Kathi (00:01.45)
Well, hey friends, welcome to the Writing at the Red House podcast where we gather the table to break bread and tell tales with some of our favorite writers and creators who share their wisdom to help us all share our story.

And guys, I am back with Tenille and Tanya. These, Tenille Register is the social media director for all things, Kathy Lipp. Tanya Kubo is in charge of membership and they do a hundred other things, but this is really where their energy lies and what we’re gonna be talking about on today’s podcast, because we’re talking about how to create a social media habit. And I promised in our last podcast that today,

we were going to get super, super practical. And so, Tonya, I would love for you to share a little bit about we are doing a social media challenge in our paid group right now. And I feel like, and I’ve gotten some personal messages from people. In fact, one of them I got today was I am now officially over my fear of social media. Yay!

Tonya Kubo (01:11.102)
Mm -hmm.

Tonya Kubo (01:25.086)
makes me so happy!

Kathi (01:26.506)
Yes, yes. And I will tell you, this is somebody who I had no idea she had a fear. She’s in our private mastermind group, Sarah. She would not mind me saying Sarah from our private mastermind group, but she’s like, I have been showing up and I have been doing it. And she goes, I’m really excited to keep going on. And so.

Tonya Kubo (01:38.366)
Mm -hmm.

Kathi (01:54.122)
Can you talk a little bit about what we’re doing and then how can people do this on their own?

Tonya Kubo (02:00.286)
Yeah, so the social media challenge that we’re doing in the Red House Writers Collective and also our Mastermind members are participating in that. So, you know, we all have gifts, right? I happen to be, interestingly, not intentionally gifted at creating social media prompts that work to not just increase engagement, but also help to develop good relationships between the poster and the people who see the posts.

And so we craft, so here’s part of the problem though, is most of us, when we go to learn about social media, we are taught all about broadcast model methods, which means post this, don’t post that, post, you know, worry about your selfie, worry about your video. And what isn’t taught is the flip side of social media, which is how to be a good follower. And so in this challenge, we have, you know, everybody gets a daily prompt.

that helps them think about how to best show up and serve their audience. Cause most of them don’t have the miles on them to know what their audience needs to hear on the average Wednesday, like Tenille mentioned at the last episode. So it helps them get in the right frame. But then the other side of the challenge is we all share our links to our posts. And then you go and you comment and you leave, I tell people a meaningful comment on at least three other, other accounts so that they get to see what that

feels like first of all, I need people to be aware when we talk about being a good follower, Kathy, how much time it takes to actually leave a meaningful comment. Because back to what we talked about the last episode where we get sad if we only get one comment, I think it’s because we don’t recognize how much time and energy it takes to leave a thoughtful comment. So when you have to leave three a day and you go, my gosh, that took me 15 minutes.

Kathi (03:47.754)
Mmm, yes.

Kathi (03:54.762)
Right.

Tonya Kubo (03:56.126)
Then you start to say, one person actually thought enough of what I had to say that they spent five whole minutes with me. three people did? I captured 15 minutes of collective attention today. And so that’s what I think is most powerful about the challenge that we are running right now.

Kathi (04:06.154)
Mm -hmm.

Kathi (04:17.29)
So how would you guys see somebody says, okay, great, but I’m not part of your membership. I don’t have access to your calendar. How would you encourage somebody to start thinking about those meaningful posts? I love what you just said. You could just spend 15 minutes commenting on three other people and that’s half the challenge friends. It’s not just about what you’re putting out there. It’s what you’re responding to.

Tonya Kubo (04:41.086)
Mm -hmm.

Kathi (04:47.498)
And I have followed people because of their comments. I’m like, okay, well, that was a wacky post, but the person who responded with a thoughtful comment, I’m like, and they have that little follow button next to them. I’m like, okay, I need more of that in my life. And so how would you, how would you help somebody create this challenge on their own?

Tonya Kubo (05:15.006)
Yeah, that’s a really good question. I’d love to hear to Neil’s thoughts too. But for me, I would say your first step is if you’re gonna build a daily social media habit, you actually need to show up on social media daily, right? So there’s that piece. So I would start by find five posts a day to comment on that aren’t your friends and family. Because that’s the other thing we like to do, right? We like to say, I spent an hour on social media. Okay, an hour scrolling people’s grandkids does not count.

Kathi (05:44.298)
Yeah

Tonya Kubo (05:44.798)
So go out there and just search. I mean, all of our social media platforms now operate as search engines. So figure out what you’re interested in. Okay. If it’s anxiety, right? Christians with anxiety, throw that into Facebook search bar, throw that into Instagram search bar, see what comes up. And I’m not saying you have to comment on everything because some things honestly are not worth commenting on, but find three to five and

Kathi (06:07.818)
Right.

Tonya Kubo (06:10.59)
leave those thoughtful comments and get in the habit of that for a few weeks, doing that regularly, understanding how much time it takes you because maybe I can leave five comments in 15 minutes and spoiler alert, I can’t cause I’m a wordy birdy over here. So like five comments would take me half an hour, but you know, however long that takes you. And then that gives you a sense of how much time a daily practice would take. And then after you’ve started doing that, you’ll start to just naturally absorb.

how people talk and behave on social media. And so when you get ready to do your own posts, you’re actually gonna be five steps ahead from the people who just started out of the gate with what does everybody need to hear.

Kathi (06:52.394)
Love it. Okay, Tenille, how would you answer that?

Tenneil (06:53.518)
I love that. I want to, yeah, I want to piggyback on with Tanya that I always in a social media workshop start with having them go right then in the workshop to go comment on others because it takes away the imposter syndrome. When we scan social media and all we do is look and lurk, that’s when we start to feel less than when we comment and we engage. That’s a relationship.

And then we start to be motivated to create our own relationships. So once you have that habit of going out and being a meaningful participant, I would say come up with three needs that you know your audience needs. Like three needs they have for sure. Just top of your mind and consistently three weeks in a row, do three posts on those three needs and build from there.

so that you are committing that you have three specific topics. If you post more because you post a picture of your dog or your kids or your grocery cart or whatever, great, but specific to those three needs every week for three weeks to get started. If you’re doing this alone without a group to support you.

Kathi (08:07.114)
And I would say find a group, find a couple other creators that you could say, hey, can we post on each other’s stuff? And I really, I believe in the power of responding. I really do. Because I think it trains you to understand, like if you have a comment that gets,

a lot of interaction or starts a discussion, why not post about that on your own social media to start that conversation? On TikTok about two weeks ago, I put a comment up, you guys, it’s had 20 ,000 reactions. Should I perhaps make some content on that? That might be a good thing for me to do, but you have…

Tenneil (08:51.63)
As your social media manager, I say yes. Yes, you should.

Tonya Kubo (08:54.814)
Yeah

As your social media manager, Tenille would like for you to share the URL to that post so she can look at it.

Kathi (09:01.29)
Yeah.

Tenneil (09:01.966)
100 %

Kathi (09:05.578)
It’s a very funny, quippy comment that doesn’t really have a lot to do with what I do. But you know, it’s like, to see that those kinds of comments can really get some interaction and get a conversation started is so, so important. What do you think about, I’m gonna ask this specifically to Tanya, what do you think about those content calendars that you can find online?

Tonya Kubo (09:21.95)
Mm -hmm.

Kathi (09:33.61)
because you said that your content calendar is really designed to create interaction and so like how would you evaluate a content calendar online?

Tonya Kubo (09:41.566)
I’m going to go to bed.

Tonya Kubo (09:47.294)
it’s so hard to evaluate them. I mean, most of them I would say are like, first of all, people pretty much just sell you a content calendar, right? They don’t really tell you what’s in there. So, you know, I’ve had, I’ve bought ones all, let’s just say $27 and they’ve been everything from a prompt, which is a post about this thing to I’ve seen ones that are one to two word labels, favorite thing, favorite color.

Kathi (10:04.33)
Mm -hmm.

Tonya Kubo (10:15.87)
movie you last watched, right? I’ve seen them be that basic and honestly that useless. Two ones that are madlib style, a full 20, 30 word actual sentence or paragraph with like little brackets of filling in the blanks. I think, you know what? You cannot scroll Instagram for longer than I would say 15 minutes before you will encounter some posts somewhere sharing.

a content calendar. In fact, Cathy, you know what? I will put, I will create specifically for this podcast, I will create a one month works any month calendar that we will give as a resource to Neil, hold me to this, because you know, as soon as we get out of here, I’ll forget, I promise this, we will have one so they can see similar to what we had in the challenge this month, what those prompts look like. So we’ll do a prompt.

Kathi (10:55.562)
What?

Tonya Kubo (11:11.422)
and then I’ll actually have a little further explanation so that they can walk through what we just did in the collective. How does that sound?

Kathi (11:18.218)
Dude, you could have just offered a week and it would have blown everybody’s mind, but now we’re… Yeah, that’s true. Yeah, you’re right.

Tonya Kubo (11:24.19)
week is they don’t see it in the overall context, right? You need to see a month and see how like, that’s kind of the same question on the 28th as it was on the fifth. Huh, you can do that? Go ahead, Tenille.

Tenneil (11:42.67)
In the last episode, we talked about planning ahead because you have to hit the same message multiple times. And the glance at a month is going to give you that feel.

Tenneil (14:00.274)
You’re not creating 30 totally separate and unique pieces of content to do for the month. These are going to go in a cycle and it’s going to repeat the same theme because people have to warm up to the idea and hear it repeated times before they can make change for themselves. And that’s really the goal, right? To meet the need of the audience so they can make the change that they want to make.

Tonya Kubo (14:02.494)
You said gay.

Kathi (14:29.418)
It’s so good. Okay. So we’ve got some content ideas. We are, we are readjusting how we measure success. But now I have to go do it. And guys, I will tell you, like one of the things I am doing right now is I’m reminding myself that creating content will not kill me. I don’t think. But I,

I’m doing three brave things a day and one of them is creating content because I don’t know why I have this hang up. I’m unpacking it, my psychologist and I are unpacking it. I’m not really, but I’m gonna, I know that if I just do it every day in a month, it’s going to feel like second nature. But right now it feels terrible and I hate Tenille and she is the meanest person I have ever met.

And I want to hide every time I do this. So what is your advice for me? And I already know your advice, but tell me who is listening what your advice is for me.

Tenneil (15:42.83)
Remember your why? Why is this important to you? And then I also want you to picture the woman who’s standing in her kitchen, right? Because the content you’re working on for videos is a lot of cooking, right, Kathy? I want you to picture the woman in her kitchen completely overwhelmed. She doesn’t know which ingredient she has. She doesn’t have enough time to do this. The kitchen’s a mess. Her mind is a mess. And reach out to her in your videos, right? Because you’re not cooking just…

Kathi (15:57.226)
Right.

Tenneil (16:12.27)
so that another professional chef can borrow your recipe. Your goal is to help take the clutter out of meal prep and planning. So you have a heart for this person and I want you to picture her in the kitchen with you when you turn that video camera on.

Kathi (16:30.25)
Yeah, it was so interesting the other day. I was telling Roger about my people in Clutterfree for Life. And he said, well, could you postpone? I’m like, I can’t. They need me. I said, I just picture their smoochy little faces, and I’m excited to be with them. And he goes, I feel like that for nobody. And that’s not true.

Tonya Kubo (16:51.486)
hahahaha

Tenneil (16:53.646)
You can tell Roger I’m personally offended. I thought I was that person for him.

Kathi (17:01.418)
He would not smudgy your face. Yes. He loves he he loves you guys We talk about our deep love for you guys often, but he does not feel the smudgy face for anybody, but I do Yes, exactly. See there you go. Okay, and that’s how I feel and you’re right. I need to picture those people tanya What’s your best piece of advice for those of us who are like? This is so hard. This is this is like if it it taps into every

Tenneil (17:03.918)
Let’s go.

Tenneil (17:10.894)
Let’s get ideally good paint touched.

Tonya Kubo (17:14.206)
Yeah

Kathi (17:30.826)
fear and insecurity and everything that somebody has said about us or we’ve said about ourselves. What is your advice?

Tonya Kubo (17:40.318)
Well, first of all, there is nothing anybody can say that is worse than what your own internal critic says. The meanest person is always inside your own head. And it’s all an experiment. You know, Tenille and I are on this show as quote experts on social media. And we would be the first to tell you we aren’t experts, because guess what? The rules change all the time.

Kathi (17:49.45)
It’s so true. Yes, yes.

Tenneil (17:53.934)
Right.

Tonya Kubo (18:09.982)
They change for us as frequently as they change for you. None of us has the secret bat phone to meta and they call us and give us like a 30 day heads up on changes. So we’re rolling with the punches like everybody else. So remember that it’s just an experiment. What works today may not work next week. And that’s okay because guess what? What didn’t work today might work next week, but you won’t know it if you don’t keep at it.

Kathi (18:20.298)
Mm -hmm.

Kathi (18:37.194)
Yeah, it’s so true. And there is no way you are going to find your people if you’re not reaching out to them. Because we would love to think that everybody is just going to come to us and say, I need what you’ve got. But if they don’t know what you got, how do they know that they can get that need met from you? To Neil and Tonya, this has been so valuable. And thank you for my personal counseling session. We just need to do this once a month, if that’s OK with you guys. OK? OK.

Tonya Kubo (18:45.598)
Mm -hmm.

Tonya Kubo (19:05.598)
Sounds good.

Kathi (19:08.266)
Friends, you’ve been listening to the Writing at the Red House podcast. I’m Cathy Lipp. Now, go tell your only you story of God’s extravagant love.

Kathi (00:00.689) 

Well, hey friends, welcome to the Writing at the Red House podcast where we gather at the table to break bread and tell tales with some of our favorite writers and creators who share their wisdom to help us all share our story. And today, this is so much fun to talk about because our guest, Grace Church, is a good friend of mine. has laid her head down here at the Red House before. But she also has written a major motion picture, which is crazy. It’s just crazy. Now I know two friends who have done this because Susie Flory has a movie coming out later this year, and I feel very Hollywood. Grace, thank you for letting me have six degrees of separation for Hollywood. 

Grace (00:47.594) 

Yeah. 

Kathi (00:58.961) 

Thank you, because you’re a big part of that. 

Grace (01:02.142) 

Thank you for having me, Kathy. I’m super excited and nervous and scared to talk about it. 

Kathi (01:07.009) 

No, no, there’s no reason to be nervous and scared. You’ve had to deal with Hollywood agents. We’re nothing over here. This is fine. And you guys, I just want you to know, like, so Grace is, in addition to being a blogger and a screenwriter and a wannabe author. Okay, so you are an author. You just happen to write, you’re a screenwriter. So that’s, but living in Los Angeles, I mean, she’s, she’s doing it. And she’s also an intern for us over here at 

Clutterfree and The Red House. So you contain multitudes, which I love, Grace. So I wanna talk about this movie because, you know, when I think about a movie being made, and of course, because all of my knowledge comes from watching movies about movies being made, you know, it feels like it takes six months. But let’s talk about, your movie is called Diamond in the Ruff, and it… 

I want to know like the whole process. So I want to know the inside of what it was like for you as a writer on this. So did a studio say, hey, we want something or did you write something and say, hey, studio, do you want this? Tell us how this happened. 

Grace (02:14.438) 

Yes. 

Grace (02:24.286) 

All right, well, you said six months. I’m going to start 10 years ago. Yes, yes. And a lot of movie stories start that way. Ten years ago, I started a new job just about this month at a country club and working in the in the food and beverage area back home in New Jersey, where my heart is and. 

Kathi (02:29.333) 

Oh my goodness! That’s wild! 

Kathi (02:34.931) 

Mm-hmm. 

Kathi (02:47.442) 

Mm-hmm. 

Grace (02:49.458) 

I started to see, I had worked in hospitality before, but I started to see these very crisp characters. And they weren’t all, you know, you go into a club as a staffer and you think, oh, us and them kind of like, you know, like that’s like from the outside, you think Caddyshack and you think us and them. 

Kathi (03:07.122) 

Bright. 

Grace (03:07.37) 

So I go in and all of a sudden I’m like, oh wait, no, we’re all in a community together. Like we’re part of this community too. And I had, the members were all different, like vastly different. And maybe because of their status, I don’t know, or their place in life, really strong characters. They knew who they were, what they’re doing, and where they were going and how they behaved. Like it all was very… 

in high resolution. And that’s what characters are, right? They’re people who have values that they live and act and breathe out and speak in real life, but in on paper, but in this case, it’s real life. So I’m walking into work one day, and the ladies were having a little nine, what nine hole, there’s a, this is a little thing like, there’s a big difference between like 18 hole golfers and nine hole golfers, like the nine hole or sort of like the fun ones kind of thing. 

