Daniel Boey is a fashion industry maestro and one of Singapore’s success stories.
He is also the author of 3 books:
- The Book of Daniel
- Behind Every *itch Is A Back Story
- We Adopted
On Friday, 6 Sep, he laid down his commandments for getting one’s life story published. Here are the golden rules (I take some artistic license in interpretation):
1. Comb through your unique life experiences, especially those where not many people have access to. Tell that story! For Daniel, this was his experience on reality TV show, Asia’s Next Top Model.
2. Figure out what is your voice. This voice should be something you’re comfortable with.
3. Write spontaneously and organically. Do not pad!This process has to be inspired.
4. Don’t be worried to dream big, but don’t get carried away.
5. Start with an ego, but quickly put it away. You material needs to resonate and for it to resonate, it needs to relate to people emotionally.
6. Tell a compelling story, but don’t embellish. Your authentic story could be just as engaging, if not more.
7. Think out of the box. Help people to think, “I never thought of it this way!”
8. Identify your target audience and write it so that it’s meaningful to them.
9. Get feedback from others. Filter through for constructive feedback. On dealing with unwelcome feedback, from trolls for example, Mr Boey says he simply retweets their posts and thanks the troll for taking the time to comment/ watch/ read. This, he says, throws the troll off balance in his or her goal of bullying.
Not a Mr Boey tip, but one way to finish that half-written manuscript is to stop re-reading and editing it whenever you write. Review it once the job is done.
Here’re some photos from the session at Scape:
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