#52Women52Weeks: Writer to the Stars, Laura Morton, Wants You (or Her) to Publish Your Story

Laura Morton has written over 40 books and a staggering 19 New York Times Bestsellers, with a wide range of celebrities, including, Susan Lucci, Jennifer Hudson, Al Roker, Justin Bieber, Joan Lunden, Marilu Henner, Melissa Etheridge, and the Jonas Brothers—to name a few. She has been involved in the entertainment industry for more than 25 years as a writer, producer, speaker and entrepreneur, and continues to pursue projects of interest that cross publishing, production and electronic media through her company, Laura Morton Management. 

1) What have you learned most from telling the story of others?

I never know how the extraordinary people I work with are going to change my life—but they all do in one way or another. I don’t expect it—and sometimes I don’t see it coming but I am so grateful for the gift of learning from their experiences. Throughout the years I’ve co-authored more than 40 books with a variety of personalities from all walks of life. When I work with someone, I write in first person, which means I’ve been rock stars, politicians, rivaling soap stars, reality stars, child stars, a beloved sitcom star, morning show hosts from competing networks, a hard hitting news journalist, several health advocates, and even a bounty hunter. I have been kidnapped, in prison for manslaughter, have been the top male super model in the world, a female race car driver in the male dominated sport, donned the cover of Sports Illustrated in a swimsuit, been in one of the greatest boy band’s in history, a mega pop star, founded several billion dollar corporations and yes, the MindFreak, who can levitate in front of thousands of people.

I have been born again, Jewish, Mormon, Christian, Buddhist, Catholic and Christian; I am straight, gay, bi, curious and so much more. If this unique access doesn’t give me the most exceptional perspective on life, I don’t know what does! I have the rare opportunity to look inside each of these lives because the people I work with allow me unprecedented access to share in their experiences, wisdom and wit-- from the inside out. It’s like having a rare backstage pass to see what life is like when your favorite rock star isn’t performing, that hard hitting broadcast journalist is home feeding his kids or changing their diapers and the softer, more reflective side of those hardened titans of business when they’re not negotiating multimillion dollar deals. I am able to reap the benefits of all of their life lessons—good and bad, without actually having to go through them. The best part is I can cherry pick those I wish to take along on my own journey—and I have learned so many, whether it’s “the power of the pause” “what price peace” or the “4 addictions”—the addiction to the opinions of others, drama, the past and worry and how to break them.

I also get to ask the hard questions, dig deep and connect the dots that often times the people I work with wouldn’t allow in a traditional interview but welcome in ours. They trust our process and in return, they give me more than they often expect to. This access brings to the surface emotion and content that eventually connects them to their audience in an intimate way so they feel as if they are talking just to them. It’s personal and yet their stories are usually full of universal truths. I am looking for and harvesting their best life stories, the ones that touch your heart and mind— the stories you can’t stop thinking about because it taps something deep inside you and makes a difference in how you feel. Books, especially memoirs have the ability to do that for the reader. Above all, I’ve learned it’s a great privilege to bring that to life on the page so others can share in the experience that I am so blessed to call my life’s work.

2) Does everyone have a life story to tell?

Everyone has a story to tell, which is what I call job security! And it doesn’t have to be a life story—it can be about a moment in time or even a business memoir. Lately I’ve been doing a lot of speaking appearances, talking to companies on the extreme value of corporate storytelling. Too many companies and executives are caught up in using fancy business jargon that is meaningless or following a “ME TOO” marketing strategy, which amounts to telling someone else’s story instead of telling their own. They are relying on meaningless words that don’t accurately or authentically characterize what they do, why they are different, or how they provide value to customers, shareholders, employees, and society. This type of authentic, meaningful and informative content is now considered the rule, rather than the exception. LinkedIn gets this…in fact, so much so they list at least two dozen CSOs—Chief Story Officers— executives, a corporate trend that was born at Nike in the nineties.

Stories are fundamental to how we think about the world, but more so, how we think about ourselves and others and how others see us. They’ve been around since the beginning of time. Think about it—hieroglyphics, religious stories— they’re how mom and dad taught us to read with Dick and Jane, how we learned in school and so on. Whether you realize it or not stories are basically what got you from diapers to where you are today.

To me, great storytelling is the difference between speaking and actually being heard. Regardless of what you do for a living, at some point you will be asked, “What’s your story.” It’s a simple question that I find most people fumble over answering with confidence. Having this response formulated and ready will definitely set you apart from the crowd, but more so, it will no doubt help you understand where you’ve been, where you are now and where you want to go.

3)  How do process rejection + fear?

