 Let's get the party started. Hi, I'm Debbie Daschinger. I'm a book writing coach, media visibility coach. I love that it makes it so simple. And I do a lot of pieces to the visibility hub that I run, including how to be interviewed on radio and podcasts. Just gonna ask folks to mute themselves. So any of the background noise till we get kick started with the group dynamic is a little lower, thank you in advance. And I'm doing this because, well, the universe got me here, frankly, of my own best thinking, this would never be where I was. I was originally an actress and a singer. That's where I spent my life. And through a series of events, I surrendered that career well into my adulthood, not knowing where I was headed. So as Persephone, going underground for three years and just following energy with what presented. And after three years of singing with jazz bands and big bands and doing cartoon voiceover work and speaking and doing motivational speaking, et cetera, something came up about radio. I was offered a job, I took it from radio. I went on to write books. From books I became known as an expert and I was being interviewed on radio. And then suddenly people were coming to me and saying, I'd like to learn what you do. And thus a career was born. So Yvonne, I'm just gonna see if I can mute you because somehow every time, there we go, I'm gonna mute you. Great. Okay, so that's why I'm here today. I do privates and I do groups. Now, let's see, I'm just gonna say something very sobering right here at the beginning. And with the caveat, I have no intention of bringing the energy of anybody down. But I also really believe in transparency and keeping it real. I woke up this morning to a really big surprise by going on Facebook and finding the husband of a friend and colleague of mine bemoaning the fact that his wife had just passed away. And it's huge in my life because when I left corporate America, I was there for just a period of time between the acting and singing and where I am today, she is the one who showed me I could do books. If it wasn't for her, I would never be here. And she's also a part of my team in creating some of what I create. So I literally don't know some of my business, what's gonna happen with it. Some of my business is up to me. And as anyone who's experienced loss, it's a tremendous loss for me. I've known her for 15 years. I am left besides the processing, right? Of feelings and awarenesses and how is this possible? And this has happened and so forth. I was very unexpected, but it just drives home the importance of doing what is ours to do. I just was interviewed last night on a podcast and it was all about books. And the person interviewing me had so many questions about books. And at the very end, it was one of those questions, what else do you want the audience to know? And it's really about legacy. You know, whether it is a children's book or a memoir or whatever it is that you feel that calling like, I wanna do this even if I don't know how to do this, but I know I wanna do this, trust that energy and don't leave your bucket list unfilled. I know that is the fire inside of me today and my gratitude to her for leaving in what feels untimely but clearly was perfect for her soul and all of our lives. It leaves me with that knowingness. I must look at my life. I must examine what needs to be done, what hasn't been done and go out there and do it. So if you wanna write a book, that is my message that I impart to you. And it is the great gift of loss because we none of us know. And don't let it be your last day. And you went, oh, well, you know, I'm gonna do this workshop and I'm gonna la-la and I gotta figure out what all that stuff, trust me, if the energy is there, everything will fall in place for you to create what you need to create, okay? Trust, the universe gave you the dream because you have the power to make it come true. And if you have the dream, but don't know the how and the way to get there, there are people, there are coaches who can show you how to write your book. I'm one of them, but align with somebody so you can get it done well and good because writing a good book is so important. So one of the things I share with my class in this class is called Visible Visionaries. We meet twice a month on Zoom to write our books. I always talk, if something comes up and I do read a lot, if there's a great book I've read, I do share it. And I wanna share a great one that I read in a new author that has been out there, but for some reason I just discovered and that is Neil Gaiman. And that's G-I-M-A-N. Neil Gaiman has written many books. The one I read was called Never Wear. Oh my God, so amazing. He created a whole nother world, highly recommended and I'm definitely gonna go on to read his other books. So I know some of you love hearing my recommendations and you go out and buy the books and this is one I can highly, highly recommend. Neil Gaiman's Never Wear. Then he's got others that I'll be reading soon and I can let you know. So with that, the way today is gonna go, I'm gonna keep my eye on the clock and I'm going to be introducing you to our very special guest today. And then he and I will enter some conversation about how he writes and his process of writing and why he wrote and so forth. He is an author, he's very much out in the circuit right now and because I tend to attract very spiritual, healer, amazing gifted people, he is one of us. He's one of our tribe. So it's a beautiful conversation for beautiful folks such as you. And then I would like to put aside time for questions and for your interaction with him. So I would say, at least 30 minutes and around 30 minutes before the end, I will shift gears and open it up for you. So if you have questions, no need to raise your hand any earlier but you can just write them down so you remember your question. And then I think we should be able to easily get to everybody maybe more than once. So with that, I feel like just energetically I wanna just hear a shout out from everybody and before I start. So if you guys don't mind unmuting yourself and just I literally want a sentence we don't have much more time. Tell us your name, where you're at. No, not in your being but that would be interesting too. Like where you're at in the world, where you live, where you reside and just like where you're at in the book. I'm brand new, I haven't started it. I'm in the midst of writing it. I'm jamming along and I'm a beast, whatever your truth is. So, Karen, you wanna start us out with your sentence? Good thing. I'm Karen Abrams and I have been a part of Deb's book writing group for one plus years, I'll put it that way. And we've been working on my book which right now is a series of short stories and we're looking to figure out how to incorporate it into what I do. And I'm just really looking forward to hearing what you have to say, Walter and your advice on being involved in this. And I understand you're also an intuitive. So I'm an intuitive healer to an intuitive. Hi. Hi, thank you. You're welcome. I see you. Thanks, Karen. Beautiful. Art, check in. Yes, I'm Art Geiser. I live in Los Angeles. I'm, I don't know, 90% done with my book and also I teach energy work and healing and also I'm an intuitive. And looking forward to this and I'm in Deb's program and it's completely changed how I view my writing but also changed how I enjoy it for the better, of course. Which is a beautiful thing. That's what we want. Awesome. Barbara. Hi, Dr. Barbara Laraca. I'm a counselor, healer, metaphysician, moving toward places where the psyche and the being have never gone before. That's what I decided to do. Anyway. Beautiful. And in about, I would say in some ways, half done with the book and other ways more and other ways less. It's creating itself. Thank you. And Barbara's in Brazil, by the way. Awesome. Beautiful fattoid, right? We got a worldwide contention here. Anita, check in. Hello, thank you for having me here with your amazing group. I'm Anita Adams. I am on Bowen Island, which is just outside of Vancouver in British Columbia. And I teach people how to tap into their soul voice, listen to their soul voice, which my book is about and I'm maybe 2% into writing my book. Beautiful. Thanks, Anita. Ellen, hi. Great to see you. Hi, my Debbie. So my name is Ellen Carnahan and I'm in Ontario, Canada, just north of Toronto. And I'm a guest here today. Thank you, Debbie, for inviting me and looking forward to your talk, Walter. I really have just begun. I'm in a heavy duty planning stage but I wake up with inspiration and have been taking a lot of notes and writing, chipping away at it. I would say probably 2% as well and I hope to get into the flow soon. So this would be my first book and it's a fiction which I never expected to delve into. So anyway, that's my little story there. Excellent. Thanks, Ellen. Ivana? Hi, guys. This is my first time on this group. I'm a friend of Barbara's. I'm also in Brazil but originally I'm from Poland. I never wrote a book yet but Barbara is my inspiration, my muse, my teacher. So I learn a lot from her and I'm happy to be here but I'm also a little bit afraid that I can lose you because my battery is low and it's not charging somehow. I'm having a problem here with the battery. Unfortunately, but I'm happy to be here with you. Yeah, well, happy to have you, Ivana. And if you want in the background, mute yourself and try to figure out the, like plug it in so at least you could hear us until you need to be on screen. I am plugged in but it's not charging. Something is, my battery is dying probably. Okay. Well, you'll figure it out. We'll hope good intention