Kathi (03:38.97) 

Oh, interesting. 

Mm-hmm. 

Kathi (04:04.783) 

Mm-hmm. 

Grace (04:06.672) 

having a little event and I’m thinking what about a woman like I love Caddyshack I love Bill Murray I love his heart and his pathos and just so much about that movie is um just and plus growing up at that time but anyway um 

Kathi (04:13.852) 

Yeah. 

Grace (04:23.262) 

I’m walking across and I’m like, you know, we need a female catty shack. We need like, that’s where I was headed. I’m like, we need a female. It was a time when they were, they were reversing like Ghostbusters and stuff. Like they were making a lot of, I mean, it’s 10 years ago, but, um, they were just starting to have all these, what can we do with females instead? So I sent a note from that parking lot to my manager at the time, uh, my agent manager and to Jim, like, Hey, what about, this is how it starts, what about a female catty shack? Oh. 

Kathi (04:35.006) 

Yeah.

Kathi (04:42.161) 

Yeah.

Grace (04:54.016) 

that’s funny what would that you know and one person says nobody likes to watch golf and then another person says no that’s funny and then you start to like imagine what this looks like and it evolved and for a little bit we settled on a log line which is you know a group of female golfers do this in order to achieve this so that this happens and It sat there because we were working on other projects at the time. So we had this log line that’s just in this, I keep a big long list of any ideas we have. Any titles, anything that we come across. Um, I just keep this long list and it sat there. Then we moved out to California and I got another country club job, which I absolutely love. And even higher resolution people. And, um, we were in between projects going through our list and we’re like, wait a what’s this female caddyshack when we you know now this is a year or two later and we Jim just started he was just playing around with it one night and it kind of spilled out onto paper and 

Kathi (05:54.595) 

Yeah. 

Grace (06:04.554) 

When I came home, he was visibly excited about it. And he’s like this and that. And we were laughing. I remember him standing on the stairs and we were kind of laughing at these scenarios. And I’m like, we had just moved here. So the script wasn’t based on this experience, but we had an actress in mind and we were kind of giving voice to it and playing around with it. And we’re like, no, this has legs. We can go somewhere with this. So we started our process. We made that the focus and we started the process. And that was two, I moved in 2016 

Kathi (06:24.487) 

Yeah. 

Grace (06:34.228) 

right around that time that we started fleshing it out. I don’t think we had written much before that. We had toyed around with it but we hadn’t written much. So and that’s what now? Yeah that’s eight years ago. That’s where it started. 

Kathi (06:44.366) 

Yeah. 

Kathi (06:47.785) 

So let me back up even further, because how did you get an agent? I don’t know anything about this world, but… 

Grace (06:55.902) 

Oh, yeah. Yeah, and you know, this is a Jim is that I have to say of the partnership, Jim is the more I do a lot of the creative and the structuring stuff. um the formulation he really has the no nerd like he has no worries about cold calling people or uh cold emailing which is still a thing or now it’s dms but you strike up you know you see somebody’s movie that you like you reach out to the agent you find the agent back in the day i mean we’re talking a long time ago it was a book you got a book like the like the i think there’s a publishing one right um 

Kathi (07:42.066) 

Yeah, there’s the Publishers Guide to Christian Writing. 

Grace (07:46.062) 

Yeah, so there was a there was a there was a movie there was a guide for Hollywood reps and you would go through and you would just cold. I think at that time we were emailing I have three minutes it’s like it’s crazy how technology has changed now you can friend somebody on social and get to know them and you know if you get up the nerve to pitch your work but I asked him about this last night I’m like do you think cold emailing is still a thing and he thinks that it’s still a thing that cold emails still work you send an intro you send your log line and you say hey if you’re interested let me know and you do not wait oh a log line is um the log line is the two where it’s you should be like one to three sentence blurb that encapsulates the movie 

Kathi (08:16.946) 

Okay.

Kathi (08:24.593) 

Your log line, what’s that? 

Kathi (08:34.845) 

Okay. 

Grace (08:37.886) 

So it’s what you see when you log on to Amazon or anything and you see like the little blurb about what the show is about. That’s basically the logline. It tells you who, what, when, where, and why basically. So it’s a character wants something. The wanting is very important. There’s a kind of formula for it, but it’s a person who wants something 

Kathi (08:45.381) 

Yeah, right. 

Kathi (08:56.189) 

Okay. 

Grace (09:07.39) 

because of a reason, but some so that something will happen, but something stands in their way. And I know. 

Kathi (09:14.725) 

Okay, repeat that because I think that’s really important. That is for movies, but it’s also for books. It could be for long form articles. So say that again. 

Grace (09:21.641) 

Yeah. 

Grace (09:26.338) 

It’s a character who wants something so that something will happen, but something stands in their way. I feel like I missed one, but yeah, it’s basically that. And the elements that are, it’s easy to think a lot of, when we did this when we were first starting, oh, it’s about this person who wants this. 

Kathi (09:39.292) 

Yeah. 

Grace (09:49.394) 

And that’s enough. It’s not it has to be what makes we were just talking about Sounds the Lambs. What makes these movies great is the opposition. When you have a and we just use this method to correct we’re working on a project that we’re stuck on and the nemesis is not enough. It’s not clear enough. The opposition. And that’s why you mentioned Skyler when we were chatting Kate. 

Kathi (10:14.173) 

Yes. I was going to say Skyler is all opposition. This is one of the characters. Yeah. 

Grace (10:18.274) 

Caitlin Carver, yes, Caitlin Carver who plays her just with the gritting teeth, the tight, the tight body language, that steely look, Caitlin Carver drove embodied that nemesis. And all it was that Caitlin wanted wants to keep her role as the queen bee in the club. But it’s enough to oppose somebody who’s trying to break in. So 

Kathi (10:31.207) 

Mm-hmm. 

Kathi (10:35.112) 

Yes. 

Kathi (10:41.073) 

Mm-hmm. Right. 

Grace (10:47.038) 

we’re realizing that like more and more the nemesis really defines the hero’s journey and in life too isn’t it so that it’s the adversity that really defines yeah and you know it’s easy to lose sight of because you get so enamored and in love with oh the hero’s journey and what they want and why they wanted and the nobility well um

Kathi (10:55.717) 

Mmm.

Kathi (10:59.569) 

It’s, yeah. 

Grace (11:13.034) 

You know, this is what makes comic book movies also so easy to digest is just that they have a clear bad guy and 

Kathi (11:18.055) 

Yeah. 

Kathi (11:22.225) 

Well, and this is what, because I know that you’ve said this is a female catty shack. What I thought is feels like a Gen Z mean girls to me. And in some ways, yeah. 

Grace (11:33.63) 

Yes, well it started the idea started to us Mean Girls, I don’t know… 

I don’t know the year Mean Girls came out. It might not have existed yet. It may have. It started in our minds as, you know, kind of 80s babies as a female catty shack, but it evolved and Mean Girls is used in the log line. They’ll say it’s like Mean Girls at a country club is how a lot of people describe it. And it evolved, it originally started with a team of like we had one team of females versus another team of females and then we toyed with it and eventually narrowed 

Kathi (11:51.302) 

Right. 

Kathi (11:56.329) 

Huh? 

Yeah. 

Grace (12:09.872) 

these three or four characters, I think, five characters that deliver the story. 

Kathi (12:12.742) 

Right. 

And can I tell you who my favorite character is in all of this? It’s Christina, the, the bartender, new best friend, love, Jiu-Jitsu instructor, spontaneous Jiu-Jitsu instructor. She’s wonderful. She’s so funny. 

Grace (12:23.1) 

Oh, right? Yes. 

Grace (12:29.89) 

So, yeah, yes, Natasha Barham. She’s in a new, she’s in a, I’m gonna plug her. Yes, she is an Iranian American actor. She is in a new show on HBO called Girls on the Bus. She is fanta, yes, she’s all over the place now. She is a fantastic, her comedic timing, her heart. 

Kathi (12:46.377) 

I’ve seen ads for that. 

Grace (12:54.466) 

her sincerity. And you know, it’s interesting, that’s a character that was an evolved character. Christina did not start that way in our original script. She was, that character was based on a real friend of mine at the club who, named Sophia, who was kind of like the wise sage. She’s all like petite and she was like this little petite Greek girl. 

Kathi (13:04.023) 

Mmm. 

Grace (13:19.814) 

with like this big and like was the uniter like she was always uniting people and pulling people in so it started as that and when that’s an example of development when the producers bought the script 

Kathi (13:31.878) 

Mm-hmm. 

Grace (13:34.974) 

they consolidated two characters. They consolidated the bartender angle that was originally the male lead and the waiter into this one character. So in a way, like Christina is representative of two characters but she became one and it really that was a great improvement and we’re that’s, you know, development can be great when you have fresh eyes on something and they saw something that we didn’t 

Kathi (13:38.249) 

Mmm. 

Kathi (13:47.194) 

Mmm. 

Kathi (14:03.837) 

Absolutely. So let’s. 

Grace (14:05.028) 

so happy because she makes the movie. Her little one-liners and her facial expressions and everything, yeah. Yeah. 

Kathi (14:09.549) 

Oh, she’s tremendous, tremendous. So let me ask you, if somebody has, we have a lot of authors here. By the way, I should also mention that Diamond in the Rough, such a great movie. It’s not one you sit down and watch with your kids. No, that’s okay, because we need grownup movies. But we are on a podcast that talks mostly about Christian writing and stuff like that. 

Grace (14:28.446) 

No, it is not. And yeah, yeah. 

Grace (14:38.546) 

Yeah. 

Kathi (14:39.437) 

and grace is a Christ follower, but this is not a Christian movie. And so we have lots of people who are Christian creators, who are not necessarily writing Christian content. And sometimes I don’t write Christian content. Sometimes, you know, mine’s general market. And that’s what that’s the situation here. So I just wanted to put that on there. Sure. 

Grace (14:59.198) 

Yeah, if I can if I can elaborate on that we are mainstream. We are mainstream writers. There is a very healthy Christian market, despite what a lot of people think. Suzy Flory’s movie is directed by my friend, John Gunn. He directed, yeah, he directed Unbreak and produced Unbreakable along with others. But he directed it. Unbreakable Boy. It is so good. I’ve seen I’ve had the privilege of sitting in his backyard and watching a 

Kathi (15:05.158) 

Yeah. 

Kathi (15:09.949) 

Mm-hmm. 

Kathi (15:14.936) 

Oh my goodness. 

Kathi (15:20.302) 

I can’t wait. 

Grace (15:29.552) 

version of it. He has done it’s a beautiful job. So there is a very healthy and dynamic Christian market. The chosen has proven that… wait what’s that? 

Kathi (15:41.197) 

And it’s not schlocky is the word on the street. It is not, it’s not schlocky. It’s not wrapped up in a neat little bow, Christian, he just prayed and everything got better. It’s a real life story is the word on the street. 

Grace (15:48.073) 

No. 

Grace (15:57.458) 

It is. Yeah, it is. It’s it’s and it’s and I feel like it you can deliver those messages in a 

in a real way, in a grounded way. Our voice is Jim and I write adult comedy with a heart, and we write the way we honor our characters. And to have a golf movie that didn’t include, for us, didn’t include cursing and alcohol, and like it just, it wouldn’t feel genuine yet. So that’s what we have. Yeah.

Kathi (16:08.485) 

Mm-hmm. Yeah.

Kathi (16:30.885) 

Right, right. To your experience because you worked at real clubs. Yeah. 

Grace (16:37.972) 

Yeah, we’ve gotten blasted for that. I’ve seen, I love the reviews. I love to read reviews good and bad because they’re very informative to me and a lot of people, it turns off a lot of people, the first three or four words are cuss words in the movie. So, you know, like it’s just It’s part of her journey. It’s part of her journey is refinement is part of her journey. Yeah 

Kathi (16:43.401) 

Mm-hmm. 

Kathi (16:46.825) 

Mm-hmm. 

Kathi (16:54.086) 

Yeah. 

They were used well, you know, those, yeah, it really is. 

Kathi (17:05.032) 

So we have a lot of people who are writing fiction, they’re writing memoir, they’re writing narrative nonfiction. And a lot of people who are listening to this podcast know that their book would make a great movie or a great TV movie, or where does somebody start? Like where could you start if you feel like, know that because here’s what I know, there’s gotta be an education to it. 

Grace (17:25.515) 

Mm, it’s fascinating. 

Kathi (17:33.837) 

and then there’s got to be an application. So the education is how the industry works and then the application is working in the industry. So where do people go for education on this? How you’re in it, but if somebody was like, when people come to me, I say, go to a writer’s conference. Like they don’t want to do that. They want, they say, you know, I don’t need to do all that. And I’m like, yeah, you do. So like what would be your writer’s conference? 

Grace (17:54.722) 

Can I make a real?  

Grace (17:59.406) 

Yeah, if you don’t, Jim. I will. I’m going to I’m going to age myself dramatically. It used to be the learning annex. Do you remember the learning annex? Yes. So before. 

Kathi (18:07.612) 

Okay. 

Kathi (18:10.937) 

Right, okay. Yes, and in New York that was huge, right? Oh, okay. 

Grace (18:14.346) 

before, well and here, I lived in New York, I lived in Los Angeles prior. Before, before there was the internet, there was this catalog called the Learning Annex and you would flip through and you would pay, what was it, 29, 59, 100 dollars, sometimes more for a weekend class on how to do something. And this was the YouTube… 

Kathi (18:22.886) 

Mm-hmm. 

Yeah. 

Kathi (18:34.406) 

Yeah. 

Grace (18:37.846) 

This is the analog version of YouTube. And it was glorious because you could spend a week in learning anything and, unlike YouTube, meeting people.

Kathi (18:39.986) 

Right? 

Kathi (18:48.822) 

Mmm. 

Grace (18:49.202) 

And that was the thing that separated that from YouTube is at the learning at when you would go take a workshop or a class or whatever, a course, whatever they called them back then. I wish I had an old learning annex catalog. I probably do in my in my in my clutter situation downstairs. The I would save it if just I would save it. 

Kathi (18:54.418) 

Okay. 

Kathi (19:00.809) 

Mm-hmm. 

Kathi (19:06.385) 

Yeah, but you’re clutter free now. You know, you’ve been working the program, so you’ve gotten rid of some of that stuff. 

Kathi (19:16.354) 

Okay, I love it. 

Grace (19:19.342) 

Yeah, so you would go and the better the best thing about it was you would learn and you would meet And that is what we’re missing now. So i’m still in the camp of yes conferences, I know I think w I think Susie’s um, oh my gosh, but west coast christian writers 

Kathi (19:26.5) 

Okay. 

Kathi (19:40.009) 

Here’s comes Christian, yeah? 

Grace (19:41.742) 

is having or has had a screenwriting and entertainment program like teacher. But I think wherever someone lives, if they can plug into a screenwriting class or even a filmmaking group. And here’s the thing, like we’ve come so far when I was coming into screenwriting you had to be in New York or LA or because we didn’t have phones like we didn’t have a camera in our pocket like you had to carry like a big huge you had to rent it and buy tapes and carry around and light like you don’t have to do any of that anymore so kids everywhere schools high schools are producing content this way churches a lot of churches have um 

Kathi (20:13.672) 

Right. 

Right. Yeah. 

Kathi (20:22.267) 

Right. 

Kathi (20:31.581) 

Yeah, it’s amazing. 

Grace (20:36.294) 

fiction filmmaking or production type groups. Get plugged in. Start creating with other people who want to do it. The thing that’s different about making your own content versus  

Grace (20:51.834) 

I work in features mainly. I don’t know it’s the same though. It’s the collaboration. You have to learn to work with other people. Even even working in a community theater would teach you that collaborative nature. So first of all, if you I mean, if you’ve written a book, hey, congratulations. First of all, it’s your IP. So hang on to that. That’s super important. Can’t take that from you. You’re selling it, you’re marketing it, you’re already 

Kathi (20:59.261) 

Yeah, yeah. 

Kathi (21:05.859) 

Yeah. 

Kathi (21:15.294) 

Yeah. 

Grace (21:21.788) 

Um, as far as would it make a good movie, that is a separate conversation. Yeah, and Suzy Flory, her on her, um, memoir group, um, oh, boy, you read these, you read these names every day. Isn’t that wild? Everything memoir. 

Kathi (21:27.121) 

Right. Yeah. 

Kathi (21:36.393) 

Oh, yeah, that’s okay. Her memoir group, we can just call it that.

Grace (21:42.918) 

Suzy’s introduction, I’ve watched it a thousand times and I’ve used it to work on our scripts as memoir because what is a movie but a fictional character’s remembrance of something that happened, right? Movies are memoirs in a way but they’re a fictional character’s memoir. 

