How to get a book deal in 2020
Jordan Raynor sits down with his literary agent, DJ Snell, to talk about how to get a book deal with no platform, the impact Payne Stewart’s death had on DJ’s career, and the Church’s overemphasis on the depravity of man. This episode also includes a bonus conversation with Drew Dyck, author of Your Future Self Will Thank You.
Pre-order Jordan's new book, Master of One, and enter to win a European cruise for two, dinner with Jordan in Barcelona, and a private tour of the magnificent La Sagrada Familia: https://jordanraynor.com/trip
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[0:00:05.3] JR: Hey everybody, welcome to the Call to Mastery. I’m Jordan Raynor. Happy New Year. I’m praying that this is the year, that this is the decade that we will answer the call to mastery, by focusing more intensely in the work that God created, each and every one of us to do not for our own fame and fortune, but for his glory, for his fame and for the good of others. That’s what this show is all about.
Hey, as you guys know, that’s what’s my next book is all about as well. Master of One releases on January 21st. Less than three weeks out. We have an amazing incentive for you to pre-order your copy. By the way, I don’t pre-order books typically. You probably don’t either, but I’m going to give you a really good incentive to pre-order Master of One, because by the way, this is really important. For all the bestseller list, for all the calculations, pre-orders matter.
To encourage to pre-order your copy, we’re giving away a trip for two people for you and a friend, a friend of your choice to go to Europe. You’re going to tour La Sagrada Familia, the world’s largest church that I write about extensively in Master of One. You’re going to meet me there in Barcelona for dinner. We’ll find an amazing place in Barcelona for us to bread together.
Then you and your friend are going to go by yourselves, I’m not joining you, on a seven-night European cruise on Royal Caribbean. You’re going to go to Italy, France, Spain. It’s going to be an incredible trip all on my dime. Go ahead, pre-order the book and enter the sweepstakes right now at jordanraynor.com.
Hey, I got a special New Year’s Day episode at the Call to Mastery for you guys. We did a recent survey of my audience and found that more than 50% of you want to write a book at some point in your lives. The vast majority of you who want to write a book don’t want to self-publish, interestingly enough. You want to get a deal, a book deal with a major publisher, which I obviously endorse. I’m a big fan of traditional publishing.
Today, I’m going to introduce you to my literary agent, DJ Snell, who helped me secure my book deals for Called to Create, for Master of One. We may or may not have some big news coming very soon about another deal we recently secured. I think I can allude to that. If you’ve ever dreamed of landing a publishing deal, this is going to be a fantastic episode for you.
DJ is one of the most impressive people I know. He’s a Harvard law grad, a seminary grad, an agent to authors who are way more impressive than me, including NFL Hall of Fame Coach Tony Dungy, who you’ll hear us talk about in this conversation.
DJ and I recently sat down to talk about how to get a book deal, even if you have no platform, right? We talked about the impact of Payne Stewart’s death; Payne Stewart, the famous golfer, the impact that his death had on DJ’s career. Fascinating tragic and redemptive story there. We talk about the church’s over-emphasis on the depravity of man. This is a wide-ranging conversation that you’re not going to want to miss.
Without further ado, here’s my conversation with my good friend, my partner, my literary agent, DJ Snell.
[CONVERSATION WITH DJ]
[0:03:19.4] JR: All right, DJ Snell. Thank you so much for joining me today. How are you?
[0:03:23.9] DJS: I’m well. Thank you. My pleasure to be with you.
[0:03:27.3] JR: I was saying in the introduction to this episode, you are – obviously, you’re a good friend, but you’re also really my closest partner in my career as a writer. You're the guy that I go to with everything. I mean, just before we start recording, we talked about a new deal that we're in the process of executing. You're my agent, but you're much more than that. You're really a strategist for Jordan Raynor and company in this whole brand.
By the way, aren't you relieved that we finally decided to do a podcast? You've been pushing me to do this for four years. Well, good. Let's start here. I think a lot of people listening to this episode are curious what a literary agent does and why there are such critical partners to authors. Let's start there. What do you do as a literary agent?
[0:04:13.4] DJS: Well, the role of a literary agent is to really – it's like you said, to be a partner in the writing process. The whole structure is very much alignment with the author and helping them achieve their goals of having a successful book. It really starts with a literary agent reviewing proposals, helping refine for publishers. They really look to agents to help sort through what's a viable product and what is not. To be able to help the author figure out their message, develop that and get into a place where a publisher can. It will resonate with a publishing company and where an editor would want to take that on for the company.
Then it's a matter of negotiating the business of that. Negotiating the well, presenting to the publishers, finding the publishers that are interested in that, then negotiating the deal terms, facilitating the dialogue between the author and the publishers that are interested, narrowing that down to the target publisher and then negotiating the final publishing agreement.
[0:05:16.2] JR: Yeah. We'll get into the nitty-gritty details on the process. I want to dive deeper there in a minute. I mean, essentially at the end of the day, an agent's job is to help an author develop a proposal for a book and they're going to sell that book to the publishing world. You have to have an agent, right? I mean, publishers –
[0:05:34.9] DJS: That’s right.
[0:05:35.4] JR: – are not taking unsolicited manuscripts. Your job security is pretty set. For our listeners who don't understand, talk to the economics, because I think a lot of people don't understand how the economic relationship between author and agent works. How's that structured?
[0:05:49.4] DJS: Well, it's a commission structure typically, where it's basically the industry standard is a 15% commission. The agent typically isn't making any money if the author isn't making money. That's the manner in which we're very connected and very much partners. A successful project is key for the agent’s success as much as for the author’s success in that.
