By Sandy Gerber

My first book was terrible.

I mean the first draft. The one that sat in a folder for years while I rewrote it, argued with it, abandoned it and came back to it more times than I want to admit. Writing Emotional Magnetism taught me that good writing doesn't come from talent. It comes from editing. My editor told me when it was done. I didn't know. They did. That humility changed everything about how I approach writing now.

By the time it was published (20+ awards later, translated into three languages), I had learned something I wished someone had told me at the start: the first draft is simply figuring out what you're trying to say. Everything after that is the important work.

So when I started writing Connected Conversations, I thought I knew what I was doing.

I wrote it as a how-to book. Clear frameworks, practical tools, step by step guidance on emotionally intelligent communication. It was useful, but it was missing everything that makes a person actually change. People don't shift their behaviour from reading a list. They change by living through a moment that makes them see themselves differently. I wanted the reader inside the story with me, not sitting across from me taking notes.

I stopped thinking about what I wanted to teach and started thinking about what I wanted the reader to experience. I wanted them turning pages at midnight even with an early morning ahead. I wanted them to recognize themselves in a scene, feel the pull of a moment they had already lived, and shift their thinking through the story rather than because I told them to. I wanted the tools to emerge naturally from moments the reader had already felt in their own kitchen, their own boardroom, their own 2am.

Then I read The Celestine Prophecy. I picked it up one evening and didn't put it down. It didn't tell me what to think, it pulled me into a story and the insights arrived through the experience of reading it. I finished it and thought: That's the book I'm writing.

So I started again from page one.

But before I could finish it, I knew I needed to do something that terrified me. For years I had been teaching people how to connect with others while quietly struggling to connect with myself. I looked successful from every angle. I didn't feel it. And no amount of achieving, editing or rewriting was going to close that gap. I needed silence. Real silence. The kind that strips everything away and forces you to finally hear yourself. 

This time, as I rewrote the manuscript, it began to take shape as narrative nonfiction. It became my real journey through two failed marriages, boardrooms where I was the only woman at the table, the grief of losing both my parents within eight months, the love I almost gave up on finding, and the ordinary Tuesday evenings with Kris that turned out to matter more than any of the big moments. The EQ communication tools are woven into the story so the reader discovers them the way I did, in the moments when I needed them most, rather than being handed them in a chapter heading. One of the places those lessons came to life for me was during a 10-day silent meditation course. The people I met there earned their place on every page they appear on. Grandma Lellie. General Snapper. Stinky Edith. Wild Reg. They’re waiting for you inside the book. 

Which brings me to the part of this story that most people find either inspiring or slightly alarming.

I launched the Connected Conversations pre-order campaign on Publishizer and two weeks later checked into Dhamma Modana Vipassana Meditation Centre for ten days of complete silence. No phone, email or social media. No reading, writing or speaking. Ten hours a day on a meditation mat working through a 2,500-year-old-technique in a room full of strangers who became the most interesting people I've never spoken to. A 4 a.m. wake-up bell. 9:30 p.m. lights out. Nothing to do except show up fully to each moment.

I wasn't afraid before I left. I'd sent proposals to previous clients with discounted keynote and workshop packages, reached out to my community and set everything in motion. I left with 33 books sold and trusted the universe to do the rest. What I didn't expect was how alive my curiosity would be in the silence. Lying on the firm bed in my small room between meditation sessions, my mind drifted to the campaign. Not with worry. More like the feeling you get when you've sent something out into the world and you just want to know if it landed. 

I came home to 114 orders, a #1 Top Best Seller ranking on Publishizer, interest from two publishers, and a Women of Inspiration Award waiting in my inbox.

I didn't jump for joy the way I normally would. I just smiled. Quietly. Like something had settled inside me that had been restless for a very long time.

On day eleven, after my obligatory cleaning chores at the meditation centre, I wasn't thinking about the campaign, its results or any of it. I just wanted to get home to Kris. I raced home to the Nest, what we call our wooden home overlooking the forest, ocean and mountains of the Sunshine Coast. Our dog Router heard me come through the front door at 8 a.m. and started barking. Kris woke up.

We settled into our oversized wicker egg chairs on the deck with our morning beverages of choice (green tea for me, an energy drink for him) and a 180-degree view of the bay as the world slowly woke up around us. Eagles and ravens soared low over the water looking for their breakfast. A hummingbird chirped and darted between the feeders. Kris had tears in his eyes as he smiled and told me how proud he was of me for doing something so difficult. And relieved, he said, that I hadn't joined a cult.

I had come home a different person. A calmer, more present, more grateful version of the one who left. Relaxed in a way I hadn't felt in years. 

That morning on the deck is going in the book too.

The difference between Emotional Magnetism and Connected Conversations isn't just format or style. The first book taught me how to write. The second one is teaching me how to live what I write. The silence gave me the final piece. And it was time to write that down, with all the messy, hilarious, moving moments intact.

You don't need 10 days of silence to find what I found. That's what the book is for.

I'd love for you to be part of this journey. 

If any of this resonates, take a look at my 2-minute video to discover the simple EQ communication tools that will help you feel more heard, valued and truly connected at work, at home and with yourself. The pre-order campaign is live now with limited time bonuses including significant savings on my keynotes, workshops and coaching programs.

👉 Pre-order a copy of Connected Conversations 

Bonuses expire soon. 

Xo Sandy