How to Write a New York Times Best Selling Book (from a Guy that Has Never Done it…Yet)

I’m writing a book. It’s going to be a really good book. In fact, you’ll be able to find it on the New York Times Best Sellers list sometime in the next year or so. That’s how good it will be. It’s going to be published by Wiley in their New Rules for Social Media Series. Neither Wiley nor David Meerman Scott actually know this yet, although I suppose if they are reading this, they do now…they just don’t know it, know it if you know what I mean.

Anyway, being that I technically have not written a New York Times Best Selling Book yet, how am I supposed to teach you how to do it? It’s simple. I can’t. Not really, anyway. I mean, I guess I could do some research and throw together something pretty obvious or be vaguely profound by telling you to keep writing until it’s done and then send you packing, but I’m guessing that’s not what you are really looking for. And to be honest, that’s really not what this post is even about anyway.

Heads Up, Here Comes the Bait and Switch

What this post is really about is making a declaration. Stepping up to the plate, pointing towards left field and then smacking the snot out of the ball with everything you have and knocking it right over the left field wall with pinpoint accuracy. A declaration is a statement of fact even if there is no evidence of truth to it yet. It is the commitment to a future that is so powerful that it changes who you are right now and every single action you take from this point on. A declaration means telling the world without hesitation who you are and what you were meant for. And then doing it.

I am a New York Times Best Selling Author.

Whether I have finished writing the book yet is irrelevant. Whether The New York Times has awarded me that honor at this moment doesn’t matter. Whether Wiley has chosen to pick up my book right now doesn’t change anything. To me, deep down inside that statement is a fact. It changes who I have to be right now in order to live into it. I make different decisions because of it. I think differently because of it. I look at things differently because of it. I write differently because of it.

I am a different person because of it. The type of person that will someday soon be a New York Times Best Selling Author.

This is not some egotistical attempt to further my career. It has nothing to do with seeing my name in print. To me, it means being one of the best writers in the world. Proof that I have changed someone for the better with nothing more than the ideas in my head. It’s what keeps me awake at night.

This is Not a Goal

Don’t confuse this declaration with accomplishing your goals or receiving some gift from “the universe.” Those are all things you want whereas a declaration is who you are. Lance Armstrong won the Tour de France long before he ever won the Tour de France. It’s not because it was on his todo list. It’s because he bleeds bicycle grease. It’s who he is. If someone were to cut you open (not recommended), aside from all of the biological goo and perhaps what you ate for breakfast this morning, what would they find at your core?

Dig deep. It’s in there.

You have to look past your goals. Forget that long list of adjectives you have been using to describe yourself all of these years. Stop blaming others for your current lot in life. Disregard your limitations, you don’t have any. If you think you’ve dug deep enough, keep going. Eventually you will find it. And when you do, you will know.

And when you know, don’t keep it to yourself. Finish writing your story even if it hasn’t happened yet. Put it out there. Declare it! You can start right now in the comments below…