[0:06:13.3] JR: Yeah. You don't get paid unless the author gets paid. It's a really beautiful – really beautiful, beautiful relationship, which means you've got to be – I mean, you got to be pretty confident. If you're taking on a client, if you're taking an author, you got to be pretty confident that you're going to be able to get a deal, right? Which is great.
All right, let's back up, because I think your story is really fascinating and how you came into this whole literary agenting world. Can you tell us the five-minute version of your story and the path to mastering this work that you're doing now?
[0:06:46.3] DJS: Sure. Yes. I came into the literary representation business in a very unique way, probably for most people. Most people come at it from an English major literary background. I came at it through the sports agent track. Even that was not something I had planned or intended. I had come, moved to Orlando, Florida to go to seminary for a year and needed a job and ended up landing just far with a –
[0:07:13.6] JR: Poor college student.
[0:07:14.6] DJS: That's right. That's right. Trying not to go in debt. Landed a job with a company. I didn't really know what they did. I thought it was a law firm and it turned out to be a sports agency, but they were hiring me and I was thrilled. I took the job.
[0:07:30.4] JR: Figure out what they did later, right? That’s less important.
[0:07:33.3] DJS: That’s exactly right. It was interesting, because that was back in 1990. The sports industry was relatively new at that time, in terms of a sports management business. Most people didn't – this was pre Jerry Maguire, the movie that helped define the industry, or at least give people a frame of reference for what it's about. The company that I was hired with was one of the first and they represented a lot of coaches and some golfers and baseball players and football players. NFL coaches predominantly in terms of the coach category.
My first project when I was an intern with the company was working on a Joe Gibbs book project. They were getting permissions and photographs and permissions for photographs. That was my task was to facilitate getting all those documents signed and getting them in order. It was interesting, my first project. It was a book project, where the sports agency obviously, that was a small percentage of what we did. We did endorsements, licensing, appearance agreements, speaking engagements and then of course, their contracts with teams.
[0:08:38.8] JR: Timeout for a second. Sports agenting was a relatively new thing in 1990. What happened in the 70s and 80s? Would coaches negotiate contracts directly with GMs? How did this work?
[0:08:53.8] DJS: Yeah, I think so. I don't know the history of that. Mark McCormack of IMG was the first to really pioneer the industry and he did that with Arnold Palmer in golf. That's where it got really started. I think it was probably lawyers that were maybe helping with team contracts and things of that nature, but lots of times I think it was people negotiating their own.
[0:09:18.4] JR: That’s fascinating. Sounds like the Wild West. All right, so you're an intern in the sports agenting business, pick the story back up from there.
[0:09:25.6] DJS: Okay. I was there for a year. I did all manner of thing. I went to law school. I had deferred to go to seminary for the year, graduated from law school, came back. When I came back, my primary areas of emphasis were on the endorsements, non-team contract side of things. Endorsements, licensing, appearances, speaking engagements and literary projects. For our clients that eventual got the place wherever there was a book interest, they would have me follow up on that. I really enjoyed that aspect of it.
What's interesting about it for me at that time, when you're looking for endorsement opportunities, the pool of opportunity is infinite and a bit overwhelming, because you can never be done with that process. If you're looking for an endorsement for a client, almost anything could be – almost any company could endorse them.
For a book project, it's finite. There's a limited number of publishers and you go and you present that. If nobody's interested, you have no deal, or you have a deal, if you do have interest. It was a task you could actually complete. Then that was really nice. I liked that part of it, compared to a lot of the other things I did. I also just loved the idea of helping shape and impact a thought, whether it's a memoir, or if it's a principle-driven book, to be able to take that and you're impacting in a different way, in a more long-standing way than if you just do a speaking engagement or endorsement or something of that nature. You’re really helping communicate a message, right? Take a story.
Then, so I worked for that company. I was on point for book projects. We had a very tragic story. We represented Payne Stewart, professional golfer who was killed in a plane crash in ’99. We just had the 20th anniversary of that October 25th. On the plane with Payne, the owner of our company Robert Fraley and the president of our company Van Arden were both traveling with them as we lost them both at that moment. That created a dramatic shift in our company, which fast-forwarding several years, I ended up in my own company.
My company now is called Legacy and it's not hard to figure out the name based on those men. I still represent the Payne Stewart family, and trying to carry on his legacy and the legacy of Robert and Van. I carried forth that business in some respects and focused. As a result of that, I got to shape more of the focus and I shifted more to literary. I do more literary representation than I do “sports representation” now.
[0:12:12.0] JR: I mean, the transition was pretty seamless, right? Because a lot of your biggest, earliest projects also came for the world of sports, right? You represented Tony Dungy and the book Quiet Strength, his memoir, which is that's the biggest book you've ever done, right?
[0:12:27.0] DJS: Yes. Yeah. I represented Tracy Stewart in her book about Payne, which was also a New York Times bestseller. I did that as part of the other company and we did that very quickly after the events of the plane crash.
[0:12:39.4] JR: Quiet Strength is just a mammoth book, right? I mean, you told me it was the best-selling supports memoir of all time, right?
[0:12:47.2] DJS: Yeah, that's what [inaudible 0:12:47.3] that told me is the best-selling sports memoir of all time, at least in recorded time. Recorded, because I’ve been tracking it.
[0:12:55.5] JR: That blows my mind. I mean, listen, you and I love Tony. There are certainly bigger stars, right? Bigger athletes, bigger names that have published books that haven't done well. I think that's a testament to Tony.
