Author, Speaker, Coach Barbara Sher passed away on May 10, 2020.
Read Barbara’s obituary here. Barbara’s Club and all its programs continue in the hands of those she trained.
The Dare to Soar Telesummit Recordings
All of the mini-workshops at our February 10, 2024 Telesummit were recorded, and you can listen to all of them for free.
Survival Guide for Dreamers
If you’ve got a dream (or wish you had one) it’s time to stop being stuck. Let us send you 365 days of Barbara’s help with procrastination and Resistance. This new program is designed to give you exactly what you need to finally get moving. Here’s how it works: One day at a time for a full year Barbara will be with you via a brief email, helping you get past the procrastination and resistance that have kept you from achieving your dreams. That’s it. No exercises to do. No discussions to keep up with. Just an email a day to encourage you and teach you how to deal with whatever prevents you from going after your dreams. Begin your Survival Guide year at any time.
Barbara Sher Book Clubs
Our next book club will read Refuse to Choose from July 25 through November 13th. Registration will open on July 11, 2024. I hope you’ll join us. Read more about it here. Members of ongoing book clubs should contact webmaster@barbarasclub.com for assistance. Even after our official reading period has ended, members are still welcome to add comments for the full year. You won’t be alone in finishing the exercises.
Registration for Hanging Out opens on October 3, 2024
If you have not yet experienced the jewel in the crown of Barbara’s Club, please check out Hanging Out. Enjoy a full year of treats every Monday, Wednesday, and Friday. To make sure everyone gets to know plenty of other people, we now open registration only twice a year. Full year registration will open again on October 3, 2024, and monthly registration opens on October 15th. We will begin hanging out together on Monday, October 21st. Don’t miss this! Prior members still have access to all messages they paid for. Links are on the Hanging Out page when you are logged in.
Thinking Through Refuse to Choose: 101 things every Scanner should know
Are you a Scanner? These are people with a different (and often misunderstood) type of mindset: they’re curious and smart, always happiest when learning something new. But no matter how promising a path may appear, Scanners can never give up their love of exploring. And therein lies the problem: despite their passionate engagement with the world and their love of life, Scanners are unable to decide on one path, and they’re often afraid that there’s something horribly wrong with them. It’s usually forgotten that such people were once admired for their wide range of knowledge, even called Renaissance thinkers. Now they’re often labeled as immature, lazy dilettantes by a culture that prizes specialization above all else. I wrote this 99-cent Kindle book (with two great helpers) to highlight the top 101 takeaways from my book, Refuse to Choose! Use All of Your Interests, Passions, and Hobbies to Create the Life and Career of Your Dreams. Use it as an introduction or as a reminder after you read the book. Purchase this Kindle book here.
WriteSpeak Online: Write Your Own Success Story
WriteSpeak Online registration is closed now until February 8, 2025. This is Barbara’s entire WriteSpeak program—the 6-hour, highly interactive Teleworkshop plus a new 48-week online version of the material that was in her WriteSpeak retreat and telecourse, all for a fraction of the earlier price. The course is now taught by Patty Newbold, who taught it with Barbara since 2007, and Patrice Jenkins, a member of that first group and the first WriteSpeaker to be published, who taught it with Barbara and Patty in 2020 and with Patty since then. We also offer optional monthly group coaching and one-on-one coaching. Those who have already completed the required Teleworkshop and want to add the 48-Week Course should write to webmaster@barbarasclub.com.
For more information, check out barbarasclub.com/writespeak or listen to this Telesummit recording: How to Become a Writer and Speaker by Next February. New member registration will open again on February 8, 2025. Come find your message and your audience and begin your writing and speaking career.
Be sure you are on the mailing list to hear about new programs the moment they are available. The mailing list sign-up is under Barbara’s photo at the bottom of this page.
I have tried to sign up for the newsletter but the link is broken?
I will definitely investigate this, Amy. In the meantime, I’ve added your email, and you should receive your free Idea Party instructions ebook shortly.
