases for any particular month or if they had any big goals that they would like to be on the show. A few of them actually have book release months so obviously I have put them on the month that they have the book release.

After I had all the information on the spread sheet I set out a basic 2019 show list by week. I know that it may be subject to change but it was just a basic thing to start with. So if I ever have bonus episodes or two part episodes because the interview went to long then I will still have all the general dates to work with.

Once that was all set, I sent out an email to all of the people that were on the list. So out of all the people that registered only 16 provided their email. I may get their details later down the track though but we will just have to wait and see. I hope to anyway. I actually tried to contact one of the authors through their website asking for their email so we will wait and see it that actually works.

I asked them all in the email if they would be interested in participating in a competition focussed around one of their books when it is their time for their show to come out and if they would like to join the Finding Elara Facebook community as it is a great way to get their name out there and get to know the current listeners. A few of them have already joined the community and most of them have said that they would be happy to put something forward for a competition. We will just have to play it by ear and take it one show at a time. I haven’t actually had responses from all the people that I have sent emails out to but I am pretty much playing it as a first in first served so the first people that get back to me are the ones that will get the primes dates. If the dates are taken then the dates are taken.

So to start with I had to be mindful of the actual post that I sent out. I wanted to make sure that I was reaching out to the right people and that they knew what the show was and what they would be in for if they chose to participate. 

So First I compiled all the data and then I reached out and waited for response and how that I have a rough Idea of what spaces are available I can reach out to other creatives that I would be interested in talking to. I do have a sort of dream list of guests that I want on the show, some of them I have emailed already and other I haven’t quite built up the courage. Yet. YOu have to take note og the yet on the end there I definately intend on getting to it later.

I wanted to make sure that I stick to what the essence of the show is and not veer away because I just want someone to be a guest. THey have to have something to do with wither mindfulness or worldbuilding. The people on my 2019 list pretty amazing alot of paranormal a lot of fantasy a few non fiction writers and I just think it's really exciting. plus it's adding to my TBR list because I want to be able to read some of their or atleast part of their books before they come on the show. have a chance to read their style of writing before I talk to them. I am really enjoying learning about the different processes people use when they are being creative and how they handle the struggles of being an artist. I use that in the broad sense, writers, photographers, painter, graphic artists and the like all need make sure they are mindful of their actions if they want to send it out to the world.  So made some pretty big steps this week to get those emails out and start putting that spreadsheet together. 

As always on my solo shows I like to have five tips for dealing with mindfulness and worldbuilding issues. This weeks mindfulness is putting yourself out there reaching out to new people and trying to build contacts.

So Tip 1 Be honest and open to new ideas because everyone has different opinions and you need to be open minded to what they have to say.

Tip 2 Make sure that you give new people a proper chance. Don't be too judgemental with new people if you've met them online and it's a bad day or something like that they might give a different impression than they normally would so make sure you're not too judgemental.

Tip 3 Make sure that you know your own self worth. For me, I know that I have this podcast and that is my worth in this sense. I have something that they can use to build their platform and I have something that I can use to build my platform. So make sure you know what you have.

Tip 4 Don't make too many compromises. If you have something that you want done and you need it done in a specific way sometimes you can make small little adjustments but don't actually compromise completely with what you want or you are going to be happy with the result.

Tip 5 The fact that you are interested in putting yourself out there and trying something new is pretty amazing in itself so make sure that you remember that. 

So that's what I have been doing to action 2019 and I hope that you found that interesting.

Buffy Night

The night where I get the big TV in the lounge and watch whatever I like with a few friends. This week on Buffy night I finished the seventh season of Once upon a time so I wanted to talk about how it inspired me as a show and Aribela has finished a trilogy that she  has written a review for me.