Kathi (21:43.333) 

Everything? Yes. 

Kathi (21:55.869) 

Yeah, yeah. 

Kathi (22:00.125) 

Right. Yeah. 

Grace (22:05.446) 

I’ve used that a billion times. I’ve listened to it over and over again about what part of the story do you want to tell? Because if a memoir is only a small part of your life, a movie is going to be an even narrower view, maybe of an event or of an experience or a very small part of that story. So you have to that’s why books are adapted into movies because you cannot tell that whole story and Susie could speak better to that because she you know she’s written the memoirs, co-written the memoirs. You have to pick out now the slices of that and combine characters and so it’s possible though. It’s also possible to turn it into a stage play, a one act. I have a friend who did that. You can do, you can stage it in your backyard and see how it reads like there’s… 

Kathi (22:49.927) 

Yeah. 

Kathi (22:59.277) 

Yeah, it’s amazing what you know the journey it can go a million different directions I also wanted to say I follow a great guy on tik-tok And i’ll put his link here because i’m sure he’s on instagram as well in case tik-tok goes away um michael jamon writer um, so He’s written on a bunch of sitcoms and things like that and he’s produced plays and I just find him

Grace (23:06.155) 

Yeah. 

Grace (23:19.755) 

Okay. 

Kathi (23:27.865) 

His journey is fascinating. Why I started watching him was because he would gather up all of his royalty checks and open them on screen. And yeah, some of them were 27 cents. So, you know, it’s like, okay, that’s the reality there. 

Grace (23:38.91) 

Yeah. 

Grace (23:43.41) 

We got yes and I know you’re talking about that too which I think is great. You’re talking about making money as a writer. We just I just saw in my Facebook memories we got our green envelope when you’re in the guild your they’re not right there. Oh the name your residuals come in a green envelope and we got our first green envelope last year and it was super exciting to get. The funny thing was it wasn’t about the dollar amount because the dollar amount was small.

Kathi (23:48.333) 

Mm-hmm. Yeah.

Kathi (24:00.442) 

Residuals? 

Yeah. 

Kathi (24:12.296) 

No. 

Grace (24:14.684) 

It was about the green envelope represented years of effort and dedication and tunnel, not tunnel vision, but like persistence. And like we were saying before we were talking, like your credit and your residuals, like no one can take that from you. Those are permanent things.   

Kathi (24:28.166) 

Yeah. 

Grace (24:39.154) 

as a writer, you know, you’re not going to put that in your bio, like, hey, I get residuals or hey, I have a credit on a two year old movie now, like, you know, out here, it’s like, Oh, what else are you working on? You know, like, what’s next? And it’s like, Oh, my God, I’m still like, not that I am, but like, 

Kathi (24:40.945) 

Yeah. 

Kathi (24:52.226) 

It shows… 

Kathi (25:01.217) 

Money is not the only value of work, but it is one of the values of work.

Grace (25:06.27) 

It is, and it’s a real factor. We live in a capitalist economy where money buys us things and like Tanya likes to say, pays the grocery bill. Like you have to figure it out, but there’s also a lot of ways now to figure that out that weren’t accessible back then. And when I was coming up, you had a corporate job or you worked like…

Kathi (25:16.264) 

Right? 

Kathi (25:25.678) 

It’s so true. 

Grace (25:33.586) 

like you know you just worked on like non-corporate job like that was it like you had like kind of two choices now there’s a gig economy there’s side jobs corporations like when i was in corporate you couldn’t work on the weekends Like that would have been perceived as being like not cool. Like to have a side gig would have violated like all kinds of like now it’s just a given. Like everybody’s home creating. Everybody’s home collecting their extra paychecks through whatever. So, you know, Jim and I again, if you talk to Jim, he’d have a different story. But I say find. 

Kathi (25:49.35) 

Right. 

Kathi (25:53.273) 

Yeah. 

Kathi (25:59.662) 

It, yeah. 

Grace (26:14.642) 

My work is my stability and my independence. I am very proud of my full-time job that I have, and I love, love that it allows me to write. That is the balance. 

Kathi (26:20.561) 

Yeah. 

Kathi (26:27.289) 

Yes. I, you know, I earn money so I can write. I mean, that’s, that’s really what it is. I coach so I can write. I podcast so I can write, because those are all income streams. And writing is probably my least lucrative income stream. But I love what I put into the world. And I love what you put into the world. You know, it’s just amazing. 

Grace (26:33.354) 

Yeah. 

Grace (26:37.503) 

Yeah. 

Grace (26:47.37) 

Yeah. And as, and as we’ve discussed, it’s a, it’s a hard, that’s a, it’s a hard topic to talk about because there are 

Kathi (26:57.626) 

Yeah. 

Grace (27:01.83) 

we can get into that. Screenwriting is a long haul. It’s a long haul. I’ve been asking myself this over and over again. Why do it? There’s so many easier ways for me to write and put work out in the world. Why? Why coming? I love movies. I absolutely love movies. I love what they do. I love personally that they’re contained into two hours. We’re watching now. We’re watching Man Hunt about 

Kathi (27:08.167) 

Bye. 

Kathi (27:18.671) 

Yeah. 

Kathi (27:22.91) 

Yeah. 

Kathi (27:29.17) 

Right. 

Grace (27:32.124) 

John Wilkes Booth and Abe Link. 

Kathi (27:32.261) 

Uh huh. Yeah. 

Grace (27:34.926) 

I can’t like if Jim did not turn the TV off like I would be I would binge that whole series because I am so hooked and I love that movies have a time like a time stamp on them like okay it’s an hour and a half and I’m walking out satisfied. Like there’s no cliffhangers at the end of it might be there might be a tease to a sequel but you it’s an entire arc in a 90 minute or 100 or 90 100 120 minute period. 

Kathi (27:40.826) 

Right? 

Kathi (27:46.661) 

Yes.

Kathi (27:56.239) 

Right.

Grace (28:04.88) 

Oppenheimer or something, that’s three hour investment, but you know he can do that. I love that I can experience them, digest them, and put them away. To me that’s magic. 

Kathi (28:06.813) 

Hahaha 

Kathi (28:18.309) 

Yeah, and you’ve entered into a new world for a couple of hours. You’ve gotten invested with these people, but you get to also have a close to that, usually a very satisfying close. I love this. Guys, it’s called Diamond in the Rough with screenwriter Grace Church. I’m so incredibly proud of you. This is so amazing. 

Grace (28:31.018) 

Yeah. 

Kathi (28:48.466) 

What are you working on right? You said that you’re working on something right now. Can you just tell us just a little bit about it? 

Grace (28:54.314) 

Yeah, no, we’ve actually worked on several projects since then. Right now, we’re working on a holiday. So we had this idea. It’s an old idea that we kind of dug out. It’s basically a holiday movie, but it’s a heist, right? So yeah, and it’s a lot of it’s supposed to be fun. However, what I’m learning is because I don’t work in crime so much. Heists are tricky. They’re hard to write. 

Kathi (29:11.282) 

Oh, fun!

Yeah. 

Kathi (29:20.252) 

Yeah. 

Grace (29:24.208) 

great appreciation for anyone who’s writing, any kind of crime. I don’t have a criminal mind. So as I’m writing it, I’m like, oh, why would they do this? Like, they’re just going to get caught. And Jim’s like, that’s the point. 

Kathi (29:40.541) 

That’s the point, baby! 

Grace (29:41.27) 

But yeah, so I’m stretching and we got stuck on the nemesis. We have a nemesis that was not clearly defined and that was hanging up the whole process. And I had to sit in that for a long time and figure out what’s wrong with this part of the project. It took some dissecting and it’s very painful to wait for that to clear up. 

Kathi (30:08.185) 

Yeah, yeah. 

Grace (30:08.874) 

because you feel like time is ticking and the project’s getting stale under you, like it’s getting stale. And meanwhile, we’ve had three or four ideas past that were like, oh, the new idea is so easy. It’s so much going to be so much easier. They never are. We already know this. They write themselves. Yes. So it’s that persistence of staying. In this, while we.

Kathi (30:21.949) 

Starting is so easy, right? It’s the messy middle that gets us.

Grace (30:35.242) 

while we work this out has been really and just even in our partnership, Jim and I write together and it’s we’re not always at the same speed and it can cause like a little friction. 

Kathi (30:43.474) 

Yeah. 

Grace (30:45.302) 

but we’re working steadily on it and hopefully, but we’ve done others since then during the pandemic. I wrote, we wrote like, we just were trying to write different things. So we probably wrote at least two scripts since then, since Diamond, maybe three, and a lot of one, you know, three page kind of outlines. We outlined first, this is what I would tell anybody before that, you talked about education before. 

Kathi (31:07.558) 

Yeah. 

Grace (31:13.586) 

If anyone is not familiar with screenplay formats are very specific and very technical. It’s like a blueprint. You don’t just draw it out. You don’t do it on Canva. There’s rules to the formatting. Before you even get to that, Save the Cat is a book about screenwriting. It has very, very clear direction on what elements you need to have. 

Kathi (31:18.121) 

Yeah. 

Kathi (31:22.054) 

Yeah. 

Kathi (31:35.049) 

It’s such a great book. 

Grace (31:41.466) 

work your outline first. Get it? If you can’t tell the story, this is the idea of the log line, if you can’t tell the story in three sentences, 90 pages is not going to solve it. So the more is not better in screenplay format. Less is more. There’s a lot of white space. There’s a lot less thinking, a lot more action, which is the opposite for books. 

Kathi (31:52.751) 

Yeah. 

Kathi (32:04.472) 

Yeah. 

Grace (32:08.086) 

So what we do is we literally do what we call a one to 40 outline, which is 40 scenes divided in nice square portions. And we outline our opening act, the messy middle, which is really the beginning of the messy middle, and then after the messy middle, like there’s that dividing point in a movie where things are totally changed. And then the end, which a lot of people will know the beginning and the end, but it’s that middle part. 

Kathi (32:26.15) 

Yeah. 

Grace (32:37.014) 

that journey part that is the hardest and it’s really the third of the four elements for me. It’s always okay after we have all this fun and games and like we get the fun part of what happens before the ending. And those are the hardest parts for me of the screenplay. Everybody has their own spot, but that’s for me like really tricky. So we try to not commit to draft. Jim is always very excited to go to draft what we call going to draft, which is actually character, intro, like where you’re starting to type dialogue. He has a very vivid imagination, so he works really well there. We really try to make sure he has a very clear outline 

Kathi (32:53.659) 

Yeah. 

Kathi (33:11.983) 

Yeah. 

Grace (33:20.208) 

we go to draft. And I would recommend that to anybody because it is heartbreaking when you get to page 75 and it’s not coming together and you’re like, oh no, like it’s really, it’s really hard. So. 

Kathi (33:22.959) 

Hmm. 

Kathi (33:34.639) 

Yeah. 

Well, they say if you have a third act problem, you have a first act problem. And to have to go back and redo all of that is heartbreaking, yeah. 

Grace (33:40.85) 

Yeah, it’s true. Yeah, because the third act is the answer to the central question raised in the first act, which is what happens if the character doesn’t achieve this? What is so in our age, everyone talked about the Top Gun trophy, right? 

Kathi (33:52.169) 

Yeah.  

Kathi (34:01.933) 

Right. Yeah. 

Grace (34:02.942) 

The Top Gun trophy is the visual there is no Top Gun trophy in the Top Gun program because they don’t want them competing They’re supposed to be working together, right? But for the movie, uh the original the original movie, um How will we know that Tom? 

Kathi (34:07.273) 

All right. Okay, yeah.  

Right. 

Grace (34:21.326) 

Cruz, how will we know that he’s achieved, in his case, he did not get the trophy? How will we know that he achieved his goal? He will hold the trophy, right? So in that case, he did not get a lot of people already. If you haven’t seen the movie, I’m sorry, it’s like a thousand years old, but you had your opportunity. He doesn’t get the trophy. He actually leaves the program. Yeah, but that’s his… 

Kathi (34:39.089) 

No, you know what, it’s been out what, 30 years? Like, it’s okay to spoil it. 

Right. 

Grace (34:49.166) 

how we know that he’s achieved his identity, he works through his identity crisis is that he leaves the program, he doesn’t need the trophy, he needed something else. So, but that’s where we start is he wants to be in Top Gun, right? He wants to be Top Gun and he doesn’t get to be Top Gun and what does that mean for Maverick? He’s a better person. Yeah, so. 

Kathi (34:57.274) 

Yeah. 

Kathi (35:05.) 

Yeah. 

Kathi (35:09.905) 

Yeah, he’s a better person. And that’s what we want for our main characters, at least the ones we’re rooting for. And so we wanna see that journey for them. We wanna see that growth that isn’t present in that first act. And that happens in Diamond in the Rub. So if you’re looking for to see what the structure looks like, what it all, how to make it all pan out, this is a great guide to go for. 

Grace (35:22.731) 

Yeah. 

Grace (35:38.399) 

It is. 

Kathi (35:38.529) 

and you’ll recognize a lot of people in this movie. You’ll be like, oh well that guy was in, what is it, news, not newscaster, what’s the one with Will Ferrell? Oh I can’t remember where, he’s a newscaster. Anyway, one of the guys from the club is there, you recognize people from Schitt’s Creek, you know, it’s really, really fun. You recognize the country club manager, like you, 

Grace (35:50.318) 

Oh no. Yeah, yeah, yeah. 

Grace (36:04.558) 

Anchor, Anchorman, it took me a minute. I’m not at the end of my coffee. Yeah, David Keckner. Yeah, we got really lucky on casting. I’m one of the direct, there’s so much, there’s so many facets to talk about. And trust me, none of this was in our mind. We had one actress in mind who’s not in the movie that we modeled the main character, our original main character on. You can’t see as a  

Kathi (36:07.913) 

it yes he’s an anchorman he’s hli yeah 

Kathi (36:25.309) 

Mm-hmm. Right.  

Grace (36:34.874) 

Um, I mean… 

Kathi (36:35.047) 

Yeah. 

Grace (36:39.274) 

This is part of the screenwriting process, why it’s so beautiful and so maddening at the same time. You have no idea where, how long something is going to take, or who’s going to be in it. We had a casting change a week before the movie was scheduled to shoot. That threatened to, it could have shut the whole, like, we could have gotten that far to what they call principal photography. 

Kathi (36:49.353) 

Great.  

Kathi (37:00.178) 

Wow. 

Grace (37:09.728) 

could have fallen apart. We had Samantha Boscarino who plays the lead step in Jeanette Godoy our director there’s so many YouTube videos where she talks about how fast how amazing Samantha Boscarino was swooping in. She’s in almost I think she is in every scene in the movie. She nailed it like just she became this person and 

Kathi (37:36.521) 

That’s amazing. 

Grace (37:37.686) 

movie it wouldn’t be the movie it is without her and that was a last like we couldn’t have predicted that like yeah so many 

Kathi (37:40.241) 

Right. Yeah. 

Right, no. You don’t know who’s gonna be available, who’s gonna be, yeah, all that kind of stuff. Well, it’s so delightful and so much fun and I would call it a romp. It’s just, it’s that kind of fun, fun movie. So guys, it’s on Peacock right now so you can check it out there. And Grace, thank you so much for being here today. 

Grace (37:49.274) 

Yeah, there are wild stories. 

Grace (37:57.472) 

It is. 

Grace (38:08.898) 

Thanks for having me. I could talk all day about it. Thank you so much. Yeah, it’s 

Kathi (38:11.305) 

I this is so much fun and so interesting and aside we don’t get to see very often. So thank you for sharing with us. This has been tremendous and friends. Thank you for being here with us. You’ve been listening to the writing at the Red House podcast. I’m Kathy Lyft. Now go tell your only you now go tell your only God story to a world that needs it. 

Kathi (00:01.943)
Well, hey friends, welcome to the Writing of the Red House podcast, where we gather at the table to break bread and tell tales with some of our favorite writers and creators who share their wisdom to help us all share our story. And I am back with two of my partners in crime. First, it’s Roger Lipp, who is an

AI, we’ve decided AI craftsman, because I know that there are people who are working in AI, who know more than Roger, but when it comes to publishing and creating, Roger’s in the trenches and he’s making it happen and is super smart and just a great person to have on here. Welcome back, Roger.

Roger (00:55.563)
Thank you. I think I’ll have to have business cards made. Roger Lipp, AI craftsman. Yeah, yeah, could be good.

Kathi (00:58.331)
I know, right? I love that. AI is your tool and you’re creating beautiful things. And back with me is my agent extraordinaire. She’s with a live agency. It’s Kathleen Kerr. Kathleen, welcome back to the podcast.

Kathleen (01:15.606)
Thanks so much for having me again.