We're releasing this episode on New Year’s Day. We’re three weeks out for when people are listening to this, three weeks out from the launch of Master of One. Tony just was one of my absolute favorite interviews to do. Just sitting down with him and talking about why excellence matters to him, I think it's just very compelling.
I think he has a really, really good theology of excellence, if you will, and why excellence should be important for Christians and makes up the first part, the first chapter of Master of One. What most impresses you about Tony? I mean, you know Tony probably better than almost anybody outside of his family. What really stands out to you about Tony Dungy?
[0:13:52.4] DJS: I would use the word congruence. He is the same. Consistency maybe a better word. He's the same in every context. That guy, I joke with him after we did a book tour, the first for Quiet Strength. It was a very rigorous book tour, where we were in Atlanta for CBA, Christian Booksellers Convention.
We flew to LA where we had to get up at really very early to do a satellite tour, where normally you do the satellite tour from the East Coast, so that you catch people as they're waking up. We had to wake up on the West Coast in order to be able to broadcast to the East Coast, which was backwards. We had just a full day of stuff that culminated with going on the Jay Leno Show and then going to the ESPY Awards. We didn't get back to the hotel almost 24 hours after we left.
[0:14:48.5] JR: Wow. Wow. What a day.
[0:14:51.0] DJS: Yeah. The whole tour was just crazy like that. Tony was the same. He never was cranky and he never got short. I told him at the end of that, I said, “Tony, I know that you're a sinner, because the bible tells me you are now, because I've actually seen it.”
[0:15:09.4] JR: I love it. I love it. I'm sure there's some amazing road stories with Tony. Anyways, I bring Tony up because of our share of love for him, but also I know my audience just loves Tony. He’s awesome.
[0:15:20.8] DJS: Well, what you see is what you get with him.
[0:15:22.3] JR: What you see is what you get it. I love it. All right, let's talk more about the publishing process. I recently sent out a survey to my audience to figure out how many of them are interested in writing a book. Not surprisingly, more than 50% of my audience says that they want to write a book at some point. The majority of those people when I asked the follow-up question, do you want self-publish, or do you want to traditionally publish? The vast majority of them said, “I want to get a traditional publishing deal,” right? I think it's something that a lot of people want to do.
We're releasing this episode on New Year’s Day, where I'm sure some people are dreaming about maybe writing a book in 2020, maybe getting a book deal in 2020. I want to break it down from them. I mean, you are a masterful agent, you understand this industry inside and out.
Let's map out the whole process for them step-by-step. Let's say you're talking to somebody in our audience who all they've gotten is an idea for a book, right? That's it. That's their starting point. Walk through the step-by-step process to go from idea to sign contract with the publisher.
[0:16:26.0] DJS: Right. The great thing about at least non-fiction publishing, which is the world in which I operate more than fiction, is that you do not have to have your finished book before you begin this process. A lot of people think, “Well, I've got to write the book and then I can go.” That's just not true. You don't have to do that. The first thing that I recommend is that before you even start writing your book is to think about how you can promote your book.
The publishing world has changed dramatically and even just the last five years, where it really – there's so much in the marketplace, because there's so many different ways you can publish with the self-publishing. There's just a glut.
How does a book rise above to be found? You think about it, how we used to go, used to have to go to Barnes & Noble, or Borders when that existed, LifeWay, and browse the aisles to find your book.
Now it's so much of the purchasing is happening online. You're looking by author, or by title. You don't browse the way that you used to as a result of that. It's really critical that you be able to draw attention to your book, to be able to communicate with an audience that you have access to, that you've got a book, encourage them to go look for it.
A lot of times authors don't understand that. They think, “Okay, well I've got a great idea. It'll sell.” In fact, we had a an author that came to us and she's like, “I've got this great idea,” and it was. It was a very solid idea. I think it could work in the marketplace. We talked about the need to have a following to be able to drive traffic to that book. She's like, “Well, I just want to write it and they will come.” That's just – Yeah, it's the needle in the haystack deal.
As far as the actual writing process, the first thing you need to do is make sure they keep the keys to a great book, or that platform a really solid idea, an innovative, fresh approach. It doesn't have to be necessarily something new. There's nothing new under the sun, but a fresh way to approach it at least. Something innovative along those lines. Really, so a good platform, a good idea, well-executed in terms of writing.
As you begin the writing process, the first thing to do is develop a proposal. The proposal, what you need to have are just two sample chapters. You need to have your whole concept outlined, you need to know what the whole concept is. We have a structure for what we look for, but a – you a synopsis, you need a chapter outline and you need your two-sample chapters.
You also need to have an elevator pitch for it, right? What's the quick, quick statement that you can equip the editor with who's going to be advocating internally so they can quickly summarize and capture what your message is and be able to relay that. It should hook them. We call that a hook statement deal.
[0:19:24.5] JR: Yes. You got the proposal, the proposal’s done. At this point, you've got – you the author had the proposal on hand, but you've got to go find an agent to take on that proposal, right?
[0:19:35.2] DJS: Correct. Yeah. Typically, you're going to need to have the proposal in order to get an agent onboard. You'll circulate that, find the agents that you – that are candidates for you and you submit that. Then typically, they'll give you their feedback and say, “Yes, I'm interested. Probably want to have an interview with you and talk with you about your book and get a handle on that.”
They're going to want to know your platform, so that's why I say don't forget that piece. That's usually the part that authors forget is I need to include that piece, because it's very difficult for us to evaluate just the concept. We can say, “Oh, it's a great concept, but we can't guarantee that we can sell it through to a publisher, unless we know that that piece of it.”