for you to stay with us because we'd like to keep you here. And Rupert, welcome to the... If you're losing me, it's not that I ignored you. I'm sorry, I'm just... Very nice. Beautiful. We'll have a replay too. Ivana, you can come over here and watch it. I have a big screen. I love it. Ta-da. Great solutions in the moment. Rupert, welcome. Thank you. In the replay you can hear the first 15 that you missed and you'll be our last person. If you don't mind to say who you are, where you're from and where you're at, just a sentence about where you're at with your book. If you've started it, if you've written it, how much into it you are or what your desire is. My name's Rupert Drew. I live in Apagani, Brazil. I've been writing small things on and off. I haven't thought of myself as an author but I wanted to write a book about the life I had with my wife who died some years ago because she had an amazing life. And so I've been sitting in cafes whenever I'm in the US writing and getting all the research I could possibly get. And my brother who does ancestry.com obsessively found unbelievable details about things I knew something about but not very much and he found all this kind of stuff. So I've got a whole lot of backgrounds, stuff and details and I've just been sort of collecting information and writing different things now and then but I haven't actually started writing a book so to speak, I've been doing research. Amazing. Well, research can be very inspiring. I love that story and I'm intrigued because it sounds like a mystery as being unfolded in your life. So, and the fact that you're even called to write in cafes, Rupert, it just says a lot. There is the presence of that passion for writing. So I hope you will succumb and let it flow through you. Me too. Absolutely and hopefully you'll learn. Everybody will learn things here today. Feel further inspired and have questions for Walter. Even for myself, as we get to the end we'll open up for that. So thank you all for introducing yourself. I introduced myself in the beginning and now I will introduce Walter. And my guest is Walter Zajak who for 20 years has been hailed as one of the best psychics on the West Coast as an acclaimed psychic medium certified tarot reader, NLP coach, Reiki master and love coach. He has empowered and guided thousands working in 12 different countries and continues to receive dreams and psychic visions that come true. He's the author of the novel and memoir, They Came, Beyond Deja Vu. So I'm going to bring, I'm gonna pin Walter and myself which is big Zoom speak. There he is. So let's see if I can pin you and pin me. Ta-da. And here we are. Hey, Walter. It's so great to have you. Thanks for joining us. Thank you, Debbie. I'm happy to be here. Thank you so much. Yeah. I know this is early for you because of the hour. I'm a next musician too. And I still have a tendency to keep musicians hours. But thank you for waking up for us and making this happen. Oh yeah, a good cup of Joe or tea. And so first tell people who may not know what is your book about? They came, give them just an overview of what the book is. Yeah. It starts, well, first of all, it, I wrote it as a novel but every scene in the book happened to me. I wrote it as a novel in order to protect the privacy of people involved, whether they were good to me or bad to me. And then there were people that I left out because I just didn't want to have to ask their permission to write about them, even if it's a novel reference. But it starts in war-torn Germany 11 years after World War II ended. I was six years old and I was excited as I could possibly be because I was going to get to go on a train ride. And I had, these two are not in the novel but I had an older brother, 10 years older and an older sister, six years older who always got to do all kinds of stuff I never got to do. So a train ride, wow, I got to do that and it was just me special, right? And after a two hour train ride, long walk through the country I arrived. Oh, and a Red Cross lady took me. I arrived at a place called Orphanage. I had never heard that word before and they told me I was never going home again. And I had no idea. I knew that my mother was sick. Turns out she was dying of cancer and she knew for a year beforehand that she was dying of cancer. Everybody in the family knew but they decided that at my age, six years old that I was too young to know that I couldn't process it or whatever. And so it was just the most utter shock, total loss of power, loss of control which of course then affected the rest of my life. And what's fascinating is at that point I already had two imaginary friends with whom I interacted regularly all day long in dreams as well as seeing over and over and over a particular traumatic event in their lives. I'll start with the very first one that came to me the accident girl, her name is Maria in the book. I saw vivid detail as if it was a movie and originally I thought that I had seen a movie but my brother told me, no, that's not the movie that we saw. So I figured out decades later that, oh, that was a vision. And then that's why I sighed over and over and over. And you know, when you watch a movie you fall in love with the characters. I fell in love with this girl. I saw her interacting with her parents, a very loving family. She'd got into a big semi truck with massive freight on the back with her father and they got into a horrific accident. I saw every single detail of how the accident happened. I saw her above her body in a near death state or actually having died, right? But floating above her body. I saw her floating above her body in surgery. I saw her and went with her to beyond the light. She had a near death experience and Dr. Raymond Moody who has researched shared near death experiences now for almost 10 years has written about that, that that's a common thing that people go with somebody else on their near death experience and literally see it. And when I, oh my God, when I put myself in that place and you guys who are intuitive will I think be able to relate to this. I can hardly talk about it because it's first indescribable but it really is just bliss beyond bliss, that place beyond the light. Just love, love, love, love, love, love, love, love. Everything is love. The buildings were pure white and they radiated love. The air radiated love. The clouds radiated love. I was surrounded and infused with love, love, love, love, love. Just bliss, bliss, bliss. Then bam, defibrillator, she came back to life. I saw that. Then I saw weeks later when the bandages were taken off in the accident her face had been severely disfigured and I saw when the bandages were taken off for the first time and she threw the mirror down and it broke into 100 pieces and she screamed at her mother, why did you let me live? I look like a monster. So I now wanted to give you those details because first, yeah, companionship. I was able to bring two friends with me to the orphanage, right? And okay, I couldn't really talk about that with other people because people think you're nuts but they were as real as they could be to me and they were companionship. They were love. They were refuge and because the physical world was so unbearable, unbelievable I lived in the spiritual world more often than not. And what's magical than what the book was about, what incentivized, motivated me to write the book was when I was 44 years old. I met them both as real people in my life. Real people, the accident girl. I had spoken to her for three years. This was after my music career in what us musicians call a day job, right? Everybody else calls a job. And I had been speaking to her calling with prices. She was the receptionist at a company and I would ask for various people and all I ever heard was one moment, please I'll connect you just a little sweet voice. Y'all always touched my heart. And who is this girl? But after three years, one time I made her laugh and you guys know when you make somebody laugh, you connect, you connect hearts, you connect spirits. And in that moment, we recognized each other not from my past as my imaginary friend, but that same recognition that I know all of you guys have experienced where you meet somebody and it feels like, oh my God, I've known you all my life. And we had that and then because of that we started talking personally and after a few weeks she said, I have to admit something to you. I was in a horrifying accident and she started telling me the story of that semi truck and her father and I finished the story for her in detail, finished the story, which was, oh my God, for her, it was, oh my God, for me. And then I recognized, oh my God, you're my imaginary friend, but telling her that made me appear nuts to her and then how could I possibly have known that and then it got worse over the next few weeks. I told her five things, those details that I mentioned above her body and the near-death experience, the day the bandages came off. I shared those details with her and she said, oh my God, those are things I've never told another human, never told another human. How could you possibly know that? And she said, you're crazy, you're crazy, I have to stop this, I can't do this, I can't explain you to myself or to my friends. And so she cut me off and it was almost as devastating as that first day at the orphanage, but here's the beautiful part and why the book came out of it and that is it was the thing that made me realize, dude, I need some help and friends had been telling me that for years, just based on what they knew I had gone through. And so I finally sought out a psychologist and that's where I