Oh hi. I’m a shitty example.
Last month I was in Italy, teaching 30 people that there’s always something to write about.
I even passed around a printed guide I wrote called The Art Of The Start (How To Start Writing Anything). I got everyone writing.
I came back all jazzed to write about it. But I return from anywhere with a debilitating case of “let’s pretend it’s still vacation.”
And then there are the Real Housewives episodes to catch up on, and extra workouts to undo all the pasta. (It’s one thing in the south of Italy, where it’s all seafood and tomato sauce. But we were in Bologna, where before you even get the pasta they fry the bread and then give you sliced lardo to put on it. What’s lardo, you ask? Imagine just the white part of the ham. It’s essentially meat butter.)
Plus, the ultimate problem when you wait too long to write: too much to write about.
One of the tips I give my students is, when you have nowhere to start, pretend you’re answering a question on a survey, or a question from a friend. So let’s pretend I didn’t wait all that time, and I’m just answering the question, “How was your teaching thing in Italy?”
Glad you ask. I’ll tell you, in a series of notes:
1) “Um, yes?” is the new “Go for it.”
Italy was a dream. Except I never dared dream it.
If I’d ever fantasized, “One day I want to lead a writing workshop for 30 creative people high above the sparkling turquoise water of the Ligurian Coast, in an ancient castle equipped with Powerpoint,” even my wild subconscious would’ve slapped sense into me.
I got lucky.
Bianca, a friend and client I’d met through B-School, asked me if I’d ever want to teach a workshop in Italy. For money. We’d write the sales page together, promote it together, and she’d take care of the rest. As in, all the stuff I would never want to do: scout a venue, set up group dinners, process payments, order snacks, put flower arrangements on tables, help that one person who got stuck with a rude byotch of an AirBnB host switch accommodations.
All I’d have to do, once we sold it, was get up there (by climbing many, many steps) and teach.
…Um, yes?
Um, yes is my M.O.
I got my first real job after college, the job that led to all the other jobs, because I was the one still home — and sleeping, which I denied — when a friend called around at 11 am looking for fact checkers for a famous author.
This is how I achieve.
Not by “going for it” and making it all happen so much as by saying, “Yeah, sure, count me in.”
Sometimes, it works.
2) You can never have too many examples.
My attendees were as thirsty for concrete examples as I was for water.
(I went through like, 8 bottles a day. I know, I know, the plastic! How does the President get through his State of the Union without chugging from a giant, sports-nozzle Smart Water?)
After my first and second days teaching, I stayed up late under my typical-Italian hotel bedspread (floral, acrylic) creating new slide presentations filled with copywriting before-and-afters. People wanted to see more, more more.
Any time you teach something, the Number One way to keep our attention is by saying “I’ll give you an example.”
3) In-person events rock.
Online courses are great. But you can’t beat the energy of a bunch of people together in a room, from Europe, Australia, the Fiji Islands and Long Island, all having said yes to the most random of offers: Come write for your business and drink a bunch of wine in Cinque Terre, Italy.
4) All writing breaks should be on a sea-view patio.
Right?
5) Details make goosebumps.
Specific details are my favorite writing tool. If my 3 days of teaching had a theme, it was…Day 1: DETAILS. Day 2: DETAILS. Day 3: Yup, DETAILS.
It worked!
The people who raised their hands to read their stuff out loud at the end — from a wedding photographer’s new “Work With Me” intro about the bride’s last dance of the night, to a memory piece about a grandparent’s plastic-covered couch — got spontaneous claps from the group and a standing O from my arm hair.
6) My dad will not be deterred.
“I strongly suggest you reconsider the gender policy of your Italy class,” he told me repeatedly. I’d made it all-women.
“Why?” I asked the first time. I knew better the next.
“So that I can teach it. I wrote NUMEROUS freelance articles for newspapers and magazines in the 1960s.”
He wasn’t joking. After I posted pictures from the workshop…
That my dad has a walker and the town is all steps is beside the point.
7) I suck at the fake-laugh pose
There’s a thing where you’re supposed to pretend you’re laughing when you pose for photos. I look ridiculous in all of those.
8) I may as well be blind.
My husband says I’m visually unobservant. He’ll rearrange the living room on Monday and it won’t be till Friday that I say, “Hey, where’s the couch?”
I spent 3 days in this space. Ask me if I ever once noticed the giant fresco behind me of vineyard workers harvesting their grapes. Nope. Just spotted that now.
(I know, I know. All that plastic. I was thirsty.)
Now you.
Want to come to this thing if I do it next year?
Get on the interest list.
Are you a “Go for it” or an “Um, yes?”
Or, other, very different question: Got a favorite place in Italy?