Once you get an agent signed up, they'll help you finalize and get your proposal to a place where they feel comfortable, then turn around and shopping that to the different publishers. They'll identify which publisher should be candidates and they'll do that process of presenting your proposal to the different publishers. Then hopefully you have some interests. Then that's where the fun begins. Then you start – you get offers and start negotiating the major deal points.
[0:20:44.0] JR: Yeah. I've been surprised. I mean, that process from the moment that you start pitching what are called acquisitions editors and big publishing houses like Thomas Nelson, Zondervan, WaterBrook & Multnomah, my publisher whom I love. I'm going to be on the record saying how much I love them. Yeah, once you get to that point –
[0:21:02.4] DJS: Baker.
[0:21:03.7] JR: Baker. Baker who did a phenomenal job on Called to Create. It's a pretty quick process, or it can be, right? I mean, from the moment that you send that first pitch, to the moment you got a deal, can be as short as I don't know, 60 days, 90 days, something like that?
[0:21:19.7] DJS: Yeah. The typical process, so it goes to the – the normal process would be first, it goes to an editor, acquisition editor that you identified. The acquisition editor is going to say yes or no. If they say no, you get a quick response. If yes is on the table, then it's going to take a little longer for them to get to a yes. If they say yes, they may come back to me, the agent, with questions, asking for some clarifications. Then they will go to what they call ed board, which is the editorial board that features all the editors.
All the editors will then – that one editor will pitch the book to the other editors and then they'll discuss and decide, “Hey, we think this is a viable book project.” Then they may come back with more questions or clarifications. If it’s a yes, if it’s a no, you get a quick response to that again that way. Otherwise, they then take it to what's called pub board, publishing board. The publishing board typically would include all the editors, the sales and marketing team, as well as the publisher, the office of publisher who then make the decisions on which particular projects that are presented who are going to get an offer.
Typically, you've got to go through those different stages, and so it takes a couple months quite frankly, depending on when you get the different board meetings, the ed board and the pub board, then you get an offer.
[0:22:39.9] JR: Here's the summary, guys. All the work on the author is on the front-end; putting together the proposals, starting to build a platform and getting an agent. Once you got an agent, the agent is really doing the work for you to go and sell this thing, right?
I can hear all of you asking, how do I find an agent? That's probably one of the most frequently asked questions I get. Just Google them, right? I mean, there are good lists out there of agents who represent your particular piece of literature, whether you're writing fiction or non-fiction or Christian non-fiction or political nonfiction, whatever it is, there's agents that specialize in those types of books.
DJ, I want to ask you a question about this platform piece. I obviously a 100% agree with you that platform is everything. I tell people all the time, writing a book is 20% of the work. Actually bringing a successful book to market, it might be a little less than that.
One thing we found with Called to Create, was we were able to get a book deal, a decent size book deal with a traditional publisher. Baker was generous enough to take a risk on me when I had no platform, no e-mail addresses, basically no social media followers, nothing. That's contrary to a lot of conventional wisdom out there, which is you've got to have a platform before you have a book deal.
What do you think our listeners can learn from our experience getting that deal on Called to Create that they could translate to themselves, who might not have a huge platform today?
[0:24:13.8] DJS: Well, I can make a joke about having a great agent. The reality is you had a plan. You didn't have a platform, but you had a very concrete, tangible plan that you had already begun to implement. Having that concrete, verifiable plan, plus you had a very, very good idea and you're a compelling person too. We had to get on the phone we had to interview and you had to let them know and they had to experience your energy and excitement. They took a gamble on you for sure. That's rare, quite frankly as we've talked about. That's rare.
You had a business acumen, a business background that I think gave them some confidence that you could execute on your plan. Again, a well-defined plan, both in terms of how you're going to build your platform and how you're going to launch your book.
[0:25:10.1] JR: Yeah. That's why I tell people, I'm telling them like, I think the proposal with the exception of the sample chapters was probably caught 12 pages, does that sound about right?
[0:25:21.5] DJS: Yeah, that's quite right.
[0:25:22.4] JR: I think half of it was my plan for building a platform from nothing and launching the book, right? I just spelled out in detail, I don't have it today, but here's how we're going to get it. Oh, by the way, here's my bio and some other things that I've accomplished in my career to establish some credibility that I – It's a make it here, or make it anywhere quality. Oh, he’s had success doing these other things. He's got this plan to be successful in this thing. We're going to take a gamble, right?
By the grace of God, they did, right? Baker, I owe so much to Brian Thomasson at Baker Books for taking a gamble on me and to you, DJ, for going and selling it.
All right, last question on the publishing process, and I want to talk a little bit more about you and this intersection of faith and work. In terms of the book concept itself, right? You said a couple minutes ago, there's nothing new under the sun, quote Ecclesiastes. What makes a compelling concept? What are you getting excited about in terms of book concepts these days?
[0:26:25.7] DJS: Well like I said, I think fresh, something that has a unique perspective, something that really is – what's very successful these days is something that's addressing a felt need. When there is someone who's dialed in to something that's happening in culture, or something that's happening within the church because of the Christian context, which we're talking. Whatever that – in terms of the Christian walk of faith, where that's something that really resonates with what people are struggling with, or issues that we're facing and here's a fresh look and a fresh angle on that.
If it's a memoir, obviously which is more story, it's just every story is unique that it’s just a very compelling story that will really resonate with the people. That will really move them and shape them an impact their lives.