Kathi (01:17.747)
You know, this is going to be a regular discussion here on this podcast, because AI is not going away. And I’m personally very grateful for that. I use AI not just in my business life, but in my everyday life. I’ve been known to go to my refrigerator, look at the ingredients in there and ask AI to say, what am I having for dinner? And it is, it’s a beautiful thing. I’m not going to lie. It’s a beautiful thing.

Because here’s what I will say. I wrote a book several years ago with my friend Sherri Gregory, Overwhelmed. And because I feel like the number of decisions I am required to make every single day has grown exponentially. And I’m not gonna say that my life is harder than Laura Ingalls because it’s not. My life is much easier. But I will say it’s more complicated.

And, you know, she didn’t have to decide what she was going to have for dinner because whatever was there was dinner or Pa had to go kill it. So, you know their decisions were taken care of from her and How I like to use AI is to help me make decisions I am I still make a thousand decisions every single day But we’ve used AI from everything from what’s for dinner to how to plant our garden to writing cover letters

to, Roger, I can’t even think, but we’ve used it for a thousand different things. Yes, yes. And so, for these things that do not require my creativity, that do not require my internal intelligence, I mean, that’s probably a bad way of saying it, that are not.

Roger (02:50.455)
Developing training packages for our team. Yeah.

Kathi (03:14.527)
something I sign my name to, let me put it that way. They’re not the book, they’re not the article, they’re not the devotion, they’re not the blog. I use AI for almost all of it. And so I wanna talk to you guys today because you are both using AI every day as well. How are you using it? And if you didn’t hear our discussion about how we are putting bumpers around the efficacy,

of how we’re using AI. Go back and listen to the last podcast because I feel like we’ve come up with some pretty simple but pretty profound ways of saying, this is what we’ll do and what we won’t do. But I want to hear from you guys, if somebody is just dipping their toe into the AI pool, Kathleen, as an agent, what would you expect to see from your client and what would you not expect to see?

And then I want to talk a little bit about what tools we’re using, because Kathleen’s using different tools than Roger and I are, and I want to hear all about that. So somebody’s just starting out, and they’re an author, they’re working on their book. How would you see an author that you are representing using AI ethically?

Kathleen (04:32.934)
So can I first say unethically? What would concern me? And I would say this conversation used to be when I saw a writing sample, I can tell right away if you lifted it from Wikipedia. I can tell right away your voice changes. And I am trained to recognize an author’s voice, to recognize the semantic patterns of what is going into your writing. And I can tell. And if you present one way in our conversations,

Kathi (04:35.219)
Okay, yes, please!

Kathi (04:45.951)
Mm-hmm. Yeah.

Kathleen (05:00.094)
and then I’m seeing a writing sample that’s clearly AI generated, I will know. Another editor will know. That would be an unethical use if it’s just writing that you are passing off as your own. Cathy, I thought it was so interesting the way that you said for the, those everyday decisions, just to prevent decision fatigue, things that require your decision making, but not necessarily your creativity. I actually. Yes. Yeah.

Kathi (05:05.699)
Mm-hmm. Right.

Kathi (05:25.271)
That’s what I was trying to say, thank you.

Kathleen (05:28.25)
So for my work, actually, sometimes I use it the opposite way. So I mean, full disclosure, I work remotely. I do not have a team that is sitting in an office right next to me. I am not constantly, I mean, I’m in conversation with everyone all the time. We have those tools. But a lot of my work that requires a lot of creativity is me sitting in front of a piece of paper sometimes. Or it’s me going to a coffee shop and just trying to brainstorm a bunch of titles. Or if I’m working on a book proposal.

Kathi (05:33.527)
Mm-hmm.

Kathleen (05:58.386)
and saying, OK, what is the kind of that sticky statement that I really want to have called out? Or what is the key benefit? What’s the felt need? I can try to craft those myself. And I will craft those myself. What I have found to be so helpful and such a big time saver is going to ChatGPT. You’re going to Jasper. Those are the tools that I use. And just punching in, like, here’s an overview of the book.

Here is what I think the book is about. AI, give me something to play with. Get the brainstorm started so that I can manipulate it from there. There was a book I was working on recently and some of the material it came up with when I asked it to generate titles was terrible. It was a book that was a lot about how Christianity looks so much like performance and behavior in religion and how can we get rid of that?

So I wanted to call the book, Kicking Off Your Goodie Two Shoes. And the author didn’t like that. She thought it was too old fashioned. I thought it was hilarious. It’s open for anyone who wants it. So I went to chat GPT and I was like, okay, I want a funny title. This is about what it is. And it just took, I want funny. And it gave me jesting with Jesus and giggles with God. And I was like, okay.

Kathi (06:59.299)
Okay.

Kathi (07:02.571)
Mm-hmm.

Kathleen (07:21.886)
OK, that’s not exactly what I was looking for, but now I know what I’m not looking for. And I was able to further refine it from there, and that’s where that Craftsman tool comes in. And it can just do that initial brainstorm for me. Sometimes repeated phrases will come up. I’ve never taken a title or a statement directly from AI, but I let it just do that initial content generation so that I can use my creativity and intelligence from there. And that’s been super, super helpful. I think generating a proposal.

Kathi (07:26.256)
Right?

Kathi (07:39.483)
No. Yeah.

Kathi (07:47.775)
Yes.

Kathleen (07:51.598)
for like, you know, a book proposal with the agent. That is the weirdest kind of writing anyone will ever do. It is self-congratulatory. It’s a marketing piece. It’s not, you know, the novel. It’s not the memoir. It’s here’s how I’ll help people and how I can save the world through my book and how it’s going to sell a billion copies. It’s not like anything else you’ve been trained to do. So let something that’s been trained to do it, create that for you.

Kathi (07:58.099)
It’s so true. Yeah.

Kathi (08:08.162)
Right.

Kathi (08:16.703)
It’s so true that there are so many aspects to this business that require the plotting. You know, we’re just plotting along, creating that sales page, creating that.

website landing page, creating a social media plan, all these things. There’s a multitude of things that are required to do what we do. And if AI can help me do some of that. I feel like I get no gold stars from…

creating that from scratch. In fact, one of the things I do is I have people who reach out to me with very complex and hard issues. And I use AI to draft a response back.

because oftentimes those letters would sit in my inbox for months because I didn’t know what to say. And AI, I never send the AI generated letter, but man, I use it. I say, I wanna give a thoughtful, careful response. Here are a couple of suggestions I could make. Can you help me craft a response to Abigail? And it will come up.

And the more adjectives I use about, I want to be compassionate, but encouraging, thoughtful, and it will do such a good job. And I can go in there and rewrite it in my voice and take out things that aren’t maybe as helpful and add a few more things. But it gets me to do that work and the soul work.

Kathi (10:15.859)
that I wouldn’t have been able to do otherwise. Roger, how do you see the best uses for people who are just dipping their toe into AI for authors? Because even though I would not call you an author necessarily, you have co-authored a book with me, but you are a part of our day-to-day business here. And so if somebody’s just getting started, how would you suggest that they use AI?

Roger (10:39.36)
Yeah.

Roger (10:46.347)
So I think the very first toe dip is the same one that you and I did about a year ago. When we first discovered ChatGPT, we kind of thought, wow, this is something interesting that we need to understand. And we established an internal challenge with each other that we were going to force ourselves.

to use AI every day. We were going to interact with ChatGPT every day just so that we could start to understand what it could and could not do, and how best to interact and use this tool. I think that’s a great place to start. No objectives. Just use it every day for something. Go up to it and try it. Beyond that.

I think there’s a lot of amazing use cases for AI that authors really should be aware of. We’re using a tool now called Claude, Claude.ai. The reason I like Claude is that it can take large, large amounts of data, like an entire manuscript, and understand it from beginning to end.

and the thread that goes through it. It’s the only AI out there that can do that. Well, maybe Gemini from Google. And.

We’ve been able to use that for things like editorial. Could you help me edit this and find issues, including, and I’m sorry, I’m losing the word. The kind of editing where it’s looking for the thread, the plot points, you may have missed something here. That’s, oh man, yes, yes. It is.

Kathi (12:36.043)
global edit or

Kathleen (12:46.422)
The substantive edit.

Kathi (12:47.991)
A substantive edit, a global edit, yeah that’s fine.

Roger (12:50.919)
It is able to do those kinds of tasks as well. And I think that is a tremendous tool for authors to be aware of, because we’re always looking for an editor. And to have one that’s, um, at least that first edit. That’s, that’s super valuable.

Kathi (13:07.667)
Yeah, so like when I edit, I send it through ChatGPT, or you know, actually we use Claude now, first, and then I will send it to my human editor, and she says, you’re turning in much cleaner stuff these days, I’m like, thank you Claude, I’m becoming impressive. And I have to, I do both of those things because, and let me just say this, I think that this is really important for people who are very resistant to this.

something that if you’ve listened to this podcast for any amount of time, you may know I’m severely dyslexic. So of course I went into writing because that makes sense. But what this does, this is such an incredible tool for somebody who has my challenge. Because I miss things. I read things into manuscripts that are not there.

I leave things, I put things in there that shouldn’t be in there. And this really helps me. So Roger, for us, you feel like Claude has been the best tool.

Roger (14:15.575)
So let me just make the case for Claude. Claude has been designed from the beginning to be the more ethical choice in the AI space. Claude has never trained on your data that you’re interacting with it. So if you give it your manuscript, Claude doesn’t now train on your manuscript. The other AIs, ChatGPT,

can’t that feature can be turned on but it isn’t on by default and if you turn it on you give up other features so Claude doesn’t have that trade-off it’s just been that way from the beginning and this huge context what’s called context size how much information can it read at once and retain

It’s very much like a retention of a human reader. How much of the book can you retain at once? Cloud can retain the whole thing at once. And ChatGPT can’t do that. So between those two things, we’ve changed from ChatGPT over to Cloud. I think that’s a really good AI for authors for that reason.

Kathi (15:36.232)
No. Okay. But Kathleen, you use something different and you have different reasons for using it. So we want to hear about that.

Kathleen (15:42.362)
Mm-hmm. So you guys, I think, have delved further into all of this. I haven’t used Cloud before. I’m excited to try it out based on this recommendation, Roger. So my company uses Jasper, and we’ve also used some chat GPT as well. I use them for different things. If I’m just, I need some titles generated, I’ll probably go to chat GPT first to see what it grabs me. I have found Jasper to be a little bit more nuanced. It’s a little bit better at taking my direction.

for that. So for that, I would do, I’m going to give a sample chapter and let’s see that first edit. Or the sample chapter has come through and it reads young. Maybe it’s someone who has just been kind of trained herself on social media, and that’s who she’s written for. She’s written these maybe 200 word captions at most. Now she has to write a whole chapter. It’s hard. It’s hard to get that thread.

and maybe the whole chapter sounds like a social media voice, and I want to class it up a little bit. Jasper is great at just doing it. That is work I can do very easily as an editor. Many editors can do that. It takes time. It takes a lot of careful thinking. And if we can just have that first one done, it saves hours. It just saves absolute hours. And then what can you do with that?

Kathi (17:02.519)
Who is Jasper produced by? Is that Google or do we know? Okay, I was just curious if that was one of the main ones. Yeah, so I will, go ahead.

Kathleen (17:07.196)
I don’t know.

Roger (17:13.579)
No, isn’t Jasper one that gives an aggregator, it’s pulling together a number of different AIs? Or am I getting that confused? Anyway, sorry.

Kathi (17:26.911)
Well, you know what?

Kathleen (17:27.378)
I trust you, Roger, if you think that’s… Roger, you are very much the tech guru. I am the late adopter. I am, I do what’s given to me. I don’t look behind the curtain.

Roger (17:29.724)
I have well.

Kathi (17:33.28)
Hahaha

Kathi (17:37.339)
You know what, but Kathleen, I have to say for a late adopter, you’re pretty far out in front of this compared to a lot of people that we’re talking to. I’m

Kathleen (17:45.258)
Kathy, I’m just gonna hold on to that compliment deep inside, thank you.

Kathi (17:48.563)
Absolutely. And you know what? I’m going to make a little go ahead, Raj.

Roger (17:50.583)
So.

So Jasper, I just had to do a quick look up. It is a purpose-built AI. So it is probably, it hasn’t declared what they’re using behind, but it is designed specifically to help authors. So it is a more purpose-built AI.

Kathi (17:55.873)
Yes.

Kathi (18:07.103)
Oh!

Okay, I’m gonna find out more about this.

Kathleen (18:12.462)
Can I just throw in an encouragement to authors to check all these out? Check out ChatGPT, check out Jasper, check out Claude, check out all of these different options. The machines will not come to your home and take over your world if you just give it a try. Maybe you’re looking for a title. Maybe you just, the concept of writing a summary, like writing a two-sentence summary of your book is overwhelming. How do you put everything into this? Just give it a try, see what it spits out.

Kathi (18:18.421)
Yes.

Kathi (18:27.999)
No. Yeah.

Kathi (18:42.719)
And I love that you give us that permission as an agent, because I think people, and I understand, they don’t wanna be cheating. I get it, I don’t want you to cheat either. But it’s really interesting. We’ve had a number of people come to us and say, I don’t think it’s ethical. And they sit down for a 10 minute conversation, and they’re like, oh, I didn’t know that. One of my best friends, New York Times bestseller, over and over again.

And she’s like, I don’t know, because she’s been hanging out in forums talking about this with other authors. And there’s a lot of misinformation out there. There’s a lot of true information, but there’s a lot of misinformation. And so let’s just have a rational discussion. And guys, if you are like, I don’t know about this, I think you guys are all evil for trying it. Hey, send us a message at info at kathylipp.org. And…

Let’s talk about it because we’re going to continue this conversation on this podcast Uh for a long time because we have a lot to learn and i’m just going to make one last recommendation If this is something that you are interested in finding out more about if you like this kind of discussion Uh, there is a great podcast called hard fork. It’s from the new york times And um, the two hosts are hilarious. It’s a very entertaining read

Um, or listen, uh, Roger and I listened to it every week as we’re driving into town and it’s just once a week, but they They talk about A lot of these things and I think you’ll find it really entertaining and really informative Kathleen and Roger. Thank you so much for this time. This has been such a great discussion and i’m excited to try jasper now like i’m When we get off this podcast, that’s going to be my next thing. So super excited

Thanks for being here guys

Kathleen (20:41.57)
Thanks for having us, Kathy.

Roger (20:42.967)
Thank you.

Kathi (20:43.419)
Absolutely anytime. We’re just gonna have you back that we’re gonna I think this is a good threesome to be talking about these things so I’ve just committed Kathleen because She’s my agent and I get to do things like that Outstand and Roger you have no choice literally you have no choice Because if you want dinner tonight, yeah Created by Kathy or the AI. Oh friends. You’ve been listening to the writing at the Red House podcast. I’m Kathy lip

Kathleen (20:56.59)
outstanding. I’m here for it.

Kathi (21:13.279)
Now, go tell your only you story of God’s extravagant love.

Kathi (00:02.275)
Well, hey friends, welcome to the Writing at the Red House podcast where we gather at the table to break bread and tell tales with some of our favorite writers and creators who share their wisdom to help us all tell our stories. And I’m very excited. I don’t think I’ve ever had two guests. No, that’s not true. I have had two guests and one of them was Roger. Okay, nevermind, nevermind.

But this is still exciting. It’s been years and years since I’ve had two guests on the podcast at the same time. Now, one of them is just in the other room. It is Roger Lipp. Roger is our tech guru for everything. And I think he would push back against this title, but I’m just gonna say it. An AI, if not an expert, let’s say craftsman. So craftsman with AI, yes. And then also,

Roger (01:04.838)
Craftsman. Oh, wow. Okay. Yeah, let’s go with that. Sure.

Kathi (01:10.839)
I have my agent and one of my favorite human beings, Kathleen Kerr with a live agency. Hey Kathleen.

Kathleen (01:18.114)
Thank you so much for having me, Cathy.

Kathi (01:19.835)
Oh my goodness. I, okay, so I am so excited about this conversation. And by the way, Roger, I was not the one who suggested it, Kathleen did. And I know, right? So what we’re gonna be talking about today is an agent’s perspective on AI. And so Kathleen, my first question is, how are you using AI? Because I always, I enter these conversations with fear and trembling. Because…

Roger (01:28.036)
Oh, wow.

Kathi (01:49.311)
There are some people who are very excited about the potential of AI in publishing, and other people who think it’s a tool of the devil. So, yes, please.

Kathleen (02:00.53)
Right. OK, so I am in full disclosure. If you go into my social media analytics and what Google knows about me, I am officially tagged as a late adopter of everything. In fact, this is a true story from 2016 or so. 2016, 2017, somewhere in there. I was working late at night, and I just had my Spotify playlist going on. And it was generating new music for me, and I was just kind of listening in the background.