learned how to really love Walter, especially little Walter and where I figured out, while she was, is the daughter of a Toltec shaman and maybe all of you guys know, Toltec shaman is the teachings of Don Juan by Carlos Castaneda. Don Juan Matus was a Toltec shaman. Carlos Castaneda became one in the process of writing those books. And Don Miguel Ruiz, the four agreements, he's a Toltec shaman. It's a shamanic tradition in Central and South America that goes back thousands of years, maybe as much as 10,000 years. My psychologist was a daughter of a Toltec shaman and from her earliest memories, she went to other realities and other worlds and flew with the crows and just did all kinds of stuff that was unbelievable. And when I told her my story, the first thing she said was, dude, compared to what I've seen and experienced, that's nothing. You're not crazy, you're psychic. And you found these two girls in the spirit world in order to number one have the companionship, but you specifically subconsciously found these two girls who you knew were going to manifest physically in your life and cause you to finally heal. And I'll tell you, before that, I was a mess. I had a successful music career. I was great behind the drum set, but you stick me in a social situation or with a girl. You could barely handle it because of so little self-confidence. And then that sense of, yeah, I think anybody who knows adopted people or maybe if some of you have been adopted, there's this ultimate feeling of, why didn't they want me? Even if you were adopted as a baby. So Walter, let me cut you off if I may, because I love that you gave this background. And so people obviously are getting a real feel for like, first of all, oh my God, what a life. And there's lots more. And second of all, that a life like that would, and a healing as well, recognition of, oh my God, I was actually gifted, this was real, somebody coming into your life to make sure that you know, know you actually have this going on revelatory. And then all of this on your path caused you to say, I'm open, I think I need to write about this. So let's talk, and we can weave a bit, let's talk about the process of writing for you. And I think, or I wanna start, because this was so intriguing when you and I have spoken, that you shared that you met somebody at a party who was in the film industry. And I'd love you to talk about this encounter and who this person was and what they imparted to you. And I'll try to get to as many questions I have quite a few to get to before we open up to others. So we'll see how much we can get in about the writing. But let's start there because this is something unique that you would even think outside of the box like this and then use it to write your book. Yeah, thank you. I live in Los Angeles. And when you live in Los Angeles, it's almost unavoidable. You meet people in show business and movies and TV. And one of my friends is a composer and one of his friends is an Oscar-nominated film editor. And nobody knows film editors, right? And none of us I think can name a famous film editor. I can't because he was Oscar-nominated. But I met him at a party and I was already writing the book, but stuck. And trying to figure out how to make it really, really good. And you know how people love to talk about themselves. Craig and I just hit it off. Craig was nominated for Silence of the Lambs and for a movie called Reds with Warren Beatty and Diane Keaton. And he and I hit it off. And you know, when you ask somebody to talk about themselves, they will. So for about two hours, I was fascinated with film editing, right? What makes a good scene? And he loved to talk about it and we're friends still today. And first thing he said is timing. Don't stay on any one thing too much, you know? And recognize that this is visual. This is Craig mostly looking at things from a visual perspective. And timing is the first thing. There's like, you gotta keep him interested. Don't stay too long on anything. And then close-ups. One of my favorite close-ups is in my book. There's a woman who has a really, really big wart on her nose and it makes her look like a witch. And I opened a scene as Craig suggested, start on the nose, just start on the nose and the sun reflecting off the wart and then pull back. And then you get a sense of who is this person without them saying a word. Then make the audience feel it, feel it. They have to feel it. So whatever you're bringing into focus, you know, whether that's writing about it or showing it visually in a movie, they have to feel something. It's gotta make them feel something. And then keep them in suspense regarding the visuals that are happening in present time, right? What does that mean? What is this saying about this character? Why is the director, film editor focusing on this particular aspect in the present time? And then what is this visual setting up? What does this mean about what this character might do? Right? And so all of that is visuals, which a lot of us forget when we're writing a book. We just think about the dialogue. Amazing. And so you have this meeting with this fellow and a fortuitous, of course, and then you start. So did you have to do rewrites or were you so early on in your process that you were able to take what he, by the way, I have to make a comment that's coming up. There's something that I know about people who have been through especially childhood trauma, like what you went through. And that many, well, some end up on the streets and it's not a good outcome. Others like yourself get street smarts and you learn, you soak in at some of the most unexpected places. And so to me, in my estimation, that's exactly what happened to you. You're somebody because of your experience, it makes you aware of things, receiving things in different ways, but also you learn to adapt when you've come from trauma. So you incorporate and incorporate. So here you are learning from an expert and in the visual field. And then you are so excited, you wanna incorporate it. Where are you at in your book at the time? And then how were you able to use that for writing rather than film? Well, because when you're writing about a scene, you should be describing what's happening visual, what the room looks like, what the person is wearing, what their face looks like, what their body looks like. And then doing that, what I learned from him is the timing, right? In other words, you don't wanna dwell on anything too long. You need to keep them on the edge of their seats. So to answer the question directly, I had, well, actually, I started in 1995 and it went through many different versions and my first version was, okay, let's just write it, right? And it didn't turn out well. I kept coming to places where I would not be able to go further. And then when I met Craig, I had, I was in the process of writing but I hadn't actually organized it yet. And that's the thing that changed everything. Two things was organizing it. And that is, first of all, and I know I did research and found out that with your first novel, you shouldn't write any more than 70 scenes somewhere around 70. Again, because you'll lose interest, their interest, and no more than about 300 pages in order to get published, first of all, but also not to lose interest, right? Nobody really has that much interest in what you have to say, actually. And, but then organizing it, right? The 70 scenes, well, first of all, I'm gonna go back to also what made the scenes much more what I combined with what I learned from Craig McKay and visually was about that time, I was studying NLP, which at least one of you does. I noticed on the credits I think email, neuro-linguistic programming and neuro-linguistic programming is all about bringing in the five physical senses as well as the emotions. And to me, it's seven senses. The emotions are the sixth and the seventh sense is your spiritual awareness, which is, to me, it's beyond a little bit different than just emotions. And visual, audio, touch, smell, taste. Bring that into the scene. Bring it in. And me as a child, I was obsessed with smelling things. My relatives said that, yeah, ever since we knew you, you would smell each bite before you put it in your mouth. Love to smell things. And so when I organized it, I wrote out the list of the characters and their physical features and their eye color and how tall they were and their body size and what did they smell like? Yeah, and then taste, you know, like even if you're standing next to a girl and the wind's blowing and some of her hair brushes against my mouth. Well, there's a taste there, right? Bring that in. Make them feel it as if they are really right there present in that present moment. Did you have a way, a method as to how you would, I mean, I know you gave the idea of the wart in the nose and then pulling back as if you were a camera. And besides that, did you have a way, a methodology about how to start a chapter or end a chapter? Yeah. Yeah. And not so much chapter, but how to start a scene and end a scene. And can you give me share screen options here? Can I share my screen? All right, thanks. Your honor. Sorry, you'll have to give me a moment to do that. Okay. So let me ask you another question while I do that. Does writing energize you or exhaust you or both? Yes. Both because some of these scenes, I would ball my eyes out as I was writing them. So no, it didn't energize me. It exhausted me because it took me back to those moments where as some of the other scenes, like the psychologist just helping me figure out what happened and how beautifully I took care of myself, yeah, those scenes energize