The goal is what I want to be a part of is impacting culture for good. Really moving, ideally moving people towards the gospel to a greater understanding of the gospel, to understanding their individual value and their value and the context of our Creator.
[0:27:37.3] JR: I love that. That's a good transition, right? We're starting to talk theology here, right? You’re a seminary grad. You have a very well-formed theology of work. It's one of the things, one of the reasons why I decided to sign with you as my agent. When I was shopping Called to Create I was like, “Okay, this guy gets what I'm trying to say. This guy gets this idea of a God who works, of a God who creates, of a God who is productive.”
Not everybody gets that right away. How does your faith influence your work? A very broad question, right? How does your faith influence your work as a literary agent?
[0:28:16.2] DJS: There's lots of layers to that, I guess I'd say. The company that I first worked with, the founder of that, Robert Fraley, he had a standard of excellence. He wanted to do things excellently. He was very cautious about raising the Christian flag as it is often the case. People can raise the flag and say, “I'm a Christian. Do business with me.” For him, it was very much I want to wave the excellent flag, and so come do business with me.
[0:28:43.9] JR: The ministry of excellence, right?
[0:28:45.7] DJS: Yes, absolutely. You really embodied that and really drove that home. That had been something that had driven me just pretty much in my academic pursuits. That's really where I excelled and where I invested heavily up until that point, because I came straight out of college essentially and started working for them and right out of law school as well. That was really something that I enjoyed. Doing things excellently and with integrity and to God's glory.
There's lots of ways that that manifests and shapes in terms of how you do business. Just I think remembering who you work for and who is caring for and who is providing for you. A case in point would be the transition after the plane crash. I'd been with the company five years at that point. I was a vice president. I had just moved up to vice president that prior – earlier that year, or maybe late the year before. I remember the exact time when that happened. Most of the clients that we had, their relationship was with Robert and then secondarily with Van. I was down the totem pole, in terms of connection. That was appropriate and the way the business works.
I would be on point for certain clients and would spend time with them and in servicing them on behalf of the company. A big part of my job was negotiating deals, finding deals and negotiating deals. I was in the office quite a bit, rather than out on the field, so to speak as a result of that. When Robert and Van died, the primary relationship that most of our clients had were gone. While we had representation agreements with all of those clients, where we could have contractually kept them under contract, it wasn't the spirit of the relationship, right?
We made a decision that we would let every – would release everybody from their contract. Anybody who wanted to go elsewhere would have the freedom to seek representation elsewhere. We would facilitate that for them. We wanted them to pay what was due under the existing contracts and the terms of those existing contracts. If there were renewals and things like that, then the family would benefit from that, but the company itself wouldn't necessarily.
We were we were releasing everybody, because we felt that honored the relationship and honored God in the process. That's just an example of a decision that had a lot of sacrifice for us in that, but I think it was the right thing to do and that's guided by some deeper principles than what's just best for you.
[0:31:30.4] JR: We talked about this, I don't know, maybe six months ago, so in the context of Master of One, right? You have two businesses, right?
[0:31:40.0] DJS: Correct.
[0:31:40.5] JR: You have Legacy, this literary agenting business, very successful. You also have a mental health practice. We were talking about how you very much see these two things as one thing.
In the book, I talk about specific one things and broad one things, right? For example, this guy that tunes my pianos at my house, he's tune pianos for 30 years. It's all he does. He's world-class at it. He's a piano tuner. Very specific. C. S. Lewis's one thing was much broader, right? He was a teacher and he applied that one thing in multiple contexts, to writing, to teaching at a university, to being a radio broadcaster, etc.
You described your one thing to me as really helping people reach their potential, which I love. I mean, that's certainly what you do for me, right? I could not reach my potential without you being my agent on the literary side, but also in the mental health practice. I'm curious how your faith, how the gospel has motivated this deep passion in you to help people realize their full potential. Can you talk about that?
[0:32:49.5] DJS: People often make a comment, like these two things don't seem similar at all, right? To the mental health counselor and an agent, but they really are, they really are about helping people become is one way I say that. One is very intimate and the other is a little bit more professional. Obviously in counseling, you're getting into deep places and you're walking there with them. The other is a more at a professional level, but you're still connecting and helping people grow. Really from a faith perspective, we're all created in God's image.
Part of our journey, I think is as bringing forth God's image more in how live. For His image to be more manifest in how we live, how we work, how we play, all those different things. One of those is obviously as creator, like your first book Called to Create. He was a creator. We have that in us.
For example, authors that helping them realize their creator potential. Helping that manifests itself and this thing that they felt deep inside they want to, they want to share and realize that is not a selfish, self-glorifying thing. It really is part of what we're meant to be and do is to give up ourselves in that ways and share ourselves that way to bring that forth.
[0:34:13.3] JR: Yeah, it's interesting your background in seminary and just your experience as a Christ-follower, gives you an appreciation for and an understanding of God's character, who he is, because we're created in His image, who we are meant to be. Bringing out that human potential is just making us more fully human, right? Making us more like the God that we were called the image. That's a really, really beautiful way in which your work very practically is the hands and feet of God's work in the world. I love that.
[0:34:49.0] DJS: I think there's a big – oftentimes in our Christian culture, a real emphasis on our depravity. There's a place to be very mindful of that to understand. Or okay, we're sinners, yes. We also as a result of having his image have tremendous dignity and reflecting his glory through that and really helping people call that forth. That just excites me for people to get in touch with their dignity. That's in the counseling room, as well as for an author, or a sports client reaching their potential professionally.