Kathi (02:12.72)
Oh! Really?

Kathi (02:19.106)
Okay?

Kathleen (02:29.954)
Kathy, I heard this voice, this voice. And I was like, what is that? What am I hearing? And it was Beyonce. So I learned about Beyonce in like, recently, like eight years ago. Yeah. Did you know? Oh my gosh, she’s amazing. And then it was like, yeah, everyone else, the rest, the other 8 billion people were there, but I’m a late adopter. So that gives context, I hope, my initial fear and trembling is about AI.

Kathi (02:42.477)
Wow, okay.

Kathi (02:54.151)
Yes. Okay.

Kathleen (02:59.062)
which were the machines are coming. They’re coming for us. They’re going to displace us. My brain is so much more extraordinary, but people don’t appreciate the value of the brain. That was where I was. And then I tried it. And then I realized how for the last 25 years of my life, I have been using my computer like a typewriter. That’s it. That I have not been exploiting any of its potential.

Kathi (02:59.431)
Right. Yes, yes.

Kathi (03:11.231)
Yeah.

Kathi (03:23.123)
Mm.

Kathleen (03:26.398)
And I spend so much time just trying to generate, what are some good title options that I can present to publishers? What are some really strong key selling points? I’ve got this sample chapter. How do I show the publisher where it fits into an outline? I need to help the writer create the outline. Cathy, you and I have done a lot of this work. We have just brainstormed. Yeah, just throw all the noodles at the wall. Throw.

Kathi (03:50.253)
A ton of this, yes.

Kathleen (03:55.258)
everything up on the whiteboard and then see how we can organize it. You and I have spent days, literal days doing that. And it’s… Yes, it’s good work, it’s fun work. AI just does it for me. It just does it. It gets that done in minutes what has taken me hours. So for me, it’s a lot of those titles, it’s key selling points. It can give me that initial, here’s what the outline could look like.

Kathi (04:01.671)
Yes, you have spent the night at my house doing this stuff.

Kathi (04:09.619)
Right. Yeah.

Kathi (04:24.447)
Mm-hmm.

Kathleen (04:24.482)
Can you group these ideas around a common theme? And what can I do with that then? What can I do with the time that I get back? That for me is the massive win. For me, it’s, I can, I can.

Kathi (04:30.505)
Yeah.

Kathi (04:35.964)
It’s so true, right? Because we are out here, just we are working so hard to do not just the creative work, but the business work of selling these books. There are multiple things. Okay, Kathleen has balloons flying up her screen and we’re trying to keep straight faces and it’s not working.

Roger (05:01.434)
The AI has taken over there. It was very excited. Yes, that’s right.

Kathi (05:03.735)
It has, but it likes you Kathleen, so that’s good. The robots are fans. So Roger, I wanna talk about, excuse me. I wanna talk about this from a creator’s perspective as well because you and I have tried to come up with our guidelines for using AI in our business, in our writing, those kind of things. So I would love for you to talk a little bit about that.

and for Kathleen to listen and say, no, you guys should go to jail, or we’re kind of aligned. So I would love to hear your thoughts on, like where we’re, as an organization, where we’re going with AI.

Kathleen (05:38.51)
I’m out.

Roger (05:38.894)
Please don’t say that. All right.

Roger (05:49.326)
Yeah, you know, we’ve had to think long and hard about this. I’d say we were more early adopters for AI. And we’ve had to think through the question of, okay, how can we use AI to take us individually from one level of competence to another level of competence? You know, how can we use AI as a tool to enhance what we are able to do?

both individually and as an organization, because there’s a lot of potential here. When it first came out, we were all doing the party tricks with AI, talk like a pirate, any of those kinds of things. It was real fun, but it was very clear that this tool had the potential to enhance our productivity and enhance the way we do business. We wanted to leverage that.

Kathi (06:33.941)
Right

Roger (06:49.262)
But at the same time, we wanted to do that responsibly and ethically. And we’ve come up with a very small set of guidelines for us and our team on what that means. And the first and foremost thing is that we’re not going to use AI to misrepresent who’s talking to you. So if, if we’re generating AI content,

and we’re asking it to write in the voice of somebody else, we’re not going to present that as if it were written by somebody else, that other person. We’re not gonna lie to our customers, to our readers. And that was kind of the first bar that we had to pass, that we’re not going to misrepresent. But we are going to use AI as a research assistant, we’re going to use AI.

to help generate titles, we’re gonna use AI to help generate promotional content. That takes me to my second point though. We’re also always gonna keep the human in the loop. And that’s one of the terms that you’ll hear thrown out in the AI community, the human in the loop. And what that really means is that anything that AI is generating, a person is going to touch after that AI has generated it to edit it.

to make sure it’s right and to make sure it’s really on brand with what we’re trying to say. So I think those are the two really important things that we’re keeping in mind as we’re trying to use AI ethically. We’re not going to misrepresent, and we’re going to keep the human in the…

Kathi (08:31.683)
Yeah, we’ve said we want AI to assist, not replace. And that’s just kind of the basic thing we’ve talked about. So Kathleen, I’m curious, you’re in rooms with agents and publishers and people who are having these conversations. Can you tell us, can you spill all the secrets is basically what I’m asking. What are the fears? What is the excitement?

Roger (08:36.377)
Yeah.

Kathleen (08:54.222)
I’m going to go to bed.

Kathi (08:59.891)
what are the guidelines people are discussing, all of this. I mean, we’re creating, it’s almost, it feels like I lived in Silicon Valley when the internet was coming to be. And I was very young during those times, but I remember the excitement around it. And this very much reminds me of that. And so there’s excitement, there’s also fear, but there was also fear of, you know, I think about when automobiles, because we didn’t know how to,

maneuver all that. There was fear around the internet. And so there’s obviously, and justifiably some fear around AI. But I want to know what those rooms are talking about.

Kathleen (09:42.966)
What those rooms are talking about are what Roger just outlined. The fear is that people won’t use it ethically. So Roger, you just outlined here’s what AI is not for and here’s what it is for. Just you have those parameters, that box around how you intend to use this. And the concern, and when I say concern, I mean, this is now at the highest levels of the courts being litigated, is when people are not using it ethically.

Kathi (09:49.972)
Mm-hmm.

Kathi (10:09.12)
Right.

Kathleen (10:12.806)
So the deepest concern for authors right now, and I’m talking for the biggest authors, some of the names that you would certainly have heard of, are litigating this with the AI companies because AI has been trained on other authors’ content. The New York Times is in this as well as individual authors. They’re saying that, and this is pretty clear from what I’ve been looking at.

Kathi (10:36.958)
Yeah.

Kathleen (10:38.426)
that content has been taken from these companies that is copyrighted, and then AI is really just mimicking what’s worked there. So that’s one big concern, that people could just, unethical people could just generate something that’s based on what has been stolen from an individual. The other fear, and this is what I’m starting to see in contracts, actually, is that people would.

And this would both be the author and the publisher, is that they would be leaning too hard on AI. This comes up in covers quite a bit. I’m starting to see stipulations in contracts that publishers will not use AI to generate a cover image, because that’s the same thing. The AI has been trained on other people’s copyrighted artwork and their individual pieces. So we’re seeing that all the time now, that in the publisher covenants that they will not steal other people’s artwork.

Kathi (11:09.184)
Mm-hmm.

Kathi (11:23.977)
Right.

Kathleen (11:32.906)
in a sense, to create this. But the excitement is very much in, Roger, you mentioned in the promotional stuff. You’re not going to misrepresent a voice, but that promotional language, that’s not really in anyone’s voice. That doesn’t purport to be in that. If you’re looking at the description on Amazon of what your book looks like, no one’s saying, I authored this. No one thinks that the author has put that together. That is hugely, hugely beneficial. If we can just use AI as a starting point.

Kathi (11:33.14)
Yeah.

Kathi (11:45.9)
Man.

Kathi (11:52.875)
Mm-hmm.

Kathleen (12:02.518)
but keep the human in the loop, as you say, then we have saved hours. I cannot, as someone who has written a great deal of that marketing copy, and it’s not necessarily my forte. There are people who really, really thrive there. It’s not simple to do, to say, how do we distill this concept with these key selling points down into this and make it SEO compliant, all of that. It’s really, how do we think like an algorithm instead of like a human to generate some of that copy?

Kathi (12:16.157)
Mm-hmm.

Kathleen (12:31.39)
AI can just get it done. And then you can look through it and say, does this match the tone? Are there adjustments and massages that we can make? But overall, it’s just saving an enormous amount of time. So there’s the legal and ethical concern, but also massive excitement about the time savings that this is and how this is just generating stronger copy that can get more books in front of more readers.

Kathi (12:54.131)
You know, it was interesting yesterday. I received an email from somebody who Wants to write books because she doesn’t have a lot of time and she needs to generate income and it’s and it’s a perspective that I’m like, okay, but it’s all the support things that go into that nobody thinks of and that is where I feel like

bring on the AI. As I’m creating an outline for a podcast, nobody’s ever going to see that outline. But still, I have to write and create that. The summary for this podcast, I need to create that, the titles for this podcast. So I write for encourage every month or every other month.

And so I write my article devotion, whatever you want to call it. But then I need to have support materially around that. What does my social media around that to promote that article? The script for my Instagram, my Instagram Reel, I need to come up with that script. For every word that I am writing in a book, I’m writing 10.

to support what I’m doing. And that is, it’s a lot. It’s a lot. And if AI can help me outline, produce, brainstorm all that support material, bring it on. I could, and this is, I’m not trading it for watching TV. I’m trading that time for sleep. Like that’s how I feel.

Kathleen (14:49.696)
Yes.

Kathi (14:51.651)
It is. Kathleen?

Kathleen (14:52.598)
You know, there is, there’s an old short story by Roald Dahl and I’m not gonna be able to grab the title off the top of my head, but it’s a terrifying story and it’s essentially about AI. He wrote it decades and decades ago, but there’s a machine that has been invented that can just generate content. And all of a sudden the great creators of the world have nothing to do and no one’s gonna pay for their stories anymore because they can just go to the machine.

Kathi (15:05.859)
Mm-hmm. Right.

Kathi (15:13.061)
Mm-hmm.

Kathleen (15:20.59)
for any kind of story content that’s being generated. And it ends on this really dystopian note, as there’s this guy who’s like, I am a writer. The person telling the story, this narrator, is saying, I’m a writer, this is what I have to do, but I have children to feed, and my writing cannot feed my children. And the last line is so chilling. It says, give us the grace, Lord, to let our children starve. He says, I want to continue this work. I have to continue writing, even as my children are starving to death.

because I can’t feed them on my income anymore, because no one’s looking for this. It’s so scary. And I’ve kind of had that in mind. And I think a lot of people have. I think that was a legitimate fear, like will this just take over? But honestly, I see this as a massive opportunity to free us up to do the creative work. So we were looking, and I’m not going to get the statistic exactly right, so I’m not going to give actual numbers. But I saw recently a statistic that said 18 months from now, end of 2025.

The majority of content that we see online will be AI generated. The majority of that writing will just be from AI, the vast majority. What then does that allow authors to do? How can we use that to our benefit? Well, a book, certainly an ethical person, I hope, and, you know, writers and publishers will be watching out for this. They’re not going, you can’t just generate a book and have that go to a reputable publisher.

Kathi (16:26.656)
Yeah.

Kathi (16:37.984)
Yeah.

Kathleen (16:48.886)
with that’s just generated that way without keeping the human really significantly in the loop. If you go to the internet maybe in early 2026 you can just assume that a computer created some of this, but if you go to a book you know that the human’s in the room, you know that you’re getting the actual voice, and that will be a real distinction of books. For a long time I think, you know, we’ve always been talking about the decline of the book over the last 15 years.

Kathi (16:53.475)
Mm-hmm.

Kathi (17:00.543)
Yes.

Kathleen (17:14.326)
And I think for so many reasons, that is because our need for story is met through the little screens in our hands. And we don’t need to go to a novel anymore because we can just start scrolling. But maybe this will be a real differentiation for books again. And we can see this is the author’s actual voice.

Kathi (17:21.42)
Yeah.

Roger (17:33.902)
And I wonder, Kathleen, if that’s going to be a differentiation for a traditionally published book even more so, because we’re already starting to see self-published books that are written entirely by AI. So even that is getting diluted. So this could put traditional publishing houses in a good advantage.

Kathleen (17:40.617)
Hmm.

Kathleen (17:49.069)
Yes.

Kathi (18:01.371)
Yeah, I mean, I think a lot of people see those ads that come up on Instagram. You know, I wrote my whole book by AI. I created the advertising by AI and now I’m making the money and I’m like, no, you’re not. No, you’re not. It’s that’s not. And by the way.

Kathleen (18:01.568)
Absolutely.

Roger (18:10.338)
Ha ha

Kathleen (18:15.508)
No.

Kathi (18:19.411)
I don’t want to read something by that. And I don’t want to write something like that. I mean, write, I’m putting that in heavy quotation marks. Because there are a lot easier ways to make money than the publishing industry. If that’s the only reason you’re in this, there are so many different side hustles that AI can help you with. Go do that. But this, you know, and people think, well, I could do that. I just saw the best video.

Kathleen (18:34.082)
No!

Kathi (18:48.683)
where somebody was going into an art museum and there’s a big black square. And they’re like, I could make that, I could make that. And then an artist gets on and stitches that video. Go do it, go do it. But we, as humans, we recognize the soul in something and we are sparked by soul. And AI, as wonderful as it is, and I’m gonna say Claude is very encouraging,

but there’s no soul. And our soul is looking for soul. I don’t, you know, that’s what we’re looking for. Okay, here’s what I wanna do guys, because this conversation is so important. I wanna stop for this week and I wanna come back. And I wanna talk about super practical ways that we as authors can use AI ethically and with,

How do I wanna say this? In ways that are of real help, but are ethical, and can push us towards freeing up time, freeing up brain space for that creativity. Will you guys come back and talk with me about that?

Kathleen (20:04.066)
Can’t wait.

Roger (20:04.303)
Sounds awesome.

Kathi (20:05.443)
Okay, friends, you’ve been listening to the Writing at the Red House podcast. I’m Cathy Lipp. Now go tell your only you story of God’s extravagant love in your life.

Okay.

Kathi (00:00.374)
Well, hey friends, welcome to the Writing at the Red House podcast, where we gather at the table with some of our favorite writers and creators who share their wisdom to help us all share our story. And I am here with social media maven. It’s Tonya Kubo. Hey, Tonya.

Tonya Kubo (00:36.75)
Hey, Kathi.

Kathi (00:39.51)
Have you been called a maven before?

Tonya Kubo (00:42.037)
I have. I have been called a maven.

Kathi (00:44.314)
Okay, I love that. I love it so much. Okay, and here’s my next, well, recently, so we have a paid program. It’s our mastermind program, which is the top offer that we have here at Writing at the Red House, where we have small groups of people who meet together who work on their business, and we give them advice. And one of the things I love about that group is,

Tonya Kubo (00:55.609)
Mm-hmm.

Kathi (01:12.406)
you can kind of call me at any time and just say, can you help me figure this out? And when they’re doing that, I’m usually saying, yeah, Roger and I can help you figure this out or Tonya and I can help you figure this out, depending on what the situation is, because I’m smarter with my smartest people. And recently we had somebody in our group who said, hey, I want to improve my speaking.

Tonya Kubo (01:17.038)
Mm-hmm.

Kathi (01:40.89)
And there is this offer that is about helping me to be recognized by this national program where I can get stage time, I can get a video, I can get everything I need to really work on my speaking career. And this person is an author and she just, she wants to do more speaking. And so she sent me the offer and said, can you advise me?

is this something that you think would be beneficial to me? And I said, sure, Tonya and I can advise you. And so we took a look at the offer and I just did not have a good way of sorting it out for, it’s very hard to make a decision for somebody else because I do believe in investing in your business. I do believe in investing in your career. I just don’t know, and I had never heard of this program before, which is kind of a…

Tonya Kubo (02:14.017)
Ha ha ha!

Kathi (02:37.018)
not a red flag, it’s a yellow flag. It’s a like, hmm, this is supposed to be an amazing program but I’ve never heard of it before. And the person who brought this to us didn’t know anybody who had been through the program. So those are not red flags, but they’re yellow flags for me. And Tonya, you have a whole system for deciding. What do you call this system?

Tonya Kubo (02:56.)
Mm-hmm.

Tonya Kubo (03:06.993)
Um, well, you know, it’s…

Kathi (03:07.554)
for deciding whether I should lay down the money.