Hello Patty
Sorry but I didn’t know how to contact you so I write here.
I would like to cancel from the Club “Live the Life you Love”.
What procedure should I follow? Is this message enough?
Thank you,
-Chiara
When are the Resistant workshops happening again?
Thank you!
Comment, huh? I am listening to “Refuse to Choose”. If I had discovered this book sooner I may have considered another option, but I quit my job cutting grass over a year ago, put my most prized possessions in a storage unit and drove. I wound up in an unlikely job (dog boarding) that allows me a lot of free time. My family and friends think I am nuts, and I have become indifferent to much of life, including their opinions. That said, I am proud of my completely irrational, goofy sense of humor. I am a “scanner” as Sher describes in this book. I am not going to choose anything–work wise, mate wise–that is too permanent…I can’t even put a bumper sticker on my truck because it is too permanent. I have tried other “comment” posts on other sites but never get responses. I know this one will though!!!
You’re listening to Refuse to Choose, Glen? How? On audio? Can you tell me? (I’m happy to respond to the rest of your email, too.)
(I hope you haven’t left comment posts here that got no response!)
I don’t know about Glen but I listen to my books using my Amazon Kindle. 🙂
I’m interested is courses from Barbara.
Super! The next one will be a book club in German, followed in June by a book club in English. If you don’t already receive Barbara’s newsletter, look for the signup form just below her photo near the bottom of every barbarasclub.com page.
How to have fun
Hi Patty,
At some point I thought I had heard that Refuse to Choose will be offered again this November. Do you know of any upcoming book clubs as of now?
Thanks a lot,
Nadine
I hope you’re on the mailing list, Nadine, because we’re sending out the newsletter with registration information in about 10 minutes. 🙂
If you’re not, scroll down to right below my photo and get on it soon.
Oh how exciting!! Thank you!! Glad I didn’t just dream there was going to be another RTC book club starting soon. Hahah! 🙂
Thank you so much, Barbara! I’ve been on the mailing list for about a year but added my email address once more just in case. Can’t wait to get started!
We are finally moving back from Germany to Florida in just six days and RTC will be a such a blessing to me and help remind me of life-changing tools to set up my structure in the sunshine state.
Hi Patty and Barbara!
I just wanted you to know that I am still benefitting from all of the book clubs even though they have technically ended! I often dip back into the books and my notes from the exercises i did as i work on creating. A life of doing more of what i love. I did get stuck on one very hard lesson in its only too late if you don’t start now but finally, finally, after months of both silent and out loud screaming and terrified tears about wanting to keep believing that I had more power than I did…I can finally, finally admit I am a human being, not a god. It amazes me how much I was trying to hang on to believing that I had the potential to be all-powerful…”if only”!
So now somehow what I understood intellectually as I was reading it, I have now accepted emotionally (to a tipping point degree, at least!) and i am diving back into Book Two of its only too late if you don’t start now. I absolutely must reclaim my original self and second life…..and I so appreciate the support of both of you and everyone in Barbara’s club and the book clubs and everywhere else!
summary of this post: thank-you times a ba-jillion!
Thank you so much for sharing this LisaMancelyn, and congratulations on all you have accomplished. Barbara sure writes powerful books, doesn’t she?
Yes, she does…and you write very thought-provoking and powerful booster comments for them! It is easy to see how helpful you will be in the write-speak course!
Awww, you’re swelling my head, LisaMancelyn. Thanks.
Hi Patty
I just wondered if you could say some more about the write speak course. I’d like some time to think about it and know the cost. Thanks. See you on bookclub also. Thanks for your great comments by the way. Cheers, Ruth
Hi, Ruth. You are most welcome. I love doing the book clubs with all you great members!
I don’t yet know the price for WriteSpeak, but it will be steeper than Hanging Out. It begins with a 6-hour teleworkshop with Barbara, to make sure you get clear on a message and an audience you can write for and speak to the way she does for us. You’ll also master a couple of helpful tech tools for writers and speakers, and you’ll get to know very well some of your fellow WriteSpeakers.