So in the first season of Once upon a time it started out with all of the classic fairytale characters were sent to a little town in Maine called Story brooke. They were sent there by a curse and there is a bit of drama involved around the curse. and the evil queen, instead of being ousted by snow white and prince charming is actually the mayor of the town. I loved this show when it first came out and I watched it with my kids and it would be a nice family night for us. My husband was the first to lose interest though and then the kids. I kept on watching it, I stayed through to the end but there were a few decisions that the writers made that I just didn't understand and I think the biggest problem was the amount of curses. There was just too many curses. I really enjoyed the fact that the characters although seemingly familiar had more depth that we could explore. Especially rumplestiltskin. He was one of my favourite characters. But it was hit with too many curses and although they tried to reboot it and start again, it was with another in a long line of curses and didn’t save viewer numbers. I think that there was a lot more to explore in the show in the series but it is over now. In the last half of the last season they really pulled everything together and tied it up nicely so I am sad to see it go but I am, content with it. What inspired me about the show was how you can change something so classic into something new and it's completely different.

I asked Aribela to provide another review for me this week and she chose the Demon road trilogy by Derek Landy. Now she got book 3 from the library not realising that it was the third book until she got home so she read it anyway and agreed with me that you need to really read them in order. She did go ahead and read the rest of the series but it was had to get through the second already knowing how it all turned out. The Demon Road Trilogy by Derek Landy is a great paranormal book, possibly horror. It has Demons, Vampires and more. The Trilogy consists of the books Demon Road, Desolation and American monsters. The story starts just before Amber Lamounts 16th birthday. Amber finds out that her parents are hiding a horrific family secret from her. Amber gets a little bit of help to escape and go on the run. With the help of Milo, a gift from her aunt, she is able to flee from her home.  They are never free from a new monster trying to get them. I highly recommend this book if you like paranormal books. It is very adventurous and horrific. It is very detailed both TMI and Thanks for elaborating. Ari has given it 3.5 stars. 

And that’s Buffy night for this week. and always at the end grrr argh.

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So I thought I would try a new section called Friends of the show. In this section I am going to talk about the people in the community and ny big events that are happening with them at the moment. There are so many things going on with the group members and I am so happy for them all. I have to get permission from the members first though so next solo episode there will be more. This week I can tell you that Allie McCormack has finally released her Audio book of Truckstop and she had a cover reveal for the first book in her wishes and dreams series. If you head on over to her blog she has documented the whole adventure and I am so excited for. I will have another friends of the show, when I am more organised on the next solo show.

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Linking to Elara I am yet to hear back from the agent I sent the Elara book to at this stage but I what I have learnt from the show is that I need to persevere and keep working on it. I am loving the idea of having a Christmas novelette in the Elaran world and I have even pencilled that in for next year. The people in my story are patiently waiting for their time to shine. The queen might get a little antsy if I leave it too long though. I am going to go through the book again during the school break and then start on the second novel in the series while I wait for something to happen with the first. It is really hectic this time of year though so I don’t want to put too much on my plate. 

Close 

That’s all I have for you today, the music is by bensound.com If you have any question about the show then you can contact me via email dianna@dlnix.com that is Dianna with 2 n’s. Or you will be able to go to my website to see the show notes which is dlnix.com/012. The full show notes are usually up a couple of days after the show is released but I have the highlights straight away. Next week I am interviewing Dereck Doepker. Derek Doepker is a former aspiring rockstar turned seven-time #1 bestselling author. He discovered proven processes that took him from struggling author to selling over 50,000 books. Now he shares those processes with thousands of authors through workshops, courses, and retreats empowering them to turn their passion for writing into a thriving business. He has 6 books available. He started with fitness and then moved to mindset hacks. I actually heard about him through the write and grow rich book that came out not that long ago. I subscribed through that and he was so inspiring and motivated with what he was sending out to subscribers that I looked forward to his emails. They were never too long either. I watched a youtube video he linked about a goal setting system he uses which he calls power. I was blown away by how he advanced my ideas of goal setting. His websites are Derekdoepker.com or bestsellingsecrets.com if you want to check him out before next week. 

I am looking forward to actioning some of the things that I talked to him about for the show and I look forward to sharing it with you guys. I hope that you have a wonderful week and

keep up the search.