me. So it was really, and then, you know, since it was my story, it was therapeutic, right? And that was one of my main motivations at the beginning was, well, let's just get this out there and see what I went through and how I recovered. Okay. And you now have share screen options. And so while you do that, I'm gonna just keep asking, are you glad you wrote your book? Are you glad you published it? If not, why? If so, why? I'm very glad. Very glad because in my work, it really has helped me to help other people understand their own path, you know, as people who work with others in helping them understand their world. We give them inspiration. And if I hadn't been through it, I couldn't really help somebody. So that's the main thing that I've noticed is I've really been effective, so much more effective as a psychic, as a healer, as someone that empowers people to find their happiness. Beautiful. Yeah. Okay, so can you guys see my screen? Yeah, absolutely. So I'll do the very first one, because I just repeated it. See on the left. And number one is the first scene, the place and the time that it's happening, right? And that the MIB is man in black. And you know, I wrote notes to myself. The goal of the scene is the next thing, right? And in this case, I was playing safe, I was being happy, I was in control of my world. The obstacle in the scene, and sort of what's that with the antagonist would be the man in black is in control and I lose my free will. Then what is the confrontation? What's the action that's happening? And if specifically I hear his name, what's the purpose of this scene? This is a really important one. What's the purpose? Why are we in this scene, right? And in this case, it was to introduce the man in black until the first part of that dream and to set up a mystery. And then what's coming? What's the sequel? What is this scene leading to, right? And so that's how I went from scene to scene. Then frequently, if the last scene was somebody calling Maria, I would start the next scene with somebody else calling Maria, but it was a different Maria, right? Or the last scene was a boom, right? So I'd start the next scene with something like that. I always try to, and that too I learned from Craig, right? Just bring them in to a sense of consistency, right? A flow. And then even before these, let's see, it was a one, two, three, four, six things about each scene, right? And I did this for 71 scenes in my case. But even before I did those scenes, let me find the other one here. This is this big, no, let's see if I can make it bigger. So I wrote down 70 scenes. This was my very first version, I think, and it doesn't have all 70 on them. But my very first version, when I completed it, had about 120 scenes. And I've talked to Debbie about this, and it's another thing that I really learned from Craig McKay, and that is, if a scene isn't explaining something that happened before, if it's not setting something that's going to happen, it's just fluff, and you need to get rid of it. And clearly there were 50 more scenes that I wanted to write about. This happened to me, hey! But you can't keep them on the edge of their seat if you lose them. If you're writing a scene that just, they're wondering why am I in this scene? What, is it explaining anything? Is it leading to anything? And then writing it out this way is what I suggest because in word processor, this is a PDF version, but in word processor, you can highlight one and move it, right? Because the flow, how the scenes happen, how the, which scene follows another scene is critical to in terms of keeping them on the edge of their seats. And then just real quickly, I'll show the who. And so, you know, soft wavy brunette, dark brown eyes, very sensuous, high energy, playful, smells like chamomile soap, right? I wrote that kind of stuff about everybody. Even her mom smells like chamomile soap. Yeah, so all right, that's my story, I'm sticking to it. Beautiful, we support you in sticking. Amazing, I love all this background and just so folks know, you know, there are pieces that Walter's sharing that I absolutely concur with. If you have a book that is longer, once it's formatted, let's be clear, eight by 10 is different than a formatted six by nine general size of a book or whatever you choose, eight by seven by doesn't matter. Your choice, but really, if you have a book that's longer than 300 pages, that's fine. But then break it up into a series, make it a series of books that you roll out. There are books that I'm reading one right now called the O-Manuscript and it's a fricking tome. So in bed when I'm trying to, I'm telling you, I'm working out my guns just holding up the book while I read it. But it is very rare, most publishers will never recommend it. So between 153, 350 is okay, but keep it in there. That's the number. And yes, the things he's sharing about, the choices he made, which I love because it's a very unique way to describe it, but you must end each chapter in a way that people are sitting there thinking they're gonna go to bed. Thank you, I read the chapter, I am complete and yet darn it, you have given them something incomplete and so intriguing that they have to read the next chapter and turn the next page. You need to be the reason why they can't sleep at night. So that's what we're after is to write a page turner and highly engaging book. What are some of the pitfalls, Walter, or frustrations that you encountered along the way writing your book? The biggest one was why should anybody care? How'd you get over it? Cause clearly you did, here we are. Here we are. Determination and my therapy with my psychologist was over 25 years ago and since that time, I've used all these tools, especially since I've been working with clients for 20 years helping them. I've remembered all those tools and used these tools in my work with clients. And the thing that I learned most from her was take a chance, take a risk, put it out there. Well, and people know this, if you risk nothing, you gain nothing. And then also what I learned from her was she said it to me the very first session and I thought you'd just be a nice but I finally ended up believing it and that is Walter, when you walk into a room, you light up the room. I never saw that about myself, but I now do that consciously on purpose. Beautiful. What a gift. What a shift and what a gift. Yeah. Have you ever gotten writer's block? Yeah, all throughout the process. I started in 1995. So it took me about 20 years to write the Hummer. Damn. And so I would reach a point where, and mostly it was because, yeah, who gives a shit? Why would anybody wanna read this? It's just my story, right? Who cares about me? But then I reached a point and especially just using those tools that I learned from my psychologist and I just, dude, by writing what you went through and the fact that you actually did recover, it's not a depressing book. You help other people, you give them inspiration to tackle their own stuff. Even if they don't tackle it the way you tackled it, you give them inspiration just because you did it. So write the Hummer, right? So that's what... I love that. I love that you say that. I so agree with you. And I really feel like if you have the inspiration and something in your gut says, I wanna write a book, you need to trust that energy. It is divine energy. It's your soul speaking to you and it's not up to us ever to try to determine the impact. Although writing a good book is incumbent on us, but it's, you just need to have faith in the process. And so many people go through what Walter's saying, everybody who comes to work with me has a different story about why not writing or what their doubt is in themselves or their hangup. It happens to everyone, love your hangup, bless it and say, and yet I'm gonna salt and pepper my dream and put it out in the world. So how do you feel, Walter, that as a writer, how did you feel like you were taking care of the reader specifically? I never thought about that. Can you tell me what you mean by taking care of the reader? It's actually a part of what you were saying. Who would wanna read this? Who would wanna read it? Right? Who would wanna read the book? So we could say that and just write Dribble and then publish it. Self-publishing is easy and there's a lot of schlock out there, but you're not a schlocky guy, right? None of us are here. Everybody here has enormous, not only integrity, but if I may, a little tinge of perfectionism, which in some circumstances ain't so bad, but because it means aesthetically and word-wise, like your heart is in the process. You wanna deliver something that is worth being birthed out into the world. And I love that. So while you're writing and the other side of the who would want to is, okay, people are gonna buy my book. They are gonna read it. So how are you gonna view something in the book that says I'm taking care of you so you have a good experience reading my book? I am thinking about you, the reader. Thank you. Now I understand the question. So it goes along with what I mentioned earlier and that is keeping them on the edge of their seats, keeping them interested if you're boring them, you're not taking care of the reader. And like I said, those 50 scenes that I threw out, yeah, I could easily have ended up boring people because it was something that was significant to me, but wasn't necessarily significant to the story, didn't necessarily relate to somebody else's experience of their own trauma. And then making it as real as possible. And this is something that I've gotten feedback from many people on that is, oh my God, I feel like I'm right there in