Listen:
As someone who started out in service journalism at Woman’s World magazine decades ago, I found Megy Karydes new book, 50 Ways to More Calm, Less Stress: Scientifically Proven Ways to Relieve Anxiety and Boost Your Mental Health Using Your Five Senses really well sourced and structured and wanted to speak to her about how she did it.
We discussed ways we both used to find experts, locate research and navigate through a complicated publishing landscape, while creating a quality product.
In This Episode
- Megy Karydes mental health journey and reason for the book [4:17]
- Structuring her book and Estelle’s tips on service journalism [13:01]
- Megy’s story about finding an agent & pitching to book publishers [11:05]
- How she found expert sources for her book and what Estelle recommends [18:14]
- Resources from Megy and Estelle every writer/author can use [13:41]
- Building accountability structures [31:40]
- Creating deadlines for yourself as an author [25:15]
Watch on YouTube
About Megy
Megy Karydes is a professional writer who has written for publications such as Architectural Digest, National Geographic, USA Today, Eating Well, Sierra, House Beautiful, and more. Her book, 50 Ways to More Calm, Less Stress: Scientifically Proven Ways to Relieve Anxiety and Boost Your Mental Health Using Your Five Senses, explores different ways each of our senses can help bring more calm into our lives. She also ghostwrites books and other content for clients.
In addition to being a Master Gardener, she holds a BA in English Literature and MBA in Marketing. She also teaches graduate-level communications courses at Johns Hopkins University. Megy lives in Chicago with her husband, two teens, and rescue dog who barks at everything and anything.
Thank you for being my guest, Megy, and our great discussion!
Connect with Megy
Connect with Estelle
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News
- Freelance Writing Direct was included in this great list of resources by longtime freelancer Erik Sherman in his substack, and don’t forget to sign up for mine. I have a new feature coming out next week, that I’m excited about
- I had a wonderful conversation about Writing That Gets Noticed and the state of publishing with Joanne Tombrakos, a fellow NYU Professor on her wonderful podcast Marketing, Mindfulness & Martinis. Thank you Joanne, for inviting me on your program for our discussion on storytelling, creating content for publications, and pitching ideas.
- Jennifer Chen, who I had on episode #70, wrote a wonderful piece on Micro Memoir for Writer’s Digest and quoted me and other writers I admire. Read it in this month’s March/April issue (to buy click here.
- Speaking of Micro Memoir, join me for a webinar on it for Writer’s Digest in May, Making Your Mark with Micro Memoir. Sign up here.
- My episode was in the top 10 of 2023 for the podcast by The EmPOWERed Half Hour (it came in at number #3, and I am honored). Thank you Becca.
- Don’t forget to check out my post about the goings on at AWP. Love being a mentor in the Writer to Writer Mentor program.