Tonya Kubo (03:10.753)
Okay, are you ready? It’s super clever, Kathy. It’s called, Do I Need This Now? I know, I know you’re shocked. Took me ages to come up with that. No, it’s not trademarked. It’s not even copywritten or copyrighted. No, it’s just, Do I Need This Now? But I mean, it’s succinct.

Kathi (03:14.459)
Okay, do tell.

Kathi (03:18.702)
I’m sorry.

Kathi (03:33.078)
It’s, and it’s got two questions to it. Do I need this? And do I need this now? Like those are two questions that you have to answer. Now, does this work the same for a $14 program and a $14,000 program?

Tonya Kubo (03:37.189)
Mm-hmm. Right.

Tonya Kubo (03:48.489)
It does, although, you know, your decisions are probably a lot faster with a $14 program versus a $14,000 program, I would say. But it works. And honestly, so here’s a spoiler alert. It works in personal decisions, too. We need to buy a new stove. We need to buy a new stove. I’ve gone stove shopping now three times and I run through the whole framework and I keep not buying a stove. Because

Kathi (03:57.965)
Yeah.

Kathi (04:06.22)
Oh, see that’s… Hmm.

Kathi (04:17.491)
Okay.

Tonya Kubo (04:18.389)
just, you know, it’s just not working for me. Nothing I see I like enough to bring home. So the first thing I wanna do, Kathy, is I think we first have to talk about sales in general because most of the decisions that we are talking about have to do with business investments. And business investments…

Kathi (04:25.787)
Yeah, I get it.

Kathi (04:36.356)
Okay.

Tonya Kubo (04:42.325)
everything costs something. Okay, so even that $14 offer, that costs you time usually. There’s a lot more DIY expectation around a lower cost offer than a higher cost offer. But ultimately there’s gonna be money changing hands. And so there’s a sales process. There goes, you know, and you’re gonna go from having no idea that this offer exists to being.

Kathi (04:46.059)
Mm-hmm.

Kathi (05:06.05)
Mm-hmm.

Tonya Kubo (05:07.213)
given the opportunity to choose to invest in it or not invest in it, right? That’s kind of the beginning to end part of a sales process. Anybody who has come to a Writing at the Red House retreat, they go through that same process, right? They didn’t know that there are writer’s retreats. They find out there’s writer’s retreats. Then they have to decide is A, are they a retreat kind of writer? Not everybody is.

Kathi (05:22.612)
Yes.

Right?

Kathi (05:33.966)
Mm-hmm. Yes.

Tonya Kubo (05:34.337)
Then they have to decide, okay, if I am a retreat kind of writer, do I want to go to a retreat in California? That’s another decision. Then from there, they have to decide, am I a forest retreat person or am I a beach retreat person? Because if they’re a beach retreat person, the Red House Writers Retreats are not for them. Right? And then there’s some other decisions they have to make.

Kathi (05:42.478)
Mm-hmm.

Kathi (05:51.387)
Right?

Kathi (05:56.462)
Right, yes. If you want it suntanned by the time you leave, we are not for you.

Tonya Kubo (06:01.801)
No, it’s not for you, right? But then there’s a bunch of other decisions that they have to make, but it goes from start to finish. And then ultimately the final decision is, is this retreat in this location at this time right for me? So I think sometimes when we get into these processes, so one of the things that I always say is that a sales funnel, so people listening to this podcast have probably heard the term sales funnel before, right? It’s wider at the top, it’s narrow at the bottom.

I always say that they are shaped like a vortex and they have the exact same purpose, which is to suck everybody into them.

Kathi (06:40.671)
Right, absolutely.

Tonya Kubo (06:41.409)
Right? And so when you acknowledge that, that hey, we all have a job to do here and the person making this offer, their job is to sell their offer. And my job is to make the intellectual decision of whether it makes sense right now for me to invest in this offer or not. See, I can choose to not invest without it being a bad offer. Now there are some offers that are really bad, right?

Kathi (07:08.126)
Right, absolutely. Yeah.

Tonya Kubo (07:10.221)
But some are just, they’re just not right for me or they’re not right for me right now. Is that helpful for framing sort of where we’re gonna go here?

Kathi (07:15.87)
Right, okay. It’s very, very helpful. Yes, okay. So what is step one of deciding this is for me and this is for me right now? How do you get to step one?

Tonya Kubo (07:30.585)
Yeah.

So the first question is, and we’re assuming that you have been presented with some kind of offer right now, right? Like there’s something you’re looking at. So the.

Kathi (07:41.598)
Right, right. You clicked on something on social media or a friend recommended it or yeah, somehow this offer has been presented to you.

Tonya Kubo (07:53.773)
Right, so the first question you’re gonna ask is, what problem do I have that this offer promises to solve?

Kathi (08:06.222)
Mm hmm. Okay.

Tonya Kubo (08:06.509)
Because I will tell you, Kathi, if you can’t clearly articulate your problem, it’s probably not the offer for you.

Kathi (08:15.618)
Right, right. I have been taken in by things where, you know, I’m just merrily going along and I click on something on social media and that looks interesting. And now I’ve decided that in addition to offering retreats, I am also going to offer courses that I had never thought of before because of this offer.

And it’s like, wait, did I really want to start a whole new facet to my business? And I, I am very, I, I get yes, momentum going very, very quickly. And so I think this is such like, do I actually have this need? You know, that might be something to do five years from now, but I, I was not on a Tuesday thinking, oh, I need to develop.

Tonya Kubo (08:57.014)
Yeah.

Kathi (09:13.078)
these multifaceted courses, but now I’m thinking about it. And that’s the power of a good funnel.

Tonya Kubo (09:15.555)
Mm-hmm.

Tonya Kubo (09:20.769)
Right, it is. And going back to kind of the case study that we’re building this conversation around, like this individual, the problem that they were actually seeking to solve was to grow their platform. They ended up in a funnel that was about growing their platform through speaking. And in that process, they’ve said, well, I actually don’t think I’m that great of a speaker.

I actually think I have a lot that I could learn from being a speaker. But they weren’t already thinking about growing their platform through speaking, right? It was the offer that introduced them to the idea that was a way that they could grow their platform. So the first question is, what is the problem that this offer promises to solve? Then the next thing that you have to do is you really have to get clear on like, how aware were you of this problem?

before the offer presented itself. And so what I will encourage people to ask is, okay, so how long have I been trying to solve this problem? You know, and I would even say, have I invested in other programs, other services in an effort to solve this problem? And what we’re really trying to figure out here is, did I already know I had this problem or did you salesperson, did you diagnose the problem for me?

Kathi (10:17.23)
Mm-hmm. Right.

Tonya Kubo (10:45.029)
Because there’s nothing wrong, like maybe I’ve had this problem for years and I just didn’t know that’s what it was, I didn’t have vocabulary around it, like I’ve been searching and now I’m like, oh, that’s my problem. So maybe genuinely, yes, this is the right thing for me. Or maybe they just created a problem that I don’t actually have right now.

Kathi (10:46.046)
Yes.

Kathi (11:08.174)
Well, and I think this is what we see in those funky health offers all the time. Like, oh, you know what your problem is? Your, your, um, fluoroclitamine levels are down. Well, we don’t actually have fluoroclitamine in our bodies. So, um, you’re trying to solve a problem that doesn’t actually.

Tonya Kubo (11:16.927)
Mm-hmm.

Tonya Kubo (11:32.866)
I don’t even know what that is!

Kathi (11:37.39)
It is not. I just made up a word, but I can send you to Google. When people say, hey, this is the miracle cure, we recognize it in health things as like, oh, this is snake oil. But sometimes we don’t recognize it in business. Like, oh, everybody’s doing this. Are they really? Is everybody succeeding with this?

and I’m the last to know, or are you maybe making up a problem that I’ve never had before?

Tonya Kubo (12:13.001)
Exactly. And you know, once we get through these questions, then we can kind of talk about some common, like some common occurrences, like how what this looks like out in the wild, because I think that’s the other thing is sometimes, especially if you’re really new, you’re new, your early stage business, you have actually never seen any of this. So you don’t what I like to say is you don’t see the matrix or the man behind the mirror. You’re, you know, you are completely

Kathi (12:39.564)
Mm-hmm.

Tonya Kubo (12:42.469)
help to be aware of some of this stuff as to become a savvy consumer. So the first question is really like, you know, identifying your need, like, was this an established need or did they introduce you to it? The second is how aware were you of this need before being put in a position where you’re asked to buy something to invest in solving the need? Then I want you to look ahead, because here is the thing I can tell you as a marketing professional, I have been in the marketing.

industry since my mid 20s. So as a marketing professional, I can tell you that what marketing does is try to get you to make the decision right now. Try to get you to feel away right now so that you decide right now. And yes, right, it’s like now or never sort of messaging is what you’ll often get. With that, one way to remove yourself from that impulse is to go, OK, well let me

Kathi (13:23.559)
Yes.

Tonya Kubo (13:38.697)
let’s kick the can down the road a bit. If I do say yes to this offer, what can I realistically expect as a result six months from now? And spend some time really thinking through that. And then once you’ve figured out sort of what you can realistically expect in six months, then I want you to go a little bit farther. What can I realistically expect to happen in 12 months?

Kathi (13:43.19)
Mm-hmm.

Kathi (13:53.41)
Such a great question.

Tonya Kubo (14:08.109)
And I want to say it goes without saying, but it actually doesn’t. And what would be required to get those results? Right. If they’re realistic, like, what am I realistically going to have to do over the next six months, over the next 12 months? And then what I want you to do is I want you to do that, make the same decision or have the same thought process in reverse. OK, so what can I realistically expect to happen in six months if I don’t buy this? And what can I realistically expect to happen?

Kathi (14:17.739)
Yeah.

Tonya Kubo (14:37.249)
in 12 months if I don’t buy this. Now in the marketing world, we call that what’s the real cost of inaction? But what I wanna say, you’ve heard that, right Kathy? I mean, we’ve all heard it. What’s the cost of inaction? What’s it gonna cost me not to do this? But in many cases, the cost of inaction is I’m gonna be in the same place I was today, right? I’m like, if I don’t do anything about this, I’m gonna be right where I am now. Well,

Kathi (14:47.694)
Okay.

Kathi (14:51.538)
Yes, yes.

Tonya Kubo (15:05.241)
that’s not a bad thing if this offer is solving a problem you didn’t even know you had, right? So if your answer to question one was that I don’t actually, or the question two is I didn’t know I had this problem until I entered into this process, then the cost of inaction may be not such a bad thing.

Kathi (15:12.848)
Right.

Kathi (15:26.974)
Yeah, because we only have so many dollars and we only have so much time and so much energy and so much mental space to aim at issues.

And so if you’re putting money, time and energy and mental space towards issues that were not even an issue yesterday, they were not a problem for you yesterday, I’d rather see you put that money towards something that is actually gonna help something that is causing you pain. The other thing I will say is our client who came to us and said, they said, I have to decide by Friday. And I’m like, hmm.

Tonya Kubo (15:49.253)
Mm-hmm.

Kathi (16:10.07)
Do you though, they’re not gonna sell to you on Saturday? They’re not gonna sell to you next Tuesday? Really? Is that really what’s gonna happen? And I would rather you spend 10, 20% more on Tuesday and know that this is what it’s going to take.

Tonya Kubo (16:29.285)
Mm-hmm.

Kathi (16:36.406)
to get you over the line of what you need to do, then you put that money down on Friday and you save that 10%, but it was for the wrong, you’re answering the wrong problem.

Tonya Kubo (16:52.509)
Right, and I wanna just clarify what you’re saying. So, cause a lot of times I think we hear, I have to make a decision by Friday or else. When the reality is, is it’s, I have to make a decision by Friday to lock in this specific pricing, or I have to make a decision by Friday in order to be part of the current cohort. But almost every offer cycles back. Like there is a…

Kathi (17:21.394)
Yes.

Tonya Kubo (17:22.601)
An example that I use from my own business, where it was a program that only opens once per year. So I had been exposed to it in one year and I was like, oh, you know, that’s an interesting thing. The next year it came around, I thought, this is probably something I should look into. And the third time it came around,

Kathi (17:45.504)
Mm-hmm.

Tonya Kubo (17:46.761)
was a time where I was like, okay, like I’m actually in the spot in my business where I need to like look at this and consider whether this makes sense for me to invest in right now. But the thing is, is the person who was providing the offer very ethical is like, yep, we open enrollment for this every May. Like I’m not saying it’s going to be this price next May, but I will tell you, you can enroll next May. And so the only decision I had to make, right, was do I need to do this right now?

Kathi (18:03.208)
Mm-hmm.

Kathi (18:10.837)
Yeah.

Tonya Kubo (18:15.273)
And if it goes up in price, is it, you know, am I gonna be okay with that? Cause too often, Kathy, I see people make decisions, not so much like I want this, but it’s, well, I want this, I think I want this, but I don’t wanna pay more than $500 for it. And it’s $500 right now. So if it’s more than $500 next year, I’m not gonna buy it. And my answer is, well, if you don’t wanna pay more than $500 for it, maybe you don’t want it. That’s okay.

Kathi (18:33.102)
Mm-hmm.

Kathi (18:41.83)
Right, it’s so true. Yes, and you know what? Price is clarifying. That’s what I love. If it’s too expensive, then I can’t do it. And oftentimes, there are lesser offers from people that it’s a good place to start. Now, we do offer sales on our stuff, and we do have cutoff dates for that, because it’s…

Tonya Kubo (18:48.576)
Mm-hmm.

Kathi (19:06.866)
it’s easier to process everybody at the same time than have people trickle in. And so I’m fine saying, you know what, if this doesn’t work for you this year, keep us in mind for next year. But you may come back and say, no, I actually need this and it’s okay, you can enroll at a higher price. But I’m not trying to pressure anybody. And I think oftentimes,

Tonya Kubo (19:18.371)
Mm-hmm.

Tonya Kubo (19:27.258)
Mm-hmm.

Kathi (19:33.946)
our best clients for like Clutter Free for Life, which is our paid program, or writing at the Red House Collective, which is our paid program, are the people who have thought about it, who have prayed about it and said, not this year, but next year, and they sign up the next year, and it’s exactly what they need because they’ve really processed it.

Tonya Kubo (19:38.521)
Mm-hmm.

Tonya Kubo (19:53.717)
Mm-hmm.

Yeah, I would agree. And there are people who, you know, they find us on the Tuesday and it just happens that we already were planning to put something on sale on Saturday and they buy it and it’s exactly what they needed at exactly the right time. But those people weren’t new to the problem. They…

Kathi (20:08.353)
Yeah.

Mm-hmm. Yeah.

Tonya Kubo (20:14.765)
had the, they found us because they had been trying to solve the problem for a very long time and were not successful. Maybe they bought other things to solve the problem and those other things didn’t work. And then they found us and suddenly it was like, oh, now I understand why all those other things didn’t work. This is actually what I need. And now as an informed consumer, I am ready to make what seems to you, Tonya.

Kathi (20:16.897)
right.

Kathi (20:33.511)
Right.

Tonya Kubo (20:40.525)
because I just met you yesterday, seems to you like an impulsive decision, but see, you don’t know all that I’ve done up to this point. And those people are very successful as well, but I think everybody is more successful when they just take a step back and strategically work through this decision from a place like from a business owner perspective versus an emotional perspective.

Kathi (20:45.71)
Mm-hmm. Right. Yes.

Tonya Kubo (21:06.945)
which is what marketing is designed to do. It’s designed to get an emotional reaction.

Kathi (21:12.446)
Yes. And you know what, emotions are good. But we need to, you know, another, another thing we need to consider is wisdom and timing. And oftentimes, I think a lot of people join things, they put all this money down. And because they think the money is going to solve the problem, and it’s really the effort and working the program that is going to solve the problem. So if you don’t have the time and the money to do it, then it’s not the right time for you.

Tonya Kubo (21:15.266)
Mm-hmm.

Kathi (21:42.806)
Tonya, what, so in our example, our person decided not to go with that offer, but is looking at other programs, other situations, other coaches to get them across the line, because we really, we went through it with her and we said, we think you can achieve this for a lot less money and probably with more success. Do we know that for sure? No, but.

Tonya Kubo (21:53.934)
Mm-hmm.

Kathi (22:11.386)
She has peace about it, we have peace about it. Anything else we need in order to make this decision for the program, Tonya?

Tonya Kubo (22:19.925)
Well, what I would say is the biggest thing that you need is self-restraint. So understand, right, that when emotions are high, our logic or reason is low. So if you can just take a step back and just go, oh, okay, like this is super exciting. And yes, I get all those fast action bonuses if I act in the next 24 hours, but let me take a step back and let me really, really think.

