Podcast: Play in new window | Download
Subscribe: Apple Podcasts | RSS
This episode is a solo one in which Mark walks through his reflections upon recently reading the book The Power of Moments by Chip Heath and Dan Heath.
In his personal update, Mark shares an update about the Free Kobo promo that he ran which include the following results 5 weeks after starting that promo. Starting with an average of 1 download a day, no reviews and no sales before he started, here’s where he stands as of early July:
- 376 Downloads in 34 countries
- 1 Sale of Vol 2 in the series
- 6 Ratings and 3 Text Reviews
- 1 Personal email from a reader who read Night Cries and wanted to reach out
More details about these results can be found here.
Also shared are the results of the Free Friday Frights Facebook live and YouTube videos that Mark has been running since April 2018. See the full results and details up to July 5th here.
Mark then replays the most popular of the tongue twisters, this one from Episode 13, a twister about Pad Kid and done in a Monty Python style voice.
If there is a particular tongue twister you want to hear or a voice you want me to further embarrass myself with, go ahead and email it to mark@markleslie.ca, leave a comment on the show notes at starkreflections.ca or ping Mark on Twitter (@MarkLeslie) and he’ll do his best to twist like a fool.
The Terrible Tongue Twister segment (AKA “Twisting by the Fool”) is sponsored by Findaway Voices, who provide all the tools that an independent author or small publisher needs in order to get into the digital audiobook market.
In the core section of this podcast, Mark shares a few reflections derived from a recent reading of the book The Power of Moments by Chip Heath and Dan Heath and how he merged some of his thoughts from this book with David Gaughran’s book Strangers to Superfans.
Specifically, Mark reflects on the notions of “Breaking the Script” and, among other things, talks about his unique experience from reading Andy Nulman’s book POW! Right between the Eyes: Profiting from the Power of Surprise back in 2008 or so – something significant he still remembers and talks about more than ten years later.
He also reflects on the concept of Action and Insight and the promise of risk being not success, but learning.
The final concept he discusses are the Small Peaks that the Heaths discuss in their book. And he looks at a few examples of his own small peaks and how they can actually be significant and important things for authors to focus on.
So, what are the small peaks, what are the small victories, what are those little moments that you perhaps let pass that might be worth pausing and re-reflecting on?
- Did you get one more free download on a title? (This indicates that someone, somewhere was interested in what you wrote? That is a VICTORY!)
- Did you get an additional rating or review of one of your titles (regardless of whether it was a 1 star or a 5 star review) – VICTORY – someone was actually moved enough to take the time to comment or rate something – far better than apathy
- Did you only write 50 words today when you had planned on writing 500 or 1000? That’s still 50 more words than you had yesterday. It’s a small victory and a step in the right direction.
- What other things that you might have possibly overlooked or ignored can you re-examine and see the small peaks? You heard me share a few of my own (no matter how pathetic me having an additional single view or handful of free downloads in an extended time period can be, I found something positive in them) – so can you.
The small victories, the small peaks, might be the only milestones or landmarks you currently have. Are you ignoring them? Or are you acknowledging the way that they move you forward to the next peak? Each new step up, no matter how small, is still a step up, is still a step forward.
It’s okay to celebrate them. Go on, you worked hard for it. You deserve it.
Mark then talks about (and yes, it was certainly inspired from reading the aforementioned book), a survey that he has launched to get more detailed feedback from listeners on this podcast. If you wish to fill it out, you can do so at the following site: www.markleslie.ca/starksurvey
Links of Interest
- Chip Heath & Dan Heath – The Power of Moments
- David Gaughran – Strangers to Superfans: A Marketing Guide to the Reader Journey
- Andy Nulman – Pow! Right Between the Eyes
- Mark’s Free Kobo Tracking Details
- Mark’s Free Friday Frights Video View Tracking
- Findaway Voices
The Power of Moments: Why Certain Experiences Have Extraordinary Imact by Chip Heath and Dan Heath.
While human lives are endlessly variable, our most memorable positive moments are dominated by four elements: elevation, insight, pride, and connection. If we embrace these elements, we can conjure more moments that matter. What if a teacher could design a lesson that he knew his students would remember twenty years later? What if a manager knew how to create an experience that would delight customers? What if you had a better sense of how to create memories that matter for your children?
This book delves into some fascinating mysteries of experience: Why we tend to remember the best or worst moment of an experience, as well as the last moment, and forget the rest. Why “we feel most comfortable when things are certain, but we feel most alive when they’re not.” And why our most cherished memories are clustered into a brief period during our youth.
Readers discover how brief experiences can change lives, such as the experiment in which two strangers meet in a room, and forty-five minutes later, they leave as best friends. (What happens in that time?) Or the tale of the world’s youngest female billionaire, who credits her resilience to something her father asked the family at the dinner table. (What was that simple question?)
Many of the defining moments in our lives are the result of accident or luck—but why would we leave our most meaningful, memorable moments to chance when we can create them? The Power of Moments shows us how to be the author of richer experiences.
The music for this podcast (“Laser Groove”) was composed and produced by Kevin MacLeod of www.incompetech.com and is Licensed under Creative Commons: By Attribution 3.0
RSS options for this podcast: Mark Leslie at Libsyn or Feedburner
1 thought on “Episode 28 – Reflections on The Power of Moments by Chip Heath & Dan Heath”