Barbara will repeat this teleworkshop a number of times over the course of a month, so that everyone gets to work with her in a small group. I’ve been through it, and it’s really inspiring. I love to write, but once I understood what she was showing us, I knew I had to speak, too, and she made that so easy. And it watched it work the other way around for folks who enjoyed speaking.
If you opt to continue, you’ll spend 48 weeks exploring your message, getting to know and be known by your audience, building your mailing list, and writing your first book the easy way. In the last few weeks, Barbara and the rest of the gang will help launch your book.
Along the way, you’ll make a plan, using Barbara’s wonderful formula of choices, for reaching lots of people and making money from your message. This plan is different for every member, and it’s what the online course will help you plan, learn to do, and carry out. Most members will aim for a self-published non-fiction or fiction book and a healthy mailing list by the end of the 48 weeks.
The online course is basically self-study, but you’ll be doing it with a group, and the assignments will invite you to interact to encourage each other, share the load, experiment together, practice new skills, and get caught up after you get distracted. Barbara has done this work with many WriteSpeakers before, and we have lots of recordings, so you’ll pay a lot less than they did for this wisdom.
You’ll learn how to organize your book and how to get it written with a lot less work than most authors put in (you are even encouraged to hire an editor), and you’ll learn to create great workshops and videos and keynotes. But you won’t learn grammar or line editing or what to do with your hands or feet while you talk, because you won’t need them. You’ll also learn all about today’s social media and audience-building tools, because you *will* need them, no matter how good your books and workshops are.
Those who finish the teleworkshop but don’t do the online course this year will have access to some other WriteSpeak resources throughout the year.
I’m sure it goes without saying, but I’ll say it anyway. This is not a get-rich-quick on the internet or a write-a-book-in-a-weekend program. It’s detailed instruction on how to live a life you love if Barbara’s career calls to you, too — plus a community to make sure you get there, “even if you have no goals, no character, and you’re often in a lousy mood” like me.
Barbara calls it “Write Your Own Success Story.”
More details soon, Ruth!
Thanks for this info, Patty. Can’t wait for the rest of it!
Thanks for asking Ruth!
You’re welcome!
Thanks Patty, that is useful information!
Thanks Patty,
Looking forward to joining this process too.
Pam
Thanks Patty. Look forward to the program being launched.
Hey Pam, I keep wondering, I just have to ask – you didn’t grow up in Kansas City, by any chance? You look so much like a school mate of mine there, and her name was Pam H.
Let me know! (even though – what are the chances?
Thanks for asking Ruth!
Sorry for the duplicate or triplicate post! One of them was supposed to say to Patty…thanks for answering Ruth’s question with all of those details!
I had to stop my posts for a bit but want to get back to posting more soon in several places.
Bye for now!
Ruth, Amy, LisaMancelyn, Pam, Sharon, and everybody else — just in case you missed the newsletter, WriteSpeak is now open for registration. http://barbarasclub.com/writespeak
Hello,
I would like to begin the connection with Barbara Sher and Barbara’s Club.
Please send the suggestions steps/programs classes. I want to begin immediately. It’s only too late if you don’t start now.
Thank you!
Pam Davis
Hi, Pam! I hear your enthusiasm. We’ll be announcing a new book club and a new year-long course next month, so be sure your address is on Barbara’s mailing list. (That’s the signup box below her photo on every page.) This month, just a few days ago in fact, Barbara turned 80, and we’ve given her some time off for writing and relaxing. However, you can listen to the recording of one of her Resistance teleclasses. Sign up on http://barbarasclub.com/courses/ (this page, right above our comments). And in November, we’ll be allowing a new group into Hanging Out with Barbara Sher, a year-long delight of a program.
Thanks Patty!
Hey Pam, I keep wondering, I just have to ask – you didn’t grow up in Kansas City, by any chance? You look so much like a school mate of mine there, and her name was Pam H.
Let me know! (even though – what are the chances? ! …)
Please put me on your mailing list for courses. Thank you.