[0:35:26.2] JR: I love that. That's so well said. It's interesting, one of the things I appreciate about my pastor is how much we talk about sin, how much we talk about the depravity. Man, but you're right, I've never thought about that. We can forget. In the constant reminder of our sin as a means of more deeply appreciating the gospel, we can forget that we are image bearers, right? That we are vice regents, right? That we are called to image him and we have – that gives us tremendous power and confidence to go out in the world. As N.T. Wright says, “Build for the kingdom. Create for the kingdom.” That’s our purpose. That's the mission of the church.
Speaking of which, speaking of creating for the kingdom, I think there's probably a lot of people – not probably. I know there are a lot of people listening to this episode who are doing work that is not overtly evangelical, that is not overtly waving the Christian flag. Part of the reason for this podcast and all of my work is to help those people see that their work is eternally significant, even if they never shout the name of Jesus in their logos, or in their brochures, right?
Let's talk specifically about writers, right? I have lots of friends who are writing books, or want to write books that makes no mention of their faith, but they're devoted followers of Christ. What encouragement do you have for those people about the significance, the eternal significance of bringing that book to life?
[0:36:58.4] DJS: Oh, yeah. I mean, I think that's just – that's again just a reflection of God's image, right? He gave us the Word of God, the Bible, which is would be maybe the equivalent of our specific – when we're writing specifically about Christ, about God, about the Christian life.
He also made trees that speak spectacularly of his glory, without overtly having God written on them, right? I mean, he has written on them, but it's just such a beautiful picture when you look at – I think about sea turtles. They hatch from a beach and they go out into the ocean and somehow they come back to that same beach to lay their eggs the next time around. It's unbelievable how the design is.
I look at something that's not overtly Christian. That's fine. It's general revelation, right? God chooses to speak through general revelation, as opposed to special revelation to use theological terms. That creates a vehicle for people who may not be open to us a more directed specific revelation to come in contact with God's dignity, who God has made them to be and how he's working. It's not less than. It's just a different approach.
[0:38:15.0] JR: Yeah, I love that. All right, so you work in the book world. I'm very excited to ask you this question that I ask every guest. Which books do you gift the most, or recommend the most to others?
[0:38:29.5] DJS: In my counseling practice, the one that I probably – because I work with a lot of men, is Wild at Heart. It’s a John Eldredge book. It's a good just entry-level book. He does a great job of tapping into pop culture as a way for men to have some handholds into issues that they're struggling with. That would be probably –
[0:38:54.9] JR: I think you're the fourth guest that's mentioned Wild at Heart. I haven't read this book in I don't know, 15 years. Maybe I need to go back and re-read this thing. I think I had somebody on here say that they read it every year, which blew my mind. That's a good one. What else?
[0:39:12.1] DJS: Oh, gosh. Let's see, what else would I – you ask what do I give away. I give away a lot of client books. Quiet Strength is certainly a winner in most contexts, because it's just such a great story. I can speak to the validity of the person that's behind it. Now in terms of – if somebody who really likes fiction, I would say you've got to read Lord of the Rings. I love that story, because it has so much depth to it.
[0:39:41.9] JR: So good.
[0:39:42.7] DJS: For families, obviously Chronicles of Narnia, something like that. Yeah.
[0:39:46.7] JR: I love it. All right. What one person would you most like to hear talk about how their faith influences the work that they do?
[0:39:54.7] DJS: I was thinking about this. I was thinking Dolly Parton.
[0:39:58.2] JR: Interesting. That's a great answer.
[0:40:01.1] DJS: Isn't it? I mean, I just thought what a fascinating person, who is so grounded, who has touched multiple industries, be it music, be it film, be it her amusement parks and there's probably businesses I don't even know about that she's been involved with.
Yet, she seems to have a very rooted and grounded faith and a real love for people, and even love for her people, just in terms of her commitment to building Dollywood and creating an income stream in an area of the country that often struggled to find a viable industry, and turned that –made a fantastically, at least from what I can tell, very successful business enterprise. As I thought about that, that's like, “Yeah, that would be –”
[0:40:48.3] JR: That’s an amazing answer. Now she's dominating podcasting. She’s got –
[0:40:52.2] DJS: Is she? I mean, I’m baited. Yeah.
[0:40:54.4] JR: Yeah. She launched a podcast, I don't know, a few months ago now. It looks like it's doing really well. Yeah, we get to try to get Dolly Parton on the podcast. That would be amazing.
[0:41:01.8] DJS: Now who wouldn’t want to sit down with Dolly Parton, right?
[0:41:04.2] JR: That would be incredible. That would be incredible.
[0:41:06.5] DJS: You know it’s going to be fun. I mean, my sense is she's that same congruence, consistent throughout, that she's just a very kind person, it seems. I'd be interested to get to know her and see –
[0:41:19.3] JR: That's one of the more surprising answers to that question I've got, but I love it. That’s one of my favorites. All right, what one piece of advice, so let's tie a bow on this author conversation. Somebody out there, it’s January 1st, they want to write a book this year. You've given a lot of advice. You talked about platform, you've talked about the concept being strong and what they need to do to get a proposal. What someone think they could do today to move the ball forward towards getting up a publisher?
[0:41:47.1] DJS: Probably, write your elevator pitch for your book. Tap in to that one to three sentence summary of this is what I want to write about. You having a clear vision for yourself of what it is you want to write, what it is you want to say and that's really it. What is it that I want? What's the core message that I want to communicate? Concurrent with that and who is it I want to communicate it to? Identifying those two elements and just sitting down for a few minutes to however long. You need just to parse that out.