each scene. And so, bringing in the taste and the smell and the touch and the emotions that doing that in a way where I was consciously aware, yeah, I'm making them feel stuff, feel stuff because if they're feeling stuff, number one, they're having an interesting experience even if it's feeling the trauma, the pain, they're still having an interesting experience because that setting up the trauma, having them feel it is setting up, okay, there's going to be a resolution or maybe a temporary resolution at least, right? And so, yeah, keeping them interested and keeping them in a place also where, well, there's another one of the things that I learned in my research and that is about halfway through, everything should just go to shit. Where it's almost as like everything starts over and that happened with my life anyway. Once I was, after a year at the orphanage, I was adopted and that's halfway through the book where everything changes, they changed my name and my whole world changed. And then hopelessness set in because it just got worse and that's something too that I feel is taking care of the reader where you're just setting up that, oh my God. And I noticed this in movies, right? Where it just gets worse and worse and worse and then shortly before the end, you find a solution and there's the boy and girl fall in love. 100%, yeah. You know, what Walter is referring to, we often say in the book business is called the hero's journey or the heroine's journey. Joseph Campbell wrote about it extensively. Oh, yeah. And it is literally what a book is about because if you start out, you could start out everything simple, you could be in the middle, everything simple, who's gonna wanna read it? It's gotta be very compelling and part of something being compelling means that, you know, they're basically atlas pushing a rock up a hill and you may make five strides forward but you make three back and it is not as any of our lives, it is not a direct linear path. It is switching back and forth and not knowing what's coming next and by virtue of taking someone on a hero's epic journey, there is, you know, even when you reach the crest then there's further, there's another hill to climb. So remember that, you don't get off easy, the reader doesn't get off easy. So I'm curious, because you've shared so much that because your book is mostly a memoir, Walter bit of fictionalizing here and there to protect the not innocent. What did you feel as a writer that you owed the real people upon whom your characters were based? What was that process? In some cases, the lady at the orphanage who I think was in her 20s, Fraulein Adel is her name in the book. She, there were so many of us and she didn't have time for everybody. And yet we had a special relationship and she always made me feel like I was special. I actually mattered. She gave me hugs and gave me attention whenever she could. And as I wrote about her, as a matter of fact, the name I chose for her, Adel in German means noble. So Miss Noble is what I called her and that's what she was. You heard it in my voice just then. Just writing about her made me choke up because there's so much love. And then I saw her once, you read about it in the book. I saw her again after my adoptive parents took me back to the orphanage because they were taking some clothes that they were contributing from the community. I couldn't speak German anymore and we were just bawling our eyes out because there's so much love and yet I couldn't speak to her anymore. Wow. How many hours a day did you write, Walter? Was there discipline? And did you have that set up in advance? Were you at Hock? What did that look like? I would do two or three hours and yeah, there was discipline involved and because I'm an ex-musician, my creativity came at night. I had other people are more creative in the morning. So after I finished my work as a psychic, then I would take two or three hours and just write what was there. And then my goodness, that organizing that I talked about coming up with those 70 scenes and the six elements of each scene, that took over a year. And I recommend that because once you have that written out, then the book almost writes itself. Then you can focus on keeping them on the edge of their seat within the scene, the smells, the tastes, the feelings, the touch. I'm gonna open this up. I'm a go by energy kind of gal and my energy is leading me there. I have so many other questions but I really want to open this up to folks who are percolating. That's what I'm feeling. And so this is your time and I think I might ask you to raise your hands if you know how to do that. You go under participants. Okay, cool. Anita, thanks for raising your hand. I knew that I didn't know you could do that. Where do you find that? Look under participants and under your name, there's a way to click on more or raise hand. Oh, cool. Okay, thanks. Also at the bottom of the screen as reactions. So you can click there. Thank you. Awesome. Thank you so much for sharing your story. I'm really fascinated with your personal journey and the journey of writing your book is really cool. I was wondering if you wouldn't mind quickly recapping what the six elements of each scene should be. I wasn't able to write them down as quickly as we went through them. Yes, should I post it again? So it's okay, say it and I will type it. Okay, so place and time of the scene, then what is the goal of the scene and then what is the obstacle of the scene, what's preventing that goal from happening and what's the action confrontation maybe, but what action is happening? Am I going too fast? Then what is the purpose of the scene? Why are we in the scene? Is it explaining something from the past or is it explaining something that's gonna happen in the future? Not necessarily the next scene, but some time in the future, setting up a mystery for instance and then what is the sequel to this scene? What's the next scene that's gonna happen and how do they fit together like Debbie was talking about? Great, may I ask another real quick question? Did I understand you correctly that you did this first for every scene before you actually wrote the book? Yeah, that's what took over a year. Yeah, and it was worth it. When I first started that, I thought, no, I wanna write, but then after so many years since 1995 of writing and coming to a place where, okay, now what? Then I realized, no, organizing it, knowing exactly where I'm going and why I'm going there, that's what made all the difference. And put me in a place where I'm proud of it, right? Rather than, oh my God, I hope people like this, right? Because putting all of that thought and planning into it, I realized that, wow, this is solid, this is strong. And it wouldn't have been if I had just free flowed, right, written, right? Say that five times. Free, free flowed, written. Okay, does that make sense? How am I answered? Okay. And I wanna piggyback on what Anita just asked you and then I would like to type this out for people. You were saying, taste, give us those elements again that for the physicality, if you will, or the filmatic piece of it, it's taste, touch, smell, what were the other elements? Well, the first one really is visual, you know, because when you first describe a scene, you're usually describing what the room looks like, what the person looks like, and they don't have, excuse me, they don't have to come in any order, right? So, visual and audio, what are the sounds? The touch, you know, and even if that's just like a girl's hair blowing in the wind and touching against your cheek, right? That, the smell, like of the scene, or the girl, or the boy, or the food, and then the taste of anything that comes along and frequently what I noticed is, and you guys that are in spiritually intuitive, you know that when you have a real strong spiritual awareness, sometimes you're also tasting, and it's sort of like an electrical taste in your mouth. At least that's my experience. Those are the five physical senses, and then the sixth sense is emotions, what are you feeling? What are they feeling? And how is that coming through in the dialogue and even in the expression on their face? And then seventh is the spiritual awareness, right? In other words, that goes like I mentioned earlier, beyond emotions, the spiritual awareness usually comes with some emotion, but it's a different world, it's a different place, it's much deeper than just your feelings. Excellent, okay. And I put it all there in the chat for people who are interested. Awesome. Who else has a question? Raise your hand. She's a nobody. Art and I both got the memo about the blue shirts. And we're both in LA. That's good. Okay, anybody else? Karen. Formulating my question right now. So when you sat down to write, did you put yourself in any other state? Like sometimes you can go, okay, God, you write this for me or you know, Angel of Knowledge, come and write this for me. Did you do any sort of your own process? Yeah. Got you into that space. Good question. Yes, absolutely. In my therapy with a psychologist, she used a technique which I had all actually already read a book about. The book was a Dr. Stanislav Graf who was, you know, Debbie knows him, foremost researcher in levels of consciousness. And when he first started his work, he used LSD. And of course, this was scientific where he made a record of everything that happened and the specific descriptions of the levels of consciousness that people were reaching on LSD. And then at some point, I think maybe early to mid-60s, LSD became outlawed for research. He didn't have access to it anymore. And he, of course, was devastated