I was in Portland, OR at the World Domination Summit conference (basically 3000 passionate creative types networking and trying to bring their dreams to life) and I met with a book agent, someone with whom I have been going back and forth for a while now via email.

Many of you know that I am looking to secure a book deal with a major publisher within the next year—after at least temporarily ditching the self-publishing angle for now—and I've been meeting with a few agents about my concept.

And concepts I have many ;)

While I was so grateful to be meeting with a great agent and talking through so much of my vision for my first major book, it was also part depressing. See, the nature of traditionally published books is that they need to have an insanely good “hook,”—you know, THAT THING that causes people to actually want to buy it. The hook is normally the title and tagline, and because it’s so competitive in the publishing space, you have to strike a balance of curiosity, counterintuitive-ness, and sexiness. It’s like marketing anything—people have to be convinced of its novelty and effectiveness. And oftentimes that can’t happen without some dumbing down and sensationalism.

Welp, unfortunately for yours truly, the idea of #moderation365—while you and I love it, live it and know that it actually works—people out there just don’t find it sexy enough. It’s like, “Yeah, yeah, yeah, moderation. NEXT!”

See, this is the problem I have with the dieting industry.

It’s entirely based on sensationalism and bright, shiny objects. Which, because of their novelty, on one hand we can’t resist, but on the other hand … the shit just doesn’t work.

‘The Grapefruit Diet.’ Uh, yeah.

‘Lose 10 Lbs in 10 Days!’ WTF?

‘Eat These 6 Foods For the Rest of Your Life and Lose Weight!’ … #idie

So there tends to be a disconnect between what sells and what actually works.

And this? It hits my unfairness button big-time.

So, back to the meeting.

Here I am talking to the agent about my fantastic idea—how I am going to sexify moderation—and while he’s intrigued and likes my platform, he says, “Hmm, yeah, it’s going to be harder to sell because well, it’s more, you know, soft skills. Now, ‘Get Shredded in Seven’ or something like that is a lot easier to sell because it’s more nuts and bolts.”

#idieagain

This is a problem. The very books that people are being compelled to pick up and follow are, by design, so incredibly extreme that 99% of the people doing these dies with fail.

Because again, the old shit--you know, the stuff that actually works--is not really sellable.

Well, this is something I am super passionate about. Mainly because I hear from DOZENS of women daily who are struggling to be perfect on these random diets. And not only are they not successful at losing weight, but the way they now approach food is mentally funkified. Boooo.

Thus, the reason my entire business is based on helping women become less neurotic about food and more self-reliant.

But those? They’re “soft skills.”

Well, as you can probably imagine, I wanted to grab the microphone, commandeer the stage in front of those 3,000 people and scream at the top of my lungs that “soft skills” are where the magic happens! HAHA.

Soft skills—your perception, how you think about the process, how to view the journey—are the transformative pieces.

Nuts and bolts are easy. Writing meal plans is effortless. Handing someone a list of “to-dos” in a book isn’t a skill—there are only so many ways to recommend chicken and broccoli. Telling people what to eat and what exercises to do is day 1 stuff.

Where’s the nuance? Where are the tools and strategies to help people actually implement those to-do’s? What tools are there for people who know, but who are struggling to do? Are they just SOL?

I don’t believe they are.

The answer is … your mindset.

The way you think about the process is what bridges the gap between knowing and doing. The most successful people don’t “do a plan for 30 days”—they eat forever. They have worked hard to fall in love with the way they do things so that the process feels easy.

Getting to that point requires you hone those soft skills—things like self-compassion, resiliency, gratitude, giving yourself benefit of the doubt, introspection and self-awareness.

These things are what make you effective. Effective in your physique goals, in your professional life and in your relationships. These things help you actually enjoy your life, rather than becoming a slave to rules and requirements.

And so. I’m sticking to my School of Soft Skills. We’ll see how it pans out!

But, I can promise you I am going to keep on with the education, through blogs at JillFit, through daily Facebook posts, through emails like this one, and through educational products and programs.

The Mindset Makeover 2: #RadicalResponsibility course is open for enrollment until tomorrow (Friday), and you can bet that I will be talking a whole lot about those skills: consistency, honesty, authenticity, responsibility, self-trust and body esteem.

Many soft skills will be addressed—insights AND actual tools—and they will absolutely be transformative, guaranteed.

I invite you to join the course by Friday (tomorrow!), before I close it down until 2016!

Let me know if you have any questions, and I can’t wait to work with you!

Xo,

Jill

P.S. For those interested, the book is still very much on the table, just working to get that perfect angle so that people will pick it up, and then proceed to learn #moderation365 :)