[0:42:23.5] JR: That's really good advice. I think that may be the hardest thing to do in the writing process is nailing that. What is the one idea you want to communicate in a book that you think needs to be communicated in a fresh, new way and related to that? Attached to that question is who is this for? I think if you answered those two questions in a really compelling way, you're onto something great. Then from there, make an outline and all that good stuff. I love that.
By the way, I was just thinking if anybody listening wants to see the book proposal DJ and I worked on for Called to Create, I don't know if he's okay with us, but I’m okay with people getting access to that privately. Just shoot me an e-mail, Jordan@jordanraynor.com and I'd be happy to share the arc that we followed for that. Might have to redact a few things. For the most part, it's pretty well intact.
Hey, if you've got a book concept that you think DJ would like to read, you can find him at legacy-management.com. DJ, I just want to commend you for just being so exceptionally good at what you do. It is no exaggeration whatsoever to say that this podcast, my career as an author would not exist if it were not for DJ Snell.
Thank you for being excellent with what you do. Thank you for the ministry of excellence. Thank you for bringing out the best in others and really viewing that as the work that God has given you to do. You're incredibly good at it and I'm very grateful for that. Hey, thanks for hanging out with me for a few minutes on this podcast.
[0:43:58.6] DJS: No, thank you for those words and that's really kind of you. I appreciate the opportunity to be here, enjoying with you. Certainly excited for me too.
[END OF CONVERSATION]
[0:44:06.7] JR: So appreciative to DJ for sharing all that wisdom with us. Hey and I was serious about you guys getting access to my book proposal for Called to Create. If you want a copy of that, just let me know. I'd be happy to send it along. While we're talking about books, I'm going to remind you again. Master of One comes out in less than three weeks.
If you pre-order it, you're going to enter to win a chance to have dinner with me in Barcelona, go tour the world's largest church, La Sagrada Família and then go on a seven-night European cruise. Go to jordanraynor.com right now to enter to win that sweepstakes.
Hey, before you go, I got another shorter conversation I want to share with you that's very applicable on New Year's Day. I sat down with the author Drew Dyck, who wrote a book called Your Future Self Will Thank You, which is actually celebrating its one year book birthday today. This is the perfect book to start your new year. It's a book about self-control that's necessary to reach some of your New Year's resolutions. Drew writes from a biblically-sound perspective, which I very much obviously appreciate.
It's a funny book. It's a practical book. I think it's really essential to anybody who's setting big resolutions for 2020. I recently sat down to ask Drew a couple of questions about the book. Here's my conversation with Drew Dyck.
[CONVERSATION WITH DREW]
[0:45:29.8] JR: Drew, thanks so much for joining me, man.
[0:45:31.6] DD: Hey, thanks for having me on. I'm excited about this.
[0:45:34.0] JR: Yeah. We're releasing this conversation on January 1st, so happy New Year to everybody. This is the first birthday of your book, right?
[0:45:43.0] DD: It is. That's true, because it came out January 1st, 2019.
[0:45:46.8] JR: Yes. Happy birthday to Your Future Self Will Thank You. I think people are going to see very quickly why we're talking about this book on New Year's Day. Tell us what's the book about, Drew.
[0:45:57.3] DD: Yeah. Well, it's funny because the book actually grew out of a personal frustration with New Year's resolutions. I had the experience, I think a lot of people do, of coming to the end of the year, getting all excited about the next year, making these New Year's resolutions. Then a few days, maybe a few weeks into the new year realizing that you've fallen flat on your face and kept none of your resolutions.
Honestly for me, it was a personal journey at first, wanting to figure out how to shore up my self-control, how to grow in this area. I wish I could say I was attracted to the topic, because my self-control was so incredible and I was like a ninja of personal discipline, but the reverse is true.
Initially, actually I was just reading for myself, researching all about self-control from a biblical and a scientific perspective, try to grow in this area and then I realized somewhere along the way, “Hey, maybe there's something that would be helpful for other people as well.” It morphed into a book project and I'm just hoping it can be helpful for other people too.
[0:46:55.2] JR: I think the best books start with really selfish questions, right? I think about that a lot. My first book Called to Create was born out of very selfish questions I had about like, how do Christian entrepreneurs more deeply integrate their faith with their work?
Tell our audience what they're going to get out of this book. Walk them through the structure of the book. I have thoroughly enjoyed the book myself, but these people haven't even read the introduction. Give us an overview of what they're going to take away from Your Future Self Will Thank You.
[0:47:24.2] DD: Sure. Basically, it's like a primer, a primer, however you say that on the topic. I start out by talking about my personal struggle being pretty transparent about that and then looking at why is self-control so important? It really is.
Researchers call it an instrumental virtue, meaning that you need self-control if you're going to grow in other areas of your life. It's so true, because if you think about it, can you be faithful without self-control? Can you be honest, patient, kind, hard-working? You need self-control for all these things. Just talking about the importance of it from a practical and a biblical perspective.
Then I get a little bit into the research, looking at willpower and the role that plays, the research on that. I look at habits and how that can really help you, because you get these automatic routines, hopefully healthy habits that can carry you and help you grow in this area.
Then some of the challenges, right? I mean, and some of them are just been around forever. Then other challenges like the inundation that we have with tech these days, distracting us, tempting us to various things, how do we deal with that? Hopefully giving some practical strategies for people on how to be better in this area.
