Podcast 530: Al McDermid: Finding The Flow Within The Written Word

Todays guest joining us on the Steve Jobs inspired Join Up Dots podcast is an author with a similar tale to many of our guests. At least the starting point is. He was born in Michigan, where he lived for most of his childhood, before making the decision to join the U.S. Navy upon graduating high school. He served aboard three different ships and at the U.S. Naval Station at Subic Bay in the Philippines. And whilst on-board dealing with the idle hours, he began writing about his experiences simply as a way to pass the time. Which is something that most of us will do, but not consider why we are doing it. But the simple answer is we are not trying to simply pass the time, but instead are choosing to do something that we enjoy to pass the time. Which if you can then find a way to monetize this enjoyable pursuit, you quite simply never ever work again. After getting out of the Navy he worked at a variety of jobs, including fry cook, baker, disk jockey, electrician's assistant, book seller, editor, teacher, and taxi driver. But it was when he took advantage of the G.I. Bill to attend college in Hawaii, that he discovered that he could actually write well, and where he continued to polish his skills. He worked as student writing tutor beginning in his second year, and won a number of writing awards during his junior and senior years. All of these small dots building up to something that couldn't be denied. He was on his way to becoming an author. He just needed to write that first book, which appeared once he relocated to Japan and took a job in Tokyo. He took on the National Novel Writing Month challenge, and after three false starts, finished his first 50,000 word novel in 2011 called The Crossroads at Forgotten Lake and the rest is history. So why was it that he took so long to get to the point that his writing prowess could be unleashed on the world? And does he look back to his life before the Navy and see any more clues as to where his life was ultimately going to end up? Well let's find out as we bring onto the show to start joining up dots, with the one and only Al McDermid