I received an email last week from a person who essentially asked, “I’d love to have your career as a storyteller and consultant. Can you tell me how?”
I receive questions like this quite a bit. Maybe one per week. More than you might expect. More than I ever expected.
Essentially, people want to know how to become an author, a storyteller, a keynote speaker, or a consultant.
Or all three.
They primarily want to know how they can make money doing what I do.
The answer is a simple one:
Work like hell.
Make things.
Then keep making more things.
Maybe find some like-minded people to help.
Never stop.
Be patient.
Be relentless.
Hope to get noticed.
They never like this answer. I suspect it’s not the magic pill or secret door that many are hoping to find.
But I always find requests like this a little silly and slightly annoying because there is no secret formula.
No secret door.
No hidden recipe.
No predetermined route to success.
There never has been, and there never will be.
Nothing I did was planned. I never possessed any grand vision for the future. I just kept moving forward, making things, trying new things, seeking out the support of like-minded people, and working like hell.
It’s what I continue to do today. I hardly think I’m a finished product. I hope that I’m continually evolving, and something new and amazing is waiting for me around the next corner if I keep making, moving, and evolving.
Elysha just planned our summer vacation. While showing me the Airbnb, she said, “And look. You can work here,” pointing at a table in a nook off the kitchen.
“Work?” I said. “I’ll be on vacation!”
“Yes,” she said. “But you’ll still be you.”
And she’s right. I won’t schedule any meetings. I won’t film any videos. I won’t sign any contracts. But I will still climb out of bed at the crack of dawn and write. Maybe answer some email so I don’t fall behind. Design some stickers I’ve been wanting to own. Probably revise the manuscript of my next novel.
I’ll still be me.
However, since I frequently receive requests for advice on how to replicate my career, I’ve compiled a step-by-step guide to help them along the way.
The next time I’m asked for my secret formula, I’ll send this list:
- Write every single day of your life without ever missing a day for 17 years before finally publishing your first novel.
- Keep writing every day. Write more than 2.5 million words, spread across six published novels, three published books of nonfiction, five unpublished manuscripts, and at least half a dozen partially written manuscripts.
- Write a blog post every day for nearly two decades without ever missing a day, including your wedding day, every day of your honeymoon, the days your children were born, the day of your hernia surgery, and during three bouts of pneumonia.
- Launch a wedding DJ business even though you knew nothing about weddings or being a DJ. Entertain at more than 500 weddings over 25 years, allowing you to become adept at speaking to audiences extemporaneously and use microphones and other sound equipment expertly.
- Finish your workday, then drive to New York City and Boston — two to three hours each way — to maybe tell a five-minute story on a stage (for free) before turning around and driving back home so you can go back to work the next morning. Do this more than 300 times over the course of 14 years.
- Launch your own storytelling organization (Speak Up) by partnering with venues throughout the region, recruiting storytellers to train and perform on stage, and working with organizations that want to use storytelling to promote their work and build their brand. Produce more than 125 shows over a dozen years. Launch a podcast that features the stories told on Speak Up stages.
- Begin performing five-minute stand-up sets at open mics in Connecticut, New York, Boston, and beyond, even though the idea of stand-up comedy initially sounds terrible and frightens you.
- Write a rock opera and three musicals with a friend. Produce that rock opera at a local theater, partially funding it through a GoFundMe campaign. Parley the relationship you establish with that theater into a series of storytelling improv shows with one of those like-minded people, then find additional homes for that show based upon the success of the first show.
- Write a solo show and pitch it to theaters in Connecticut. Find one that agrees to squeeze you in between shows for three nights. Work like hell to sell out all three nights. Repeat this process two years later. Then start writing your third show.
- Launch a company that sells storytelling courses online. Find a like-minded partner and hire an exceptional colleague to work alongside you. Invest money in building a studio in your home and purchasing equipment, hoping that your initial investment pays off and you can eventually turn a profit.
- Get noticed by a local businessperson while performing at a benefit show who believes you can help him with his company. Get referred to other local businesses, and gradually grow your coaching and consulting business until you are consulting with prominent companies like Amazon, Microsoft, Johnson & Johnson, and Salesforce, as well as clergy members, keynote speakers, politicians, and the FBI.
- Continue doing all of this while relentlessly looking for the next big thing. For me, in 2025, it’s a Storyworthy rebrand, the launch of a Substack, partnering with a speaking agent and management company, and trying to write three books.
- Oh, and do all this while being a husband and father and elementary school teacher. Also an obsessive reader and golfer and cyclist and friend to many.
It’s admittedly a snarky, sarcastic, almost certainly unhelpful list. Not exactly a realistic path for anyone to take.
But it wasn’t realistic for me, either. Had I been shown that list when I was 17 and just beginning the process of writing every day of my life. I would’ve thought it a ridiculous and impossible list.
But entirely accurate, too.
And through it, I’m trying to make a point.
There is no magic pill.
No secret recipe.
No shortcuts.
It’s not easy.
Just relentless movement forward. The constant making of things. The never-ending search for the next thing. Leaping into uncertainty with hard work and the belief in possibility.
It’s the formula most people who have achieved success in life have followed.
I wish I could offer a magic pill. Instead, I offer simplicity, uncertainty, and hope.