and he realized that in observing all of the people on LSD, they also hyperventilated when they were going to these levels of consciousness. So he decided, how about developing a method of breathing? And it's as simple as breathing a little bit deeper and a little bit faster. Doesn't take a heck of a lot, but you end up, and hyperventilation is that state right before you faint, right before hypnosis. And it is at least a semi-hypnotic state. And my therapist used that in our sessions, Walter. All right. And then in 1995, I went back to Germany to the orphanage and to where I had lived and remembered everything. And I went down below in the scenes where I went under the apartment where I used to live and did this breathing technique. And I was there again. And I was balling my eyes out and feeling everything. And so that's specifically what I used in writing the book I would put myself in this state. And I do this when I do sessions with clients as a psychic. That's a psychedelic. And that is literally, you put yourself in at least a semi-altered state. And in that state, I was able to relive. And I recognized that I was able to remember all kinds of stuff by being in that state that I wasn't necessarily remembering consciously. It came back. So that was a great question. And to me, that's also really important, especially if you're writing about your own experience, but then also if you're writing total fiction, use your own experience, right? That's what they teach actresses, Debbie, right? Is use your own experience to be this character, right? Thank you so much. That's very cool. Yeah, you're welcome. Thanks for the question. You talk about in this, you know, your scenes, one of the things is the goal and purpose. And in terms of writing the book, you have a sense of what your goals and purposes were. Yeah. Yeah. And, you know, I had already done my work as a psychic for quite a few years before I finished the book. And I realized that God, so many of us out in the world have gone through trauma, physical abuse, sexual abuse as kids, abandonment, whether that's because daddy was never around or daddy died or daddy left or mommy left or sent away being adopted, right? Those elements in our lives are really dominant, just so common and people suffer and don't know how to get past those things. So, yeah, writing about my own experience and how I got over it, I thought would be a contribution. Then also helping people understand that the concept of being psychic, the concept of deja vu, having dreams come true, ESP also is far more common than people realize my experiences, really, everybody has that. If they choose to be aware of it, they have psychic ability, psychic experiences. And the purpose and another purpose in writing the book was to help people realize that, yeah, you can use that. You can use that to put yourself in a safe place to find a refuge and then also to get insight and to understand. Thank you and were there other purposes more for yourself and your own process? Sure, just the therapy of, yeah, this is what I went through and realizing that it was way bigger than I ever allowed it to be. In other words, putting it out in a detailed chunk, chronologically, well, actually, no, there was the slashbacks, but putting it out in a detailed chunk made me realize that what I had gone through really was significant, whereas it's something that I talk about or have learned in people who are intuitive and who have had psychic experiences since they were kids, you're not aware that this is a psychic experience now. You're only aware of what's normal, right? Whatever you've experienced was normal. And my normal was crazier than shit, except it was normal, right? And so what I realized in writing it was so many people out there are going through crazier than shit and they don't know that it's actually not normal, right? Because they don't have anything to compare it to. It's the only life we have lived, right? So this was my normal. And then with something that I did that also I think was really important in writing the book to help other people and that is I minimalized what happened to me, right? It was just me, I'm not important and that wasn't really that bad. And yet whenever I told somebody about what happened to me they were in disbelief, right? But I discounted it and I think a lot of us do that. And so that really helped me, if therapeutically. Makes sense, thanks. Yeah. And feel free to raise your hand. Also, if you have any questions about obviously Walter and his process, but also your process if you're wherever you're at you may would like a lead about something that is an interesting way for you to start or where you're at. And let me ask you, Walter has writing this book changed your life? Yeah, just in that sense of understanding myself but more than anything in bringing really big, huge satisfaction to the work that I do in empowering other people. If I hadn't written the book or written the chunk and realized, oh, shit, you went through some hard stuff I wouldn't be able to help people the way that I do. If I hadn't given myself the credit I wouldn't be able to help people with giving themselves the credit, recognizing. I wouldn't be able to help people with the concept of and this is something that for decades I avoided seeing a psychologist because I didn't want to relive it. My feeling was, oh my God, I barely made it through the first time if I relive it with a psychologist what if I go nuts and never come back? Totally. And again, if I hadn't written about all of that and realized how really awful it was but also realized in writing it that, oh yeah, you can get over it, you can find ways and we have tools, the psychic stuff and then the fact that it's just so common. You know, gosh, every face that I see here on screen each of you has got a lot of trauma going on in your past, I feel it. And you got stuff to say and you have things to say that will really help other people and inspire other people. And another thing that I realized as being a musician I was in a one hit wonder band and that experience made me realize that, dude, just because you had a one hit wonder doesn't mean that anybody knows you, nobody knows you. You have a market, you know? And there were what, 250,000 people that bought the single, right? Okay, that's nice. In number 18 on the billboard charts but nobody knew me, nobody knew about me other than those people that are your market, right? And so that too, I thought about when I wrote the book and that is, okay, not everybody's gonna like this, not everybody's gonna give a crap about what I went through. I have my market, people who are going to be inspired by what I went through and you guys have your own market and it's different than my market probably. Yeah. Oh gosh, I just wanna say with a lot of humor I totally relate to what you said about the concern you had about writing the book and the number one resistance was, I don't wanna relive it, you know? I didn't feel that in my books because I have not done a memoir, I've written more how-to books. However, that's, you know, a total transparency. That's exactly how I felt before I did ayahuasca. I'm like, oh no, I'm gonna do plant medicine, it's gonna bring up my child, I already did it once. And of course, it was not that at all. It couldn't have been further from the truth. And I think the beautiful thing is, you know, this awareness I'm having, even sharing this is whether you're writing a book, whether you're drinking plant medicine or working with a healer or, or, or, the bottom line is you did it once. It will never, never, never be that again and you will never be that again, that you were an innocent child put into a situation that was untenable, doing the best you could. And so the beautiful thing is you never really have to relive it. And I love the fact, Walter, that you had those feelings and that resistance and that very legitimate concern. But, you know, you got to the edge of the cliff and you jumped and, you know, look where you are now. So what a payoff, you know, what a payoff for people to read it. Thank you. And Barbara, I see your hand is up. Thank you. Hello. And as a writer, writing because I'm working in two worlds, the metaphysical world and the more practical world and every once in a while I go through how are the people in the practical world going to deal with me? Now I do have some things I'm doing with that, but how did you resolve the gaps that the reader might have between practical and metaphysical? And since Debbie wrote the book, maybe she knows better how I resolved it, right? When I think back on how I wrote it, my feeling was I didn't necessarily resolve it. I, you know, because like I mentioned earlier, that was my normal. I drifted in and out. And I think that that's normal for a lot of people where, and like when I'm having a psychic experience, it wasn't announced. It was normal, you know? The imaginary girls that I played with, it was normal. And yet nobody else saw them and I couldn't talk about them because they would then tell me that I'm nuts, right? Even adults, you couldn't talk about it. And adults have had more of a tendency to just laugh at you, right? So I don't think that I did, Debbie, did I? Did I just go from one to the other, the spirit world to the physical world? Yeah, so Barbara, is your question about how seamless was it or how did he structure it? So it was clear to the reader. I just want to understand the question better, clear the reader about what space he was in. Actually, it's a third question, but I don't know how to frame it. It's like, how do you inside of yourself