You literally have to become the book. Live in it, be it, for it to be successful. You have to work as hard as you can and concentrate as if that book was a life and death issue. You cannot be a part time writer. You are either a full time writer while writing your book or not.
As part of my series on the “5 Things You Need To Know To Write a Bestselling Book,” I had the pleasure of interviewing Nevsah Fidan Karamehmet.
Nevsah is a recognized authority, who combines science and spirituality for physical, emotional, mental development and for enhancing psychological well-being. She is a pioneer in helping people learn functional breathing habits and a motivational speaker on the subject of consciousness and breathing. She teaches about staying in the “now” through breathing, in her Miracle Courses.
As a best-selling author, a faculty member of the Graduate School of Behavioral Health Sciences, a consultant to Better Physiology, Ltd., the Founding President of the Breath Coaching Federation, and the national representative of International Breathwork Foundation, Nevsah has won numerous awards in her field and has been an inspiration to millions. She is a recognized authority on emotional and physical healing through breathing. She has been working on breath for 20 years, established breath coaching as a profession in Turkey, trained thousands of people from around the world in breath coaching, and has inspired more than 100,000 people in her lectures, workshops, seminars, and private tutorials to learn breathing for improving their health and performance.
Thank you so much for joining us! Can you share a story about what brought you to this particular career path?
I have been leading seminars, giving lectures and doing workshops on ‘how to change your breathing habits and change your whole life’ for more than 15 years all around the world.
I have worked with amazing people who literally changed their whole lives when they got more conscious about how they breathe, how they think and how they behave, with the methodology I taught them.
I wanted to share my knowledge and experience on my path in my books so I started writing. I first wrote about the methods I teach, then the spiritual knowledge behind it all.
What was (so far) the most exhilarating or fulfilling experience you’ve had as an author?
The most amazing and fulfilling experience I ever had was going to a book signing day and finding hundreds of people lined up. That was one of the most fulfilling experiences.
What was the craziest, weirdest, wildest experience you’ve had as a bestselling author?
The craziest, weirdest, wildest experience was when I decided to write my first novel. I had already written 7 books but they were all about my profession and it was easy for me. Writing a novel from the start that would support people understanding the philosophy of life and the truth behind it was really tough. If you asked me to write about spirituality, the miracle consciousness, love, healing, it is very easy for me because I have been giving lectures on unconditional love, healing, self mastering for over 15 years. But a novel, my God it was tough! It felt like I had to start all over again and get a second degree!
What is the greatest part about being a successful, bestselling author? What is the worst (if anything) part?
The greatest part is that you meet tens of people every day who read your books and got lots of beautiful experiences by them. I believe my readers are the biggest success I can ever have. I love them. I love hearing their experiences with my books, what they learned, how they changed their lives just by reading them. It is the best part. The worst would be getting stuck. Sometimes my life gets so busy with my own work, if I am also writing a book, I might get stuck for a while. I even forget the whole message behind it sometimes.
I find it hard to concentrate on my books once again after I wrote them and waited to go over them for a long time. That is the worst.
What is the one habit you believe contributed the most to you becoming a bestselling writer?
I am a very hardworking and dedicated person. When I am on a project or writing a book I concentrate on it as if it was a death and life matter. I do not give up, rest or do anything in between until I am done with what I need to finish. I know if I stop, it is going to take me forever to get back. Like one time, I was writing my third novel and I had to stop in the middle because my schedule with my seminars and lectures got very busy, then it took me at least another month to get back to writing again and I promised myself not to do it again.
Which writer or leader has had the biggest impact on you as a writer?
Eckhart Tolle because he writes everything so simple. He is talking about the universal knowledge but he can keep it really really simple. I love that.
What was the biggest challenge you faced in your journey to becoming a bestselling author? How did you overcome it?
If you have a good book and you know it is good for sure, the only thing you need to concentrate on should be getting people to read it. This was my biggest challenge. Because I knew my books were good books but I had to spend lots of time, energy, and money to get people to read them. I would suggest spending every penny you have on PR. Of course if you have a good book. If the book itself is not good, no PR campaign could help you.
What challenge or failure did you learn the most from in your writing career? What lesson(s) did you learn?
I learned that to write a really good book you need to be ready to invest your time, energy, money. It has to be the number one thing you concentrate on. You should think about it day and night, awake and asleep, that is how people write bestseller books.
You literally have to become the book. Live in it, be it, for it to be successful. You have to work as hard as you can and concentrate as if that book was a life and death issue. You cannot be a part time writer. You are either a full time writer while writing your book or not.
What are the things you would tell your younger self who was just starting out on their writing journey?
I would tell myself to believe in my books more than I did. I somehow knew they would be successful but still, I wanted to push and push and have more pr and spend more money on bill boards, magazines etc. I would not do that now. A good book always sells.
You definitely need good PR but you don’t need to force it. You don’t need to spend hundreds and thousands of money. A modest, good PR strategy would be enough. I would concentrate more and working closely to the books stores and do more projects with them instead of spending all my money on PR.
What are you most excited to work on next? Most excited to read next?
I am excited to read more on the Sufi Path because right now I am working on a project that would bring thousands of people to Anatolia and start the Sufi Trail Tradition again.
Many people read Rumi but they do not really experience Him. His words are alive, living in Anatolian ground. The Sufi Trail is the most powerful spiritual journey one can take and it does not have to be tough as the old days. We created a beautiful journey where people can experience everything that needs to be experienced on The Sufi Trail and easily. I am very excited for that! I am sure ı will write about it later.
You are a person of great influence. If you could inspire a movement that would bring the most amount of good to the most amount of people, what would that be?
I would tell everyone, YOUR IDEAS ARE UNIQUE. THEY ARE IMPORTANT. WRITE THEM. SHARE THEM. TEACH THEM. We are all teachers and students in our own worlds. Once you stop learning or teaching you die. So keep on learning and keep on teaching so that you can keep on living!
Thank you so much for these great insights!