Kathi (22:36.203)
Yeah.

Tonya Kubo (22:50.341)
is, you know, are those bonuses even something I want? Like I am the person who will invest in the program for the bonus, right? But then I’ve already felt feel like I win just because I get the bonus. I don’t need, you know, maybe I don’t need the full program. So I think that’s the first thing. And then I think if you need help, I mean, obviously we’ve got the Writing at the Red House Free group that people can join and ask these sorts of questions with, right? I have like a super cheap.

Kathi (22:54.339)
Right. Yeah.

Kathi (23:02.13)
Yeah.

Kathi (23:12.366)
Mm-hmm. Yeah.

Tonya Kubo (23:17.589)
little, like I have this all set in a super cheap mini course. Um, it’s like nine bucks and it’s called, guess what? Do I need this now that people can buy.

Kathi (23:19.529)
Yes.

Kathi (23:26.195)
And we’ll put the link up for that. We’re not doing this to sell this to you guys, but sometimes that nine dollar Decision-making tool can save you thousands and we like to save thousands. Yes

Tonya Kubo (23:29.181)
No, we’re not.

Tonya Kubo (23:37.129)
Exactly. But let me just say this. You can also just save this podcast, download this podcast episode and play it every time you need it. I have a little note in my phone, I have a little app where it’s like decision making resources. And if I’m up against a decision, then I just kind of go in there and go, oh yeah, I remember that. That’s how I make a decision on a service provider. Oh yeah, that’s how I make a decision on a course.

Kathi (23:45.46)
Yeah.

Tonya Kubo (24:05.837)
And I’m gonna leave people with one more thought. I think we all need to, from a business perspective, create some price point, I don’t wanna call them warning signs, but some price point checkpoints. So there was a time early on in my business where my yes price, where it’s like, okay, I don’t have to think too hard on an offer that is under 40 bucks.

Kathi (24:08.386)
Yeah.

Kathi (24:22.516)
Mm-hmm.

Tonya Kubo (24:33.089)
Okay, but my threshold is $100. Like at $100, I need to sit down, I need to think long and hard because of where I’m at, that’s really like what I can afford to invest. And then there have been times in my life where my yes price was up to 500, given where I was at my business. So don’t be afraid to treat your writing like the business that it is and make thoughtful investments.

Kathi (24:33.651)
Yeah.

Kathi (24:38.228)
Yeah.

Kathi (24:44.62)
Yeah.

Kathi (24:51.22)
Yeah.

Kathi (24:58.678)
Yeah. I love it. What a great note to end on. Tonya, thank you so much. This is a wisdom podcast. That’s what I love. This is a wisdom episode here, and that’s what we need because these are investments of our time, money, space, and energy, and we wanna be wise with where we put all of that effort, all of our resources. And friends, you’ve been listening to the Writing at the Red House podcast. I’m Kathi Lipp. Now go tell your only you story of God’s extravagant love in your life.

I’m so excited about this conversation with my friend Chris Morris today, but I’m just going to tell you, it’s got some hard topics. We’re talking about suicidality, talking about depression. So if those are triggering to you, you may want to either skip this episode or listen with somebody you love that you can talk about it with afterwards. And if you have kids in the car and you’re going to school, maybe just pop over to a different podcast so that you can listen to this when you’re in the car by yourself.

Kathi (00:01.42)
Well, hey friends, welcome to writing at the Red House podcast where we gather around the table to break bread and tell tales With some of our favorite writers and creators who share their wisdom to help us all share our story And guys i’ve got one of my dear friends here on the podcast today His name is chris morris. If you have been part of the west coast christian writers conference If you’ve been part of the collective you

have encountered Chris and he has an amazing book coming out. It’s called Resilient and Redeemed. And it’s talking about some very deep topics. And we wanna talk to Chris about feedback. How do you handle feedback when you know it’s not all going to be glowing and positive? And unicorns and kittens, how do you deal with the people who are going to be the haters?

Chris Morris (00:47.65)
Yeah.

Kathi (01:12.796)
Chris, welcome to the podcast.

Chris Morris (01:15.406)
Thanks for having me, Kathi. It’s great to be here.

Kathi (01:18.288)
Um, would you give me in a nutshell the content of your book? Because we want people to have an idea of what you’re going to be talking about because this doesn’t get talked a lot about in Christian circles. So yes, Chris, go first. Go. There you go.

Chris Morris (01:35.278)
Sure. So, so the subtitle is lessons about suicidality and depression from the psych ward. That’s the easiest way to sort of tell you what it’s about. It is a you go on a journey with me throughout my life with the different snippets of my life where I’ve had moments that where my suicidality and my depression have come to the forefront of my life. I like to say that

It is half memoir, half self-help, and half theology. I know that’s three halves. There’s a lot happening in this book and it’s all good.

Kathi (02:11.64)
Yeah, that’s amazing. Okay, so Chris, when you told me you were writing this book, I’m not gonna lie. Like, I wanted to wrap you up in some bubble wrap.

and go ahead and publish the book, but we’re just gonna put you away for about six to nine months and let the dust settle. And so, because here’s the thing, when it comes to mental health, can we just say some Christians, not all, not the people you and I run around with, but some Christians are just weirdos. They’re not wise.

They can come from a place of, well, if you had more faith, if you prayed more, you know, all the stupid things that we have heard. And I’ll admit, I was very concerned that when I heard you were writing this book. And it wasn’t because I didn’t think the book needed to be written. It’s because I didn’t want my friend Chris to be the one who had to write it.

Chris Morris (03:23.426)
Thank you.

Kathi (03:25.988)
because you have gone through some really tough stuff. And I know in many ways that you have grown and you have healed, but I also know I get negative feedback and it’s about, you know, I have to take to my bed. It still affects me. And in some ways I think that’s really good because it makes me very tender to people that I love and I care about. But I’m wondering, how are you girding your loins?

for the arrows that are going to come here. How are you protecting yourself? And I asked you to give me some ways ahead of time. And so one of the things you said is that you, one of the things you’ve talked about is giving someone the gift of going second. So explain what that means, because I have no idea. I can’t wait to hear what you’re gonna say here.

Chris Morris (04:21.678)
Sure. So in every relationship and every conversation, there are unspoken boundaries that guide the conversation. And the easiest way I can describe what I mean by that is if you say, Hey Bob, how are you doing? He says, I’m fine. How are you? You know you need to answer in one sentence or less because he’s already set the expectation.

Kathi (04:48.92)
And it has to be fine or overwhelmed. These are the only two acceptable answers in that particular circumstance, yes.

Chris Morris (04:53.342)
Yes. So with the gift of going second, what that means is we’re, we’re choosing to go first. So let me, let me give that, that same conversation with Bob again, Hey, Bob, how are you doing? He could give a teaser say, well, it’s been a little bit of a rough time lately, to be honest with you, my mental health is a little sideways, but I’m working through it. So what that does is that gives the other person that is engaging in the dialogue.

permission to be a little more real, permission to even ask the question or to express, oh, what’s going on? Oh, man, I’m glad you asked. Actually, that that. So what we’re doing is we’re setting the stage for transparency by choosing to be transparent first. It’s one of the hardest things in life that I’ve gotten pretty good at doing.

Kathi (05:37.476)
So, yeah.

Kathi (05:46.804)
I, yes, and I have to say, you know, there is that core group of friends that I can say, or, you know, I’m also very fortunate to be in a marriage where I can say, today’s not a good day, today’s tough, and I’ve got a core group of friends. But I love that what you’re saying is, maybe this goes beyond.

Chris Morris (06:03.192)
Mm-hmm.

Kathi (06:12.988)
just those couple of people so that you can go first for somebody else and give them permission.

Chris Morris (06:20.534)
Definitely. And there’s always levels. Like with my, with my, one of my besties, Lindsay, she can say, how are you doing? And I’ll be like, I’ll, you know, we, we talk mostly through messenger on Facebook about like, oh, let me tell you. I’m not going to do that with some dude that I’ve just met. So there’s levels, but still the idea of going, of giving someone the gift of going seconds.

Kathi (06:22.818)
Yeah.

Kathi (06:32.496)
Ha ha ha.

Kathi (06:37.292)
Right, right, but there are levels, yes. And, oh.

Chris Morris (06:47.122)
still has application in every level of a relationship that you have.

Kathi (06:51.604)
Yeah, we do. I’ve got a couple of friends. We just do check ins. And in check ins, we’re never allowed to say that we’re fine or overwhelmed.

Chris Morris (06:57.271)
Mm-hmm.

Kathi (07:02.124)
We have to say, you know, here’s what’s going great. Here’s what I’m struggling with. And those check-ins are really helpful to me because I know I don’t get to go away with the pat answer. I don’t get to go and just say, oh, I’m fine. How are you? And they’re fine. And, you know, then we find out, oh, you know, online. No, actually, my mom’s been in hospice or.

Chris Morris (07:29.239)
Mm-hmm.

Kathi (07:29.676)
I’m going through a marriage crisis or whatever the thing is. We’re never gonna find out by surprise. So I love that idea of gift of going second. And I feel like in your book, that’s kind of what you’re doing. You’re saying it was not okay. It was, I spent time in a mental health ward.

I spent time recovering from a suicide attempt. I, it was really rough. How has that changed your interactions with people that now know about your story? Has it allowed people to open up more with you?

Chris Morris (08:15.87)
Yeah, it’s really interesting to think about that. Ever since I started sort of representing myself as a mental health advocate for the church, which was…

Chris Morris (08:32.127)
I think I had an audio problem, am I still here?

Kathi (08:34.597)
Oh, you’re great, yeah. No, that’s fine.

Chris Morris (08:36.79)
Okay, sorry. Ever since I started representing myself as a mental advocate for the church, the nature of the conversations I’ve had with people has really dramatically shifted in some surprising ways. Like people will, they’ll say, Oh, Chris, I you’re a mental health advocate, let me tell you about and something, it goes in two different ways. One is helpful. One is just weird. Helpful. I, I know you do.

Kathi (09:01.92)
Okay, I want to hear both.

Chris Morris (09:05.922)
I’m gonna give people the weird one, but I’m gonna give them both because of you. The helpful one is, oh, I’ve really been struggling myself with anxiety. Do you have any thoughts? And so we have a really frank conversation really quickly. It sort of goes from like, hi, I’m Bob, to I struggle with anxiety. Very dramatically. And then the other one is, the weird one is, oh, my friend’s sister’s roommate once had a hard bout with depression.

Kathi (09:09.802)
Yes.

Kathi (09:26.18)
Yeah. Wow.

Chris Morris (09:36.778)
And I’m like, cool. I don’t know what to do with that.

Kathi (09:39.604)
Yeah. Right. Are they trying to make you feel better? Are they trying to identify? Like, yeah, it’s an interesting take, isn’t it?

Chris Morris (09:51.071)
Yes.

Kathi (09:52.368)
And you know what, I mean, let’s just give it to people. Some of us are just awkward. We don’t know what to say. You know, it really is interesting. And maybe that’s gonna be their first response, but that lays the groundwork for six months later, where they’re able to say, I’m struggling. So, you know, we give it to our awkward friends because we’ve all been that awkward friend. But yes, they’re trying to identify. So here’s my question.

Chris Morris (10:06.126)
Sure.

Kathi (10:19.6)
how did you find the courage to write this? Because this is not something that happened 20 years ago. This is four years ago. And first of all, I love that you wrote from an aspect of, yes, I have healed so much, and yes, I am still going through some very significant things. I mean, that’s just, it’s the two answers can be right at the same time.

Chris Morris (10:28.451)
Right.

Chris Morris (10:47.842)
Mm-hmm.

Kathi (10:48.2)
So where did you find it in yourself to be able to do this? Or maybe you found it outside of yourself.

Chris Morris (10:54.942)
You know, for as long as I have been a follower of Christ, God has always placed this thing in me that says, what you’re going through isn’t only for you. It’s sourced in one of the Corinthian epistles. I can’t remember which one and I don’t know the address.

Paul says, the comfort we have been given has been given to us in order that we might later comfort others.

Chris Morris (11:31.934)
I read that not too long after I first became a Christian. I just settled into my gut in a really deep way. And it’s sort of like the Lord highlighted that idea and said to me, everything you’re going through, you’re going through not just for yourself, but you’re going through it in order to be an encouragement and a strength to others. So that is part of the reason that I was able to write this.

The other reason that I was able to write it is because, gosh, I have met so many people over the last two years, three years, that are struggling so hard and are in such unhealthy church environments, like what you were talking about with there’s a spiritual answer to everything, that they just need a life raft.

Kathi (12:22.164)
Yeah, it’s so true, right? And.

You know, I mean, as much as I would love to delve into, come on, church, snap out of it, you know, and it’s not every church. But there are some, I want to talk to the writers out there. Because you have had I mean, this is a compelling story. Let’s be honest, it’s very, it’s interesting.

Kathi (12:58.11)
I think that’s interesting. And, but a lot of people go through something really hard or something that is unimaginable. And everybody around them tells them, write a book. You should write a book. That your story is so interesting. You should write a book. But I love the scripture you just shared with us because it’s not just about sharing the story.

It’s about how are you going to give help to the people who are reading your story? How are you going to give comfort to those people? Because you’ve come through this, you have been comforted by God and by others. How do you give that advice? I don’t know, do you have people who tell you, oh, everybody says I should write a book? What is your response to that?

Chris Morris (13:31.821)
Mm-hmm.

Chris Morris (13:51.614)
I do, I have had a lot of people come up to me and say, Oh, I’ve been wanting to write a, write a book about my story. And like the first thing I asked them, well, the first thing I tell them is. I mean, you could definitely do that in today’s world of self publishing. You don’t need anyone to give you permission. So that’s the first thing. However, if you want to sell more than 12 copies, you need to think about a few things. Probably the biggest thing you need to think about is what.

Kathi (14:07.264)
100%. Yes.

Kathi (14:15.883)
Right.

Chris Morris (14:19.114)
What do you hope that your readers are going to learn from your story that exists, that sort of sets itself outside of your story per se. That’s why I said, like my book is part self-help and part theology. Cause those are elements that are, that are wrapped into the story that make it. Yes, it’s about Chris, but it’s also about a lot more than Chris.

Kathi (14:33.856)
Right.

Kathi (14:41.468)
Right, your story is a reflection of the bigger issue.

Chris Morris (14:47.415)
Right.

Kathi (14:48.457)
the bigger problem, both personally and in the church. And so you’re giving, you’ve got lots of hooks in there. And I don’t mean like writing hooks, but a lot of places where you can say, here’s some practical help, or here’s a spiritual principle that you may wanna explore, or here is something you could take to your church to help people who are in this situation. Okay, so.

Chris Morris (15:10.149)
Mm-hmm.

Kathi (15:15.352)
Chris, there are gonna be a lot of people who think this book didn’t need to be written. I’m gonna say all the ugly things that I think are gonna come at you, you knowing not one of these is coming from me, right? We can agree on that because you know I don’t believe, a man shouldn’t go through something like that.

Chris Morris (15:33.656)
Mm-hmm.

Yeah.

Kathi (15:44.276)
If you, you know, if only you were tougher, Chris, I mean, because these sounds so silly coming out of my mouth, but there are actually human beings in the church who think this this, there is this, I don’t know, from the people I watch, they call them red pill people. I don’t I don’t really understand the reference. I know it’s a Keanu Reeves reference. I don’t really understand it. But

If you were only tougher, if you had more faith in God, if you really loved your wife, you wouldn’t have gone through this. And here’s what I can imagine, Chris, that you have said some of these things to yourself in the deepest, darkest parts of your life. Is that a mistake or is that true?

Chris Morris (16:31.87)
No, you’re 100% right. Yeah.

Kathi (16:33.864)
What am I missing? What are the other ugly things that people have either said or you imagine people might be saying or you’ve said to yourself? Okay, good

Chris Morris (16:43.006)
You hit on the big ones that the, yeah, if you only had more faith, you’re a man, you shouldn’t be dealing with this. That’s a big one. Um, if you really loved your family, you know, have you tried praying? That’s my favorite one. No, I’ve never considered that. Thank you.

Kathi (16:51.118)
Yeah.

Kathi (17:00.216)
It’s like when people say to me, have you thought about losing weight? You’re a genius. No, that has never occurred to me in my entire life. You should be a life coach. So you know that these are either, OK, there are two equally terrible things. You either know that these things are coming, or you know that they could come. I mean, those are both terrible, right?

Chris Morris (17:23.01)
Mm-hmm.

Kathi (17:26.18)
So how do you prepare for the pushback?

Chris Morris (17:31.966)
I think the first thing that I have to say is that I am very proud of the words that I’ve written in this book. And I stand by the stories, the moments that happen in my life as truth, but also the applications from my life and the spiritual principles that are drawn from my life. And I’m 100% confident that those are God-directed words.