as you're writing and what did you actually do if you did anything to help the reader come begin to get comfortable with the metaphysical? Yeah, so you know what? It's actually, I love this question and I'll tell you why. Because as the leader of Walter's book, what I would say is he didn't. It was a little bit like that movie, Sixth Sense, in that I thought this Heidi that he was playing with this beautiful little girl and all their adventures, I'm thinking it's real. And I- That was Maria, actually, right? Yeah, so there's these different people he interacts with and for me, this was real and it's not established because you're on the journey with him because in his mind, it was real at the time. And in his mind, when he was having these horrific, terrifying nightmares that were very particular, that was real too. So it's not till later on in the book where he's starting to learn things and revelations through other people are coming to him and then ultimately to himself that you make these discoveries alongside with him. And I actually prefer that personally, you know my take on keeping people on the edge of their seat because if he had made it really clear, let's say he started at the end of his life in the book and then just started recounting the details and then said, well, it was this girl and I thought she was real, but in actuality, she was a spirit being that I got to play with. And I now know that she was someone, she was saving my life while I was seeing pieces of her life, psychically that others, you know, if we knew all of that, it's simply not compelling. You'd kind of end that chapter and go, that was kind of interesting. But instead you're led to believe everything he believed as a child. And once it starts unfolding the truth of what's happening much later, it's, oh, it's very, very fascinating. And there's another way that maybe the resolving happened and that is the accident girl, Maria, that I described the accident. Every time I write about that, I saw the vision, which again, I thought it was a movie in blue and white, not black and white, but blue and white, right? Where all the darker colors were a dark blue or an indigo and the lighter colors were light blue and white, right? And so when I wrote the scene, I wrote it describing blue and white, right? Dark blue steering wheel, anything, snow, right, was white and yet light blue, right? So everything had this blueness to it, which didn't make sense. And then all of a sudden this scene comes up as a flashback and I describe partway to the accident. And then the next time it comes up, I describe further into that and then the next time further into it. But the whole time it's everything's in blue and blue and white. And so that establishes that we're someplace else, right? But then it gets resolved when I finally figure out with my therapist many years later that, oh, that was a vision, vision. And I've, you know, my brother had taken me to a movie and I thought for sure, we saw the same movie, but I figured out in therapy that, no, dude, you fell asleep during the movie and you had this vision. Amazing. That makes me want to, I've got a sort of whole picture of letting my metaphysical stuff come through more real. Yeah, because it is real, right? Like I said, for all of us, it's normal, right? And then my goodness, if these people could have been real imaginary people and then become physical people in my life, how more real do you want, right? And then let's go quantum physics. I've read three books on quantum physics. It's one of my favorite subjects and that is, there is no real, there is no physical reality. It's 99.999% empty space. And the only time that we see particles is if we're looking, if we're not looking, there is just frequency, there are no particles, right? So the psychic world exists in that 99.999% empty space. It's as real as anything else. And especially to you because you're experiencing it, right? And then me writing about me experiencing it helps other people realize that, oh, I'm not so crazy and oh, that really did happen to me. Thank you. You're welcome. Beautiful. Walter, if you could name one to three things that made your life as a writer easy, doable, flow, all of that and something you look forward to and knew, okay, I'm definitely in process, this is happening. What would those one to three things be that you utilize whether you were taught or you taught yourself or discovered by accident in hindsight, what would you say those are? That influenced me as a writer, that's what you mean? At least three things? Well, that made writing easy, that made it happen. Yeah, well, it's that organization taking a year to write out which 70 scenes, not 120, but 70 scenes and which order, especially the flashbacks, does it make sense to flash back here now, right? And then the scene cards, that made it easier because once- You were talking about index cards? Yeah, each index card with the six aspects of each scene that we talked about. Then having that information, once I started writing the actual words, that became easier, far easier. And like I said, for almost 20 years before that, I had just been free flow writing, thinking that I had a plan and a place where I was going, but it was just a narrative about what happened to me. It didn't keep anybody on the edge of their seat. So that made my life easier than what I learned from Craig McKay of how to do the visuals in a scene so you keep their interest and then bringing in NLP, the five senses and the two emotional, spiritual senses. Those three things made it easier. Beautiful. And Rupert, Ellen, any questions? Hi, I can unmute you or you can unmute yourself. Can you hear me now? Yeah. Okay. Well, you wrote your book. I don't know whether you call it semi-fictional or whatever by changing the name. So everything would be, everybody would be protected, let's say, the one that if I, well, when I write it, it's been working on, it's about, you know, my wife who died some years ago now and her life, but then our life together, that's the basic idea. And I'm not quite sure how to mix that together because her life's an advocate by itself. But there are a lot of people in it who are kind of, they are famous people that she knew in different ways. And just a whole lot of people who mostly are dead now. So I was wondering before whether I should write this, using different names. I don't know, you know, because it's pretty difficult to get all the permissions and stuff, isn't it? I mean, for, and so I thought, I don't even know if I could do it, you know, could get it or find the right people. I mean, most of them are dead cause she was. So I wondered about which way to do it, in other words. Follow your heart, but what you just said of getting everybody's permission and then getting their permission with specifics. Some people might give you permission for this, but not that, how can you write your book, right? And so my feeling is use names that are suggestive, you know, like I wrote about a couple of famous people. One was a famous singer in Germany that I backed up as a musician. And I changed his name, but the details about his life, I kept the same. And that is he was a German country singer. He was actually a friend of Johnny Cash's and he had this particular career and he was famous for 15 years and had massive numbers of number one hits. But I changed his name, right? So the people, if anybody really knew the guy could think, oh yeah, that's probably Gunter Gabriel, but I called him something else, right? So how close can you get? I mean, you know, it's like, there must be sort of a line. You have to feel it out. Have to feel it out. And then there are some, you know, for instance, one of the scenes I'm playing in the afternoon parade at Disneyland, but you cannot write Disneyland in your book. Things like that. You just need to research one piece at a time and feel it out, right? But my suggestion to you is make it a novel. And then also what I suggest is, you know, my very first scene in the book is about this man in black. I showed that in the detailed scene cards. The very last scene explains who that is, right? So figure out a place to go, right? A place to end, right? And a place to set up, oh my God, what's this, right? And then don't resolve it until the end, right? And then that would be about her life somehow, all right? Or something that, where she changed your life, right? Yeah. I mean, can I use her name though? I mean, I believe so, but you might have to ask, you know, if you're writing anything controversial, yeah, you'll have to ask siblings, aunts, uncles, right? And that may not be worth it either. Yeah. Okay. And you know, in my case, I had a brother and sister that I didn't mention and there were things about my mother that I avoided writing about because I didn't want them to get upset about our mother. Yeah. Right? Yeah. So I changed things that our mother did to a different character, for instance, right? But I experienced it still. Did you find it hard to remember who's who? Yeah, but I wrote it out, right? I wrote out a list of every single character. And while I showed that briefly, maybe you were gone, every single character, their physical description, their personality and the kind of clothes that they wore and what they smelled like, right? So, and then keep track of it. And so each time that this person came into a scene, I would refer to that. Oh yeah, this is the one that smells like chamomile, right? This way of doing it is kind of like storyboarding, you know, for films. Yeah, absolutely. And even John writing, he liked that too. Absolutely, right? And then the