Where do you get your inspiration from? In terms of my non-fiction work, I tend to write about things I’ve learned a lot about.  My first book, How To Find Your Vital Vocation: A Practical Guide To Discovering Your Career Purpose And Getting A Job You Love (http://www.viewbook.at/vitalvocation) outlines the process I discovered in building my own portfolio career as a charity chief executive, career coach, and freelance writer.  I’m also working on a book – Real Food Revival Plan - about healthy eating, having experimented with my own eating habits until I found an approach that made me feel healthiest and most energetic.

In terms of fiction, I have notes scribbled down in lots of places about things I want to write about. Inspiration here can come from many directions.  Snippets of conversations, things I glimpse, and ideas that flash into my head.  The inspiration comes from lots of places – I know I’m ready to pull things together into a cohesive whole when I feel that “click”, and that’s far less predictable.

What is hardest – writing, publishing or marketing? Well, I’m new to the last two.  Writing can be hard when it’s not flowing, but really – if you’re a writer – it’s harder not to write.  I think it was Maya Angelou who said something like “when I’m thinking about writing, it’s painful, but when I’m in and writing, I’m home free”.  I haven’t yet tried to get a traditional publishing deal, deciding instead to focus on indie publishing as a way of getting my work out there.  The options available these days to indie publishers are of course amazing, but I think it’s quite wrong to see it as the soft option.  Your work still has to be of a high quality, and you still have to manage the process – not just the writing, but the formatting, design aspects, thinking about pricing and so on.  There’s a lot to consider, and it can be quite overwhelming when you’re new. You just have to take it step by step.  In terms of marketing, I’m only just starting on that road. That’s what this interview is partly about!

What marketing works for you? I’ve developed a pretty healthy social media presence.  I have an author twitter feed (https://www.twitter.com/cormackcarr) and a Facebook page for my book (https://www.facebook.com/vitalvocation) and of course my blog at http://www.cormackcarr.com .  I also have a growing email list, which I think is really important for any writer now.  It’s hard to tell what works best yet.  Ask me again in a few weeks, once the blog tour is over!

Do you plan to publish more books? Yes.  I have a couple more non-fiction titles in the pipeline, and the beginnings of a novel brewing.  I also have some poetry and short stories I’m considering collecting together and publishing in a single volume.  And a children’s story.  I just need to decide on what to focus on first!

What else do you do to make money, other than write? It is rare today for writers to be full time… I’m chief executive of a local charity, BVSC The Centre for Voluntary Action, which supports volunteers and community groups to make a difference in society.  That’s my full time job, but I trained as a career coach a few years ago just for my own interest and actually started my blog as a means of promoting my coaching practice.  I guess I’ve transitioned from being a coach who writes to being a writer who coaches.  The topic of my first book How To Find Your Vital Vocation (http://www.viewbook.at/vitalvocation) is very much about helping others to determine what kind of career combination is right for them.  I think portfolio careers are becoming more popular and it’s certainly a model that can work well for writers, especially in the early stages.

Ready to choose or change your job? Stuck in work you hate? Think the career of your dreams is beyond your reach?

IT’S NEVER TOO LATE TO FIND YOUR VITAL VOCATION

If you don’t love your work, you deserve better – and with this book at your side, you can get it. A lively and potentially life-changing guide,How To Find Your Vital Vocation sets out a simple-to-follow yet profoundly effective process that will take you step-by-step from wherever you are now to a working life based on your most cherished dreams.

LEARN HOW TO:

• Hear the inner call that’s telling you what will make you truly happy
• Rediscover your gifts and use them to build a perfectly-tailored career
• Identify and overcome the obstacles that stand between you and your ideal work
• Create powerful networks to help you find great jobs that are never advertised
• Find out what it takes to become an entrepreneur of the future
• Maximise the impact of your job applications
• Ace every interview
• Attain reward levels that will help you thrive – even in this tough economy!

Put yourself in charge of your career – once and for all. Packed with valuable insights, powerful exercises and illuminating self-coaching questions, How To Find Your Vital Vocation will help you chart a practical path to a fun and fulfilling livelihood. In this comprehensive resource, expert career coach Brian Cormack Carr shows you how to find your passion and purpose and finally start doing the work you were born to do.

WHAT THEY’RE SAYING:

“Too many of us have gone about finding our livelihood in a haphazard way. Before long, we become a statistic in a job dissatisfaction survey. Happily, it doesn’t have to be that way and Brian Cormack Carr proves it. If you think that work should be about more – much more – than just a way to pay your bills, this book is the roadmap you’ve been looking for. Work with How To Find Your Vital Vocation for a short time and you’ll be working at your real work for a long time.”

~ BARBARA J. WINTER  Bestselling author of Making a Living Without a Job

“Warm, witty and wise. I highly recommend this book. Brian knows his stuff and How To Find Your Vital Vocation is a breath of fresh air.”

~ GRACE OWEN  Executive coach and author of The Career Itch

“I appreciated the step-by-step nature of Vital Vocation. It made finding a new career that much easier, and I’m still amazed at how well it helped me clarify what I wanted to do with the rest of my life.”

~ DAVID  Member of the Vital Vocation Online Coaching Programme

“Vital Vocation helped me focus after I had spent too long panicking and going nowhere. Now my part-time hobby has grown to a full-time occupation and I’ve finally given up the day job that was making me sad!”

~ STEVEN  Member of the Vital Vocation Online Coaching Programme

Buy Now @ Amazon & Smashwords

Genre –  NonFiction / Careers

Rating – G

More details about the author

Connect with Brian Cormack Carr on Facebook  & Twitter

Website http://vitalvocation.com/