I recorded this interview weeks ago and postponed it due to the racial tragedies and injustices that have impacted me deeply. To support the Black Lives Matter Movement, I have been speaking out on my social media platforms and will be making changes to this blog. You can read about my stance on The Inspiring Bee, but I will be posting here as well. Thank you for your understanding while I figure out ways to serve you and what we’re all going through right now.
Inspiration Conversation With Author, Speaker and Teacher Susan Purvis
If you heard that an avalanche buried three toddlers where one did not survive because the rescue dog was unable to help him, what would you do?
If you were Susan Purvis, you would make the life-altering decision to get a dog, train it, and make it your life’s work to never let that happen again.
Susan is a go-getter who always wanted to be a writer but was waiting for a story and this became her story in the award-winning memoir Go Find: My Journey to Find the Lost-and Myself.
In this conversation, Susan will coach you to find your own best life-the one that you were too afraid to listen to. She will tell you how she got through the difficult days of writing and wanting to give up. She’ll share the rules of writing every writer should know and the surprising thing that helped her to get to the core of her book. It was a moving session and one I will never forget. Get ready to be inspired.
The Breakdown
1:38 Susan shares how she went from looking for gold in Latin America to follow a calling.
4:50 I feel like all of us can relate to what Susan shares here when we realize our hearts are just not into a job we’ve taken for money. It’s the loneliness and emptiness that accompanies that life-shifting moment.
6:17 Susan shares what she has in common with memoirist Linda Strader here.
6:50 Any black lab owners will relate to what she says here.
10:15 Anyone else always wanted to be a writer, but feel like you didn’t have the confidence and courage to do it?
11:00 This is why you should keep detailed notes if you ever think you might be a memoirist one day.
14:30 The group Susan talks about that she calls, “midwives,” to help her write her book. You can learn more about Authors of the Flathead here.
18:00 “I can kick your ass.” Susan shares why she wrote her book.
20:00 If I do this one thing, I’ll be validated, get attention, etc. Haven’t we all felt this way? Fill in your own thing with lose weight, publish a book, get promoted.
22:00 What helped Susan to keep writing when she felt like giving up.
23:00 She shares the hardest thing with writing the book and the fight she had every day with herself to overcome it.
24:13 Three years into her writing, Susan discovered the real purpose of her book.
27:32 The level she had to get to become a bestselling author. Are you willing to go that deep?
29:30 How her literary agent brought her to the place needed to get her published.
34:00 How the classes she’s teaching in person is changing because of COVID.
35:25 I ask Susan how she knew what to include in her own life and leave out. She gave a great tip, I’m going to use here.
36:51 Here are the four rules of writing.
38:00 Susan shares her amazing elevator pitch. Writers take note!
41:00 Here’s how Susan got her agent. It’s not in the usual way. More great writing tips that I follow too. She found her agent and her manuscript was sold enviably quickly!
43:33 Want to create a writing career? Susan is a speaker, teacher and an author and she shares a simple message of how you can do it too.
45:00 The exciting thing Susan is working on now! Susan also has great advice on recording your own audiobook.
48:00 What she’s going to do the next time around.
49:00 Here is her next project.
You can see what Susan’s up to on her website: www.susanpurvis.com
{Music by Kevin MacLeod from Incompetech.}