thing that really impressed me the most after 20 years, almost 20 years of starting and coming to a block was, yeah, you have to organize it. You have to know where you're going. You can't just write a narrative. Yeah, because I was saying when I first came on earlier, I've done a lot of research. You know, I have all these names. I try to remember everything I could because I should have written it down while she was alive. And she always says, there's too many books written already, you know? So I never did anything specific. But anyway, when I'm sitting in these cafes, I just, it just starts to come to me and I get into a state of, a bit of caffeine probably. And a lot of stuff comes to me. So I just write all this, whatever comes to me, I write it. And then I try to get a research. My brother does a genealogy and finds all kinds of information. But it's a big, and I list it, but it's still a big, you know, collection of stuff. So then write it out as an outline, right? So that you can take each scene and or each aspect of a scene and write it in a different order if that makes more sense. Well, it's not really like written, you know, it's not written, it's more like- Well, you've done all the research, right? And so now you've got a whole lot of facts and you're in a place where you can among those facts, select the features, the highlights and make an outline. Yeah. Organize, right? And then I also want to speak to your research thing. That's another thing that made it easier for me and that is doing the research since mine was a period piece, right? If a black Mercedes came by, I researched, okay, what was a Mercedes model at that time? Right? So that you make it as real as possible. Yeah. Well, her life goes back a long way. So there's a lot of historic stuff to be put in. Yeah, I did a ton of research too so that I was historically accurate and accurate within the scene itself. Yeah, hadn't really thought about that. Rupert, if I may, just to respond to that. It's such an important question. It comes up a lot. I work with clients who are women writing about a contentious relationship, marriage, divorce. Of course, that's quite different than what you're mentioning. I bring it up because in that case, I have been very clear with them, you are entering really dangerous territory to name your husband and write specifically. And I always point them to a lawyer, must have a literary lawyer in that case. And since your beloved is deceased, chances are you would at least ethically have her permission to write this. She may have been waiting for you to write this. And if there are other characters, absolutely, you can write about them to great degree. And if you don't have permission, I would change their names. And you can make that obvious in the introduction by saying, these are all real people. However, most of the names have been changed. Most people don't care, we're just so invested in your story. And the last thing I wanna mention to you is something that Walter alluded to that's so important is you must essentially know the end. Because when you know the end, you can reverse engineer and you know where you're starting, right? And that'll keep people storyboard and map for you. And then of course, you wanna view all those pieces in between with the ways that are so unresolved and such amazing heightened experiences, whether they're internal, external, situational that compels and pushes the story forward and the pages to be turned. Yeah, that all makes a lot of sense. Yeah. I hope you know it. Well, it's really helping me to know where to go with it because I kind of got all this and then I'm sitting there with like this whole bunch of stuff and kind of not knowing where to go. Beautiful. Ellen, do you have any questions? Cause we're right here at the tail end. We have a bit of a minute left, but you're welcome to that minute. You'll have to, yeah. Most of the questions have been answered already, but Walter, I think when you were talking about the character list, your screen wasn't actually sharing. So I didn't see that. Did you all? Because if I would be interested- I can bring it up again if Debbie can give me sharing. You have sharing ability. I do. Okay. Does it feel good? Okay. So I have to select share and select what, who. Okay. Give it to this. So I'm gonna move it over. Okay. Can you see it? Yes. All right. Okay. So Fraulein Adel here, orphanage caregiver, right? Things she does calls me sweet, sensitive. So she calls me Wolfie and she's sweet and sensitive and feminine and affectionate. She connects hearts with me, protective of me, in love with hair Schmidt, which also works at the orphanage. She has soft brown eyes and she smells like carnations, right? And then hair Schmidt, he's loud, assertive, right? And interestingly, I didn't like the way he smells. And so I just didn't wanna bring that back. Good. So did you get your answer that way? So she muted herself. Okay. Yeah, okay. All right. Cool. And I put into the chat Walter's website, psychicwalter.com so you can all, if you would like to pursue a connection with him or get his book, which is on Amazon, et cetera, you can do so. And as always, I love when people stay in touch and get connected. Community is so important to me. And I want to thank everybody for coming. And before we end, just share with you that as you know, I teach this privately and my ongoing group, Visible Visionaries and folks who are here, if you wanted to join, just email me. I will give you the not team, the actual direct email for me is Deb. If somebody wants to type it in the chat, that would be great. It's Deb on the radio, D-E-B on the radio at gmail.com. You can reach out to me directly and let me know your interests. I do vet people because it's a very sacred intimate group. But of course, now that I've thank you, Ellen, now that I've gotten to know you and I know you, you're welcome to join. Also, I do this privately. And most important, because of all of you guys, I am going to be offering a book incubator, meaning it's going to be a weekend, two days in a row, where you can bring your book wherever you are in the process. Many of the people here are quite into their book. And some of you have not yet started your book. All are welcome. I'm going to facilitate everybody at whatever level you are. Originally, I was gonna do it in my home in person because I love being with people and meeting with them. However, I think it was Anita who heard about this and was actually not in regards to her, but she said, oh, I might be interested in that, but I'm in Canada, what's possible. So I asked my group, if we did this on Zoom, are you okay with that? Everybody was like, yeah, let's do it. So if you are interested in participating in that weekend and actually you will leave, even if you're just starting your book, you will leave with enough to do your book. And then I'm not going anywhere. We can still work together or you could join the ongoing group, et cetera. There's so many ways you can be supported. As I said in the beginning, I think the most important thing, like someone once gave me a card that said, I came here to sing out loud. And I feel like that's been my biggest wound and the biggest driver in my life. All the times I've suppressed myself because of any place I thought I couldn't possibly for whatever reason and all the ways I've broken out and said, but I must and the glory at the other end of that when you do. And that is really what I wish for all of you who have a book inside of you. If you are seeking someone and you resonate with me, allow me to be the doula, to help you give birth to this book. I believe this is more important than ever right now for everybody who's alive, who has a message that the universe has said, do the work, it's your time. And I just wanna thank Walter for being here with us today and for sharing his amazing process and for his bravery and answering the call when he heard it. And it doesn't, by the way, it doesn't often take as long as it did for him. And resilience to have this, be a little lost in your book, but that's where 85% of the people let go. That is the statistics. People pick up the pen or the laptop, 85% will never finish their book. And then out of that, the other 15%, boy, because it's not always a pretty picture that people take the time to really write a good book. So if you're here, I know where your heart is. I wish that for you. I know you can do that. And just have that moment of closing your eyes and seeing yourself holding your published book, signing your book, being on webinars, being interviewed because you wrote the book, teaching what was in your book, knowing your kids, your family, even your dogs, your neighbors, whoever it is you're connected with has this piece of legacy from you. So I appreciate you all. This will be available, this replay on the platform for anybody who's interested. And Ellen is posting her email. I love that. So yes, to community. And yes, Barbara, thank you too for coming. As always, I adore you. And for anybody who wants to copy these emails, we've got Karen wrote mine, Ellen wrote mine, Drew wrote his, Ellen wrote hers. You've got Walter's information. And thank you to Rupert for joining us. I'm so grateful and I'm so happy you had even fun doing this because that's really what it's all about, what all is said and done, right? So big love to everybody and go give birth to your books. And if I can help you would be my honor and pleasure. And I'm so grateful we had this time together. Thanks, Walter. Thank you. Thank you all for your interest. Thank you everybody. Thanks everybody. Bye now. Thanks a lot.