So if someone wants to come at me with something, I’m okay with that. My favorite verse is Romans 8:31, if God is for us, who can be against us? I know God is for me in this book and the writing of this book and the purpose behind the book. But I’ve also done some work of, like I mentioned my friend Lindsay, I’ve done some work with her because she’s really good at cognitive reframing. You know, where I’ve said to her, I…

Kathi (18:11.98)
It’s so true.

Kathi (18:28.836)
Mmm.

Chris Morris (18:31.826)
I feel like one or two really bad reviews on Amazon or one or two really bad emails could wreck me. And, and in a wonderful way, she’s like, cool, let’s talk about that. What, what is your biggest fear? Let’s prepare for it ahead of time. Let’s think about it ahead of time. So you can already have your answer prepared. So we’ve already done that. I’m already ready. I’m not thrilled, but I’m expecting it.

Kathi (18:56.445)
I love it.

And I’ll just give you my little hint, and then we’re gonna close up because we want to get to some of these resources. But I figure I have not done my job as an author until I have five really bad reviews. It has not gotten far enough. So if I don’t get five really bad reviews, I’m just not trying hard enough. I haven’t been, I haven’t pushed the envelope enough. Chris, I cannot wait for this book to come into the world. It’s resilient and redeemed.

Kathi (19:28.542)
We’re going to have a link in our show notes so that you can go buy this book at all your favorite retailers. Also, Chris has a newsletter list and I would encourage you to go be a part of that because I know that Chris not only talks about mental health, but talks about talking about mental health.

And if you’ve got a hard topic that you want to discuss, this is a great place to get the kind of encouragement you need. Chris, thanks so much for being on the podcast. Oh, Chris, it’s such a great conversation. And friends, we’re so glad that you are part of this conversation too. You’ve been listening to the Writing at the Red House podcast. I’m Kathi Lipp. Now, go tell your only you story of God’s extravagant love in your life.

Chris Morris (20:00.366)
It’s been a pleasure, thank you.

Kathi (00:00)
Hey friends, welcome to writing at the Red House podcast where we gather at the table to break bread and tell tales with some of our favorite writers and creators who share their wisdom to help us all share our story. And guys, I’m very excited about this guest. She has not been on the podcast before. In fact, this is her only her second time of ever doing a podcast. Her first time was about 20 minutes ago for the Clutterfree Academy podcast.

Her name is Lauren Horst. And I found her on TikTok. She was doing a closet cleanout challenge. I’m like, oh, she’s so fun. I watched her for a little bit. And then I got really brave and I asked her, hey, would you be willing to come on my podcast? And I originally asked her for clutter free. And she goes, I listen to your podcast. No way. It’s Kismet, you guys. But.

The reason I wanted to invite Lauren today is so many of us are looking for ways to get our message out on different kinds of social media platforms. And we haven’t talked a lot about TikTok. And I know that there are all sorts of things coming down the pipe with TikTok. But I still think it’s a very valuable way of engaging with readers, engaging with followers.

Let’s just admit it to have a lot of fun. And so, Lauren, welcome to the podcast.

Lauren (01:30)
Thank you so much for having me, this is so fun.

Kathi (01:33)
Yeah, so we’ve had other TikTokers on here before, and let’s be clear, like, some of them have a million followers. That is not your category, am I correct?

Lauren (01:43)
No, not even close.

Kathi (01:45)
Okay, so do you know approximately how many followers you have?

Lauren (01:49)
You know, I think it ebbs and flows a little bit, but I think I have about 5,000.

Kathi (01:53)
which is very healthy and very exciting. I think so. I have dabbled, but I have not been consistent. And can I just say, I bet one of the reasons that you were in my For You page is because of your consistency. Do you TikTok every single day? I feel like I see you every single day.

Lauren (02:17)
You know, it’s probably not every single day but pretty darn close. Like I would say at least probably five days a week. And honestly, if I’ve missed a day, it’s probably just because I was really busy. I was traveling something was going on, but I’ve been pretty consistent.

Kathi (02:21)
Yeah.

Okay, and so tell us a little bit about your content.

Lauren (02:37)
So my content is surrounding decluttering specifically your wardrobe, your closet. And so every day I choose my outfit for the day. And basically my goal is to wear every single item of clothing in my closet to determine whether or not I want to keep it or whether or not I’m ready to give it away.

Kathi (02:58)
And has that been your content the entire time?

Lauren (03:05)
I, you know, every once in a while, I’ll post some very random travel video or just some thoughts in my head, but I would say it’s probably 95% of my videos.

Kathi (03:11)
Mm-hmm, yeah.

Okay, okay, very, very cool. And why are you doing this? I think that’s a question. You’re not promoting a book. You have a day job that is not really connected to wardrobe. So what caused you to wanna do this?

Lauren (03:32)
You know, I think I love watching videos of other people cleaning out their closets and, you know, the mindset of how do you decide whether or not you want to keep an item? Because a lot of people, you know, I’m getting rid of this 10 shirts. Well, that doesn’t really help me a lot because I don’t know what made you get rid of those 10 shirts. And so the people that I’ve watched and been inspired by who have talked about what makes them want to keep or get rid of a clothing item.

Kathi (03:51)
Right?

Lauren (03:59)
I thought, you know, I can expand on that and really go the slow and steady wins the race method. And you know, when people comment and say things like this totally inspired me, I’m starting this and you know, they’re not necessarily posting videos or anything, but just the idea that is so fun to know that there’s other people who, you know, I’ve helped in a very small way. But there’s so many benefits to just

having a clutter free lifestyle and a closet is just one aspect of that.

Kathi (04:31)
So how do you feel like you attracted your initial followers? Were, did you, did you have any kind of strategy or were you just posting and saying, Lord willing?

Lauren (04:42)
Yeah, absolutely no strategy. I mean, I think the types of videos that I was watching a lot of similar types of videos. And so I just thought, well, mate, you know, I’ll use some different hashtags, and either this video will find the people it’s meant to or it won’t. And regardless, I’m going to keep posting because it’s a fun creative outlet for me. It honestly doesn’t take much time in my day. And it provides a level of accountability where, you know,

now that I’m doing this challenge, I can’t just randomly stop. People are gonna be like, what are you doing? And so I have to see it all the way through and that’s been accountability for myself.

Kathi (05:11)
Right.

So you said hashtags, so there’s a little strategy that’s going into it. How did you determine which hashtags? Were you looking at other creators? What were you doing?

Lauren (05:29)
Yeah, basically every hashtag that I like to search is the hashtags that I used. So I did like hashtag closet clean out closet declutter, you know, OOTD or outfit of the day, sometimes occasionally workwear or colorful outfit, the types of things that I like to search. Those are the hashtags I used.

Kathi (05:49)
Okay, very cool. Now, let me get down to some brass tacks. How do you record them? Are you holding your phone? Are you, do you have a stand? What are you doing?

Lauren (06:02)
Yeah, I’m just holding my phone. I record directly into TikTok, which I’m not sure that other people would necessarily recommend. Because sometimes a clip gets deleted or something like that. And I’m like, well, oh, well, I’m not going back and refilming. And so I just do that. And so basically, then I don’t have to do any editing. And then I just add a voiceover at the end, pick some background music and then call it a day.

Kathi (06:15)
Yeah.

Mm-hmm.

So when you say adding a voiceover at the end and you’re recording into the TikTok app, you’re stopping and starting your phone as you’re doing different angles and things like that. Because you’re not getting dressed on camera or off camera or anything like that. You’re stopping and starting because that would be a very different kind of channel. And that’s not what we’re talking about here, friends. So does TikTok make it pretty easy for you to record your voiceover?

the what you’ve recorded.

Lauren (06:58)
TikTok makes it so easy. I think that TikTok is just it’s crazy user friendly. You know, on occasion, I’ve recorded outside of TikTok, and I’ve had to edit a video and upload things and import them and I’m like that takes triple the amount of time and that is just not time that I want to spend during my day editing. And so I feel like TikTok makes it really easy. Occasionally, I’ll re record

a voiceover like if it’s just going terribly. But more often than not, I just record the voiceover and if I stumble over a word or say something silly, I’m like, well, this is real life. You know, this is this is some very casual and authentic content. And I just hope that I’m finding the people who are looking for that type of content on

Kathi (07:42)
So, curious, I mean, what you’re doing doesn’t feel very controversial, but I know even the least controversial content can get weird pushback and people have their different ideas. How has it been for you? I mean, I look at your comments sometimes and everything seems lovely, but is that always the case?

Lauren (08:05)
You know, I would say, because of the nature of my job and because of the people following me, you know, I’m posting PG rated content. I feel like I’m very not controversial, but even still, I feel like there’s people who, and it depends on how many views a video gets. So the more views that you get, you definitely have people coming out of the woodworks with some weird comments.

Kathi (08:17)
Yeah.

Sure.

Lauren (08:33)
But for example, I had somebody who used to, they used to rate my outfit every day and it would be out of 10. So they would say like, you know, pants, two out of 10, shirt, five out of 10, shoes, zero. And I’m like, okay, that’s not really helpful feedback that, you know, that’s, that that’s different than being like, hey, I think you may want to try this type of shirt with this type of pants, you know, something isn’t working, which I’m totally open to that kind of feedback. But just a number rating. I’m like, that doesn’t really help me at all.

Kathi (08:54)
Yes!

Right?

That was gross.

Lauren (09:03)
You know, some people I think have verbiage about specific things. I’ve gotten a little bit of flack in the past for using the word kimono. And some people have said that that’s not culturally sensitive. And I’m like, that is the name that’s listed on the website when you go to buy the item. You know, that’s not necessarily my term that I’m using. So I think that there’s going to be people who are looking to be, I don’t know, to be offended, or maybe they just really need to get they need to get their feedback.

Kathi (09:18)
Right.

Lauren (09:31)
off their chest and release that into the world. But there’s a lot of people where I’m like, just because you feel compelled to say something does not mean that I receive it in my comments.

Kathi (09:41)
Yeah, and I think there are different ways of approaching this kind of stuff. I think there was a lot of backlash for Kimono by Kim. Kim Kardashian was going to name her whatever, whether the Spanx or whatever. I can’t remember what hers are called. Skims, that’s what they’re called. They’re called Skims. Kimono. But you’re right. Oftentimes, that’s the descriptor used on the website. And guys,

Lauren (10:00)
Yeah.

Kathi (10:10)
I just looked up Lauren’s TikTok, which comes up in my page every day. Do you want to know how many followers you have? 4,999.

Lauren (10:20)
How many?

Oh my gosh, I just need one more.

Kathi (10:26)
One more, just push her over the edge, push her over the edge. But you’ve had a couple of videos that have had a half million views.

Lauren (10:28)
That’s funny.

It’s so it is so funny because the videos that I feel like, you know, sometimes there’s days where I’m like, you know what, this is a good video, like, you know, either my hair looks good, my outfit is super cute, whatever it may be. There’s other videos where I come on partway through getting ready, my hair is still in a towel, I have no makeup on, I try something on, it’s not working, I try something else. And those are the videos that go, you know, quote unquote viral. And I’m like, oh my gosh, like, half a million people just saw me like with my hair in a little like,

Kathi (10:44)
Yeah.

Lauren (11:05)
turby twist towel like, oh well.

Kathi (11:09)
And you guys you can’t see her but she’s adorable. So it’s fine. She’s fine in a towel in her hair in a towel. That’s what I keep alluding to you getting undressed. This is not what I’m trying to project here, Lauren. That is not the content of D. Did you. So you don’t really notice any difference between the ones that go viral and the ones that don’t

Lauren (11:21)
That is not the content.

No, I mean, the few videos that have gone viral are the videos where either I didn’t like necessarily love my outfit that day would not classify it as one of my best videos. And I don’t know if it’s just it’s this algorithm. It’s luck of the draw. You know, maybe people are looking for those people who don’t have this super curated life and bedroom and closet. You know, I’m just a very normal person. And so, you know, maybe that’s what catches people’s attention is that they feel

Um, like they relate to me a little bit more. And so maybe that’s it, but yeah, I honestly have no idea. Tik TOK and the algorithm is very fickle.

Kathi (12:04)
Yeah.

It’s a mystery, isn’t it? So I know that you, how do you, you work full time, you have a very full life. How do you balance keeping up with TikTok and keeping up with your real life? In some ways, it feels like you’ve tucked TikTok into your real life. Is that accurate? Okay.

Lauren (12:33)
Yeah, definitely. Yeah, definitely. You know, it’s a hobby for me. And because I’m filming directly into TikTok, and then I add a voiceover, you know, TikTok in total takes me like two to four minutes a day. So it really is not a big time commitment for me. And you know, I’ve had some people in person ask me, you know, they’ve asked me, are you trying to become an influencer? And I’m like, I mean, if anything, I’m like, de-influencing people, because I’m telling them to get rid of their stuff.

Kathi (12:46)
Mm-hmm.

Right.

Lauren (13:01)
But I think there’s something to be said about there’s no pressure to post. I’m not monetizing anything. I don’t have any, you know, sponsors or partnerships or anything where I feel obligated. So certainly my full-time job, my real life takes priority. And if for some reason I can’t post, you know, it is what it is. And I’ll pick back up and the same followers will, you know, hopefully still be there. I try and be consistent. I mean, it is a priority, but it’s, I think because I feel no pressure, you know, if a video gets,

Kathi (13:22)
Yeah. Yeah, you are.

Lauren (13:30)
300 views or a video gets 30,000 views. I mean, it really makes no difference to me.

Kathi (13:37)
Okay, so I was going to ask you about monetization because I’m guessing you’re eligible for TikTok’s monetization program.

Lauren (13:48)
You know, I looked at this one time and I think you have to have 10,000 followers. So I’m about halfway there. And I mean, we’ll see what happens if and when I ever reach that number. I’m certainly not, I’m certainly not posting videos to just climb the ranks. Um, so if that happens, that would be cool, but regardless, I’ll still continue to post and make videos for fun. Um, but I think you have to have 10,000 followers before that.

Kathi (13:53)
Oh, okay.

Yeah.

Okay. Well, and if there are any brands out there listening, you know, if you wanted to send her a shirt, I think that I love that, you know, like, if somebody sent you a shirt, that would be a natural way of doing a tie in or promotion. And we would expect your honest feedback. And yeah, and we would, I know we would get it from you. And I just, I love

Lauren (14:34)
Oh, definitely.

Kathi (14:41)
that you are authentically doing this, you’re tucking it into your real life, it looks like you’re having fun while doing it, and you respond to a lot of the comments. So you’re not just trying to build numbers, you’re saying, this is actually something I love doing. And I think that is such a great way of doing it. With authors, there’s so much pressure to build a platform, to build your numbers.

And I don’t know that TikTok is necessarily the best way to do it for authors. I think Instagram and Facebook can actually give you a lot more bang for your buck. But I want to do TikTok because I am such a big consumer of TikTok that I just want to go splash around in the pool with all of you creators. I just think it’s fun and it’s something I want to do. So this has given me some inspiration and just thought.

ways to think about how can I do this with my everyday life and not have to because I know there are people who spend hours and hours and hours editing their videos, filming their videos, bribing their kids for their videos. I want none of that life. But you’re doing it without doing trends. I don’t know. I don’t remember you doing any trends. Maybe do you ever use sounds or anything like that?

Lauren (16:06)
Um, no, I really don’t. I mean, I kind of follow along the trends, but I don’t feel like that necessarily directly correlates to the type of content that I’m making. So I feel like I’m just doing my own thing and that it will attract the type of people who are looking for that type of content.

Kathi (16:07)
Yeah, yeah. Yeah.

Right.

Well, it attracted me and I had no idea that we were crossed paths, you know, what was it, 14, well, no, I’m trying to think. Yeah, 14, 15 years ago when my kids were in high school and you were their intern and the algorithm didn’t know that either. But I’m so glad that the algorithm…

Lauren (16:35)
Yeah.

Kathi (16:45)
just say it because this is a Christian podcast. The Holy Spirit brought us together and I’m so glad that happened. Lauren, thank you so much. We’re going to put Lauren’s links to her Instagram and to her TikTok so you can go follow along. I would love for one of my listeners to be the 5,000 because you guys will get so much out of watching her videos. Lauren, thanks again for being here.

Lauren (17:11)
Yeah, thank you so much for having me. I hope this inspires your listeners and that they just feel empowered to post their own authentic content.

Kathi (17:23)
I love that. Yes, authentic content, something we desperately need. Friends, you’ve been listening to the Writing at the Red House podcast. I’m Kathi Lipp.

Now, go share your only you story of God’s extravagant love in your life.