TELL ME IN THE COMMENTS.
*Except where indicated, all photos by the wonderful Azzurra Biagi
My family members all the time say that I am wasting my time here at
web, however I know I am getting knowledge daily
by reading thes nice articles or reviews.
I will take your um, yes and raise you one…hell yes! Not sure what that is to though but I feel that I should say that and see what comes my way.
LOVE your workshop in Italy (tots jelly btw) and I can hear you now seeing that painting, in that moment. Like, oh there you are you beautiful thing that was behind me this whole time! I know there must have been a lot of laughs and a lot of Aha’s and plenty of amping up people’s writing. I so wish I could have been there!
I wonder if it’s time to move from talking shrimp…to talking scallop…or maybe even talking shark!!! Well, talking dolphin if you want to keep it PC. 😉
I have a great connection that does a biz trip to Italy each and every year. She also coordinates a Paris trip. I’m sure you know you can’t ever have “too much information” except for that certain awkward conversation at a party when someone starts doing it…. ugh.
Anyway, I’d be happy to share and connect the two of you if you would like to know where she takes her group to Italy.
Cheers!
What an fantastico trip!! As an Italian who likes to write and loves you Laura (and rarely dives into anything without at least one uhmmm)…I pray I’m able to join the fun some day! (My husband and I have been talking about an Italian vacation since we met, so that has to happen first…yet I’m more than ready to start visiting more places than just for work). Grazie for another great post!
I’m sort of with your Dad. How do I get involved?
Welcome back! I’ve been wondering where you are.
It looks like y’all had a fabulous time.
BTW, I’m blind like that too. I once rushed through an arboretum decorated with 12-feet pine trees and 5-feet high ornaments, and didn’t realize they’d decorated for Christmas until I came back through with a friend who commented on the festivus atmosphere…
Umm yes, I’m interested.
Great tip on how to start writing. I suffer from the “sitting in front of a blank screen syndrom too often”.
Italy next year? Um yes!
(Women’s only groups have a fantastically supportive dynamic. When you have mixed groups, all the women tend to shut up and are too intimidated to participate.)
I’m “just back” from Italy myself! (It’s only been a week and I actually feel like a liar saying so, so thanks for giving me the permission. ;))
This post totally spoke to me on so many levels besides that — from “let’s pretend it’s still vacation” to the whole “there’s too much to write about because I waited too long” syndrome, the um yes MO, etc. etc.
I’m really, really curious about this workshop and am even-later-to-go-grocery-shopping-“first-thing-in-the-morning” excited, so I’m leaving this comment at 2pm. 😉
Rather than “um yesing” it today, though, I’m going to give you: Yes, yes, and yes.
Um, yes!
Wow, what a gorgeous venue!
“When you have nowhere to start, pretend you’re answering a question on a survey, or a question from a friend.” <——- holy crap on a stick, thank you for that.
Meat butter. I didn't know it existed…. and now I'm hungry as all get-out.
Thanks for the vicarious trip to Italy!
The workshop was AMAZEBALLS. Italy & all that seafood didn’t hurt either. Not to mention all the steps gave me bun of steel for my photoshoot couple weeks later.
It made me realized that writing is a mindful practice. Your exercises and examples were super fantastic & helpful. I also loved your sharp wit 😀
I might be interested if a) the workshop was in Costa Rica, b) the cost of the workshop was exorbitant and non-refundable (even if there was an extreme emergency, c) the workshop included an exercise in which I have to stand in front of the group in my bikini and be judged silently for ten excruciating minutes, d) all the food options were pesca-pescatarian, e) it was in August so that I could enjoy the stifling heat and humidity.
Haha! What a fun and wonderful post. It looks like a fantastic time by all as well. I was successfully distracted from writing a presentation for a conference next week. But told myself that I was researching essential tips such as “you can never have too many examples”. I agree with you about in person. Technology is nothing short of amazing. But in person is irreplaceable.
Man, I am stupid jealous and inspired by all of this. I WANT TO LEARN WRITING FROM YOU IN ITALY!
If I’m being honest, I haven’t be “um yessing” a lot lately. Sometimes I get caught in these routines where literally everything, including showering/going to the grocery store/seeing any friends at all is the most exhausting thing in the world. I’m in one of those ruts right now. But now you’ve inspired me to “um yes” the next time someone asks!
Oh, but then look at the title of your most recent blog post and we’ll see that you did more than “um yes” recently!
I wonder if these ruts we go through could be considered an unskippable interval, just like the weekend is part of every week.
I love seeing this post! Your Italy extravaganza looked amazing and I hope all those ladies know how lucky they were to learn from you! (My guess is YES)
YAY! Well done!
xoxoxo
Um, yes? 🙂