8 Embarrassing Mistakes I Made With My First Book
I wrote my first “book” in 2011.
To call it a book is generous. It was a 25 page ebook called “And College Loves Me.”
It was a play off of the Asher Roth song, “I Love College.”
Cute, right?
Shows where I was at in life then, about a year after graduating.
Part of me cringes even thinking about the book. It feels like 10 lifetimes ago.
But hey, that insecure frat boy looking for validation had the courage to lay the groundwork for who I am today. So for that, I’m grateful.
Anyway, the book I wrote wasn’t good… at all.
I even built a website for it, thinking thousands of people would somehow find it and buy it. Nope. It sold 0 copies.
It does give me the chance to highlight some lessons here though.
The embarrassing mistakes I made writing my first book might help you a lot. That’s why I’m sharing them.
Wanna See It?
I recently rediscovered the book while digging through my Google Docs. Funny enough, it was the first Google Doc I ever created.
This is the actual document: And College Loves Me
Take a peek at the not-so-greatness of it.
(I can’t believe I’m sharing it lol).
Now ready for the mistakes I made? Here they are.
8 Embarrassing Mistakes I Made With My First Book
1: I Lacked A Strong WHY
I had a few reasons why I wrote that first book:
To help people get the most out of their college experience
To share what I learned
To possibly make some money
Those are cool, but they’re not deep, soul-level reasons.
It wasn’t something that lit me up on a deeper level, or made me feel like I was going to make a tremendous positive impact on the world.
And guess what? It shows. The book doesn’t have soul. It’s not a powerful, life-changing read by any means.
If I would’ve thought deeper about WHY I was writing the book, it would’ve had more soul to it, even if it was still about “hacking college.”
2: It Could’ve Been More Empathetic
Even though I focused on what (some) college students want, I never emotionally connected with the reader.
This ties into #1. Since I didn’t have a deep reason for writing it, that blocked me from connecting deeply with the reader.
There are no detailed examples, or engaging stories from my own life.
The writing is like a high-level fly by. You see the themes from 40,000 feet as they whiz underneath you.
That doesn’t make for a great read, and doesn’t create a feeling of connection. This leads to the next mistake.
3: More bullet points than actual text
The book has more long bullet points than actual paragraphs.
A LOT of first time book writers do this. I’ve seen several other people do this too.
When you first start writing, there’s a tendency to just write lists, and avoid connecting ideas. It’s hard to create a cohesive flow at first. That’s why people default to what you see in And College Loves Me.
There are many ways to write your points with more eloquence and connect it all with more cohesiveness. I teach these strategies to my clients when they write their first book.
4: No visual flow
The structure isn’t visually appealing.
Here’s why. The paragraphs are way too long. They’re like big bocks of text.
With any digital writing, it’s important to space it out and create some variety.
Notice what I’m doing here in this article, with shorter paragraphs and sections to break up the text.
If I rewrote the book, I would…
Break the big paragraphs into smaller paragraphs
Only use single line bullet points (like this)
Include more bold, italics, and underlining
Include more headings
This would all create better visual flow, and be more engaging for people to read.
5: No unique voice or tone
And College Loves Me could’ve been written by anyone.
Nothing about the style or tone of it is unique — and nothing makes it stand out.
If I added more of my own energy and flavor to it, that would’ve made the book a lot better.
6: No memorable phrases
I had some good original ideas, but like the tone, it could’ve been communicated better.
It’s so important to write things that stick with people.
If I rewrote the book, I would turn every original idea into a catchy phrase. That would not only make the book more memorable, but help people learn the concepts better.
7: No memorable systems
Here’s a continuation of the memorable phrases… Memorable systems.
There are no easily remembered frameworks in And College Loves Me.
Like with the other examples, some simple systems would make the book more engaging and memorable.
There’s a reason why so many popular books are based on systems (7 Habits of Highly Effective People, The 4 Agreements, etc).
These frameworks act as cognitive shortcuts for people to understand and remember information.
Again, notice what I’m doing here with “8 Mistakes.”
8: I thought people would just find it
Okay, here’s the last one. It’s funny to me now.
I thought if I just posted the ebook on a website, that thousands of people would somehow find it and buy it.
Talk about naïveté, right?
So with the weird belief that everyone would magically find the book, buy it and love it, guess what? I did 0 marketing… And that’s why it sold 0 copies.
Here’s The Good News
There were other mistakes I made too, but those are some that will instantly make you a better writer.
Now, the good news about my first book.
After a few weeks after waiting for sales (and nothing happening), I had a realization…
“I don’t want to be known as the-college-hacking-guy.”
So I took down the website and focused on the future, instead of clinging to the past version of myself.
I’m glad I chose that, because it sent me on a wild journey of personal and spiritual development.
I went on to write 20+ books after. All about much more meaningful topics.
But it all started with And College Loves Me.
What a journey.
Alright, now you know the first “book” I ever wrote.
Much Love,
Stephen Parato
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