I have never liked being told what I can and cannot do. There’s no place in my life for the word, “can’t” because it accomplishes nothing. Rejection has to be turned into a challenge instead of a defeat—or what I call turning obstacles into opportunities. Astonishingly, the average toddler hears the word "no" 400 times a day. While I am sure I was told "no" for my own safety when I was a child, as an adult I don’t hear the word “no” very often—even when people say it. To me, it simply means, “try harder.”

I was told my first book was a horrible idea, and then sold it for $750,000 anyway, put it on the New York Times Bestseller list and went on to co-write more than 40 books and 19 more New York Times bestsellers. There’s something about overcoming other people’s idea of what can and cannot work over my own. In fact, I love proving other people wrong. If you believe in yourself, anything is possible—even the perceived impossible. I say this to my 7 year old daughter all the time. The phrase, “FEAR, False Evidence Appearing Real” is written on a white piece of paper and taped to the wall in her bedroom. Every day when she comes home from school, I ask her to tell me one thing she tried and failed at. If she didn’t fail, she didn’t try hard enough. I am raising my daughter to not be afraid of failing but rather to embrace it. For most people, FEAR is the greatest hurdle that holds us back in life—especially young girls. WE are each born with only 2 fears—the fear of falling and the fear of loud noises—every other fear is learned. If we learn it, we can overcome it.  Facing and conquering FEAR has been one of my greatest assets throughout my life and career. It has opened more doors than any other skill or trade and has proven fruitful time and time again.  Fearless living is the freedom to start over, begin anew, whether it’s rebooting your career, relationship, health or any other area of your life.

4) Who is a warrior to you?

When I think of a warrior, I envision someone who is brave, courageous, compassionate, genuine, authentic, action oriented and someone who advocates for a cause. She is able to break free of worry, is not attached to the opinions of others and lives an authentic life. When I chose to become a single mom in my 40’s—a decision which at the time, was considered by many to be bold and brave, one of my fertility doctors actually required me to undergo a psychological “evaluation” before he would agree to treat me. I ultimately went through 7 rounds of IVF over the course of 3 years without telling anyone what I was doing because I didn’t want and couldn’t afford to jeopardize my career opportunities. At the time, I believed this was a true warrior story—that is until I finally became pregnant at the age of 43. That’s when I came to understand the true meaning of “warrior mom”—at least warrior mom to be. I delivered a book to my publisher 2 days before delivering my daughter without my editor ever knowing I was pregnant. 

As women, we fight for our family, our loved ones, our communities and the causes we believe in. We put ourselves last on the list, of course until something happens that causes us to become warriors in our own lives and forces us to fight for ourselves—and that’s when the word "warrior" takes on an even deeper meaning and purpose. Seven years after becoming a mom, I unexpectedly redefined what a warrior was--this time fighting against my foe: Breast cancer.

Refusing to be defined by my disease, I wanted to live each day as an example to my daughter, to show her that, as women, we must take control of our health at all stages in our life. I didn’t hide anything from her and always spoke in a way that didn’t make cancer seem so scary. She knew that I had lost my mother to cancer when I was 10 and had internalized her fears that I might die too. Thankfully, I caught my cancer early, and because I was also BRCA 1 positive, I took every precaution to ensure a long and healthy life after my treatment.

Words and stories are always important, especially for young girls. We see a lot about princesses and what it takes to be one in our culture. And while it’s easy to see the levity and magic that goes along with fairy tales this was a chance to give her another type of story. One grounded in real life that she could learn from—a reality warrior. I wanted her to know that true warriors persevere in the face of adversity. They exhibit unwavering strength, live life with dignity and with an indomitable spirit.

5) What is the best way to take control of your destiny?

One of my favorite life quotes comes from author Jon Kabat-Zinn; “You can’t change the tide, but you can learn to surf.” We all face lots of challenges every day. Some of them, we can’t do anything about. But in most cases, we have a choice in determining the outcome by the decisions we make which guide our actions. The reality is, in life you won’t always have the ability to change your external circumstances, but you will always be able to control how you react to them. Your mindset, how you perceive things, is how you approach whatever life throws your way. And, that attitude often determines the outcome.

An elite athlete will tell you that their mindset is as important to their performance as talent and physical training. The mark of a champion is the ability to win even when things go wrong. This is the power of maintaining a positive outlook. Those who believe they have the capability of learning and growing through hard work and persistence will continue to evolve and will have a desire and capacity throughout their lives to continue to improve their circumstances. By refusing to accept failure as a bad thing, you can see every situation and challenge as an opportunity to grow and move forward toward whatever your goals are. Changing the words you use from negative to positive, reframing your perspective and seeing yourself as resilient are just a few of the secrets I’ve learned along the way to help me take control of my destiny. I’m not sure we have total control over our destiny, but we surely play a hand in it by the way we handle crisis and challenges.

Connect with Laura Morton HERE

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