[0:48:31.3] JR: We talk a lot about habits and routines on this show. I'm curious, after going through this process of doing all this research, first for yourself and then for this book, what personal habits and routines have you implemented in your own life?
[0:48:45.5] DD: Yeah, great question. Some of them have been really simple. They say the best way to establish a good habit is to replace it with a bad one, right? I realized early on, one of the goals I had when I started this book was just to read my bible every morning. I thought that was a better way to start the day than jumping on social media, which was my bad habit. Not that social media is bad. It's fine, but it's just not the way I wanted to start the day scrolling through Twitter.
No matter how hard I tried though to start my day reading scripture, I would inevitably reach for my phone instead and instead of getting on my bible app, I'd go on Twitter and then e-mail and then a kid would walk into my room and the day begins, right? I never get around to read my bible. Understanding that I had a habit in place there was important. What I eventually had to do is actually move the phone off my nightstand, hold my big black bible out of retirement, plunk it down there instead.
It was cool, because I was conditioned to consume content as soon as my alarm went off and I got out of bed. Now instead of reaching for the phone, the bible is there. It’s cool. Just by doing surgery on the habit loop, keeping the cue the same; waking up and reaching for something to read, I was able to establish a new healthy habit. Did that with some other areas too.
[0:50:00.1] JR: I was just talking to – you know John Mark Comer’s work?
[0:50:03.0] DD: You bet. Absolutely. He's the local guy, we live 10 miles apart.
[0:50:07.1] JR: I didn't know you were in Portland.
[0:50:08.3] DD: I am. Yeah.
[0:50:09.3] JR: I didn’t even know that.
[0:50:10.6] DD: Well, actually I'm just north of Portland in Vancouver, Washington, right across the border, but I'm 15 minutes from downtown.
[0:50:15.4] JR: Vancouver's one of my favorite cities in the world. I love it so much.
[0:50:17.6] DD: Awesome.
[0:50:18.5] JR: I was just talking to John Mark yesterday and we were – he said something about, I think it was 90 plus percent of Americans keep their phone on their nightstand, which is old mind-boggling to me.
[0:50:29.5] DD: I believe it. Yeah.
[0:50:30.6] JR: I've never kept it on my night – well, I shouldn't say never. I haven't in years kept it on my nightstand. I think it's a big productivity hack. Hey, who's this book for?
[0:50:39.2] DD: Yeah. Well, it's cheating because of the subtitles about something like, for sinners, quitters and procrastinators. I realize that's pretty broad. I would say it's for anyone who – obviously, it's geared toward Christians. If you're not a Christian, some people have read it that aren't believers and have benefitted somewhat, but it assumes a Christian worldview in perspective and that the bible is something that we want to follow and believe.
Christians that find themselves – it's like, okay, I've got enough. I have a lot of theological knowledge. I believe I should be doing these things, but I find myself unable to do them, not because of lack of information or inspiration, but because really I lack self-control and discipline. It's a way that people like that can grow.
Pretty broad, but I think there are a lot of people though that this is not even around the radar. They're like, “Oh, no. I don't need more self-control. I just need to more fully express myself or something.” For people that realize, “Hey, I got a deficiency in this area” I'm hoping the book is helpful.
[0:51:36.5] JR: Yeah, good. The audience for this podcast, the people listening to this episode are ambitious professionals, these are Christians who have integrated their faith with their work and that is leading them to be more ambitious for their career, doing more exceptional work for the glory of God primarily and the good of others. For that person specifically, what are they going to get from this book? How is this book going to serve that particular audience well?
[0:52:04.3] DD: Yeah. Wow, that's intimidating. That sounds like some really sharp, driven people, probably more so than me. I think, actually sometimes when you're in that camp, right? When you are someone who's really focused, maybe even a little type-A and driven to change the world and that's all great, sometimes self-control means slowing down and putting some boundaries in your life around work and your personal life.
One of the things I found really helpful researching this book was what they call it bright lines strategy, where you have these bright lines in your life, whether it's food, your use of tech that prevent you from going overboard in certain areas. For instance when it comes to technology use, a bright line strategy might be I don't look at my phone past 7 p.m. Or my family, we do something called no screen Sunday, which is just what it sounds like, where it's okay, on Sunday, we're going to look each other in the eyes, we're going to go for a hike. We're not going to sit there and watch TV. Dad's off his phone.
We do it imperfectly. I'm usually the one who breaks it, but I think especially when you're really driven, you need some – and it's counterintuitive, because you think self-control is just about being more productive, but sometimes it's about slowing down too, because that's tough.
[0:53:11.6] JR: Yeah, that's incredibly well said and reminds me a lot, we were just talking about John Mark Comer, reminds me a lot of his new book, The Ruthless Elimination of Hurry. Two great books. Hey Drew, I just want to thank you for writing this book. I have enjoyed it. I've appreciated it for myself and I know that my audience is going to really love this book as well. Thanks for taking a few minutes to chat about it.
[0:53:34.3] DD: Hey, thank you so much. It's been fun.
[END OF EPISODE]
[0:53:38.0] JR: The book is Your Future Self Will Thank You. You could pick up a copy right now wherever books are sold. Hey, thank you for listening to the Call to Mastery. I look out on 2020 and I look at the projects that I'm most excited about. Yeah, I just keep coming back to this podcast, maybe even other podcasts, other forms of audio in 2020. Who knows? No, but I love making this show for you. I hope you guys enjoy listening to these conversations as much as I enjoy putting them together for you and bringing these people into your ears, into your homes, right?
Thank you again for being such a loyal listener to the show. Happy New Year and I'll see you next week.
[END]