I promised a few weeks ago that I would post regular updates on how my book is progressing. Well, I am currently at just over 53,000 words, and plan to be at 55,000 before the end of this weekend. The pace has slowed a little because I have stopped writing in chronological order and gone back to the beginning to put in more detail.

It’s quite difficult at 54 years of age to go back to events that happened really early in childhood: Did that really happen? Was it a dream? Has my memory played tricks on me? There has been a lot of head-scratching and coffee-drinking (decaff of course!)

A couple of people have also expressed an interest in helping me to publish the book, because the publishing business is now a little bit like the music business – you don’t have to have a big publishing company/record company to get your work out there for people to listen to or read!

When I started this I didn’t really believe that I would get to over halfway through the book so quickly, but I have been very disciplined, writing on train journeys and even at motorway service stations when I have had time to stop on journeys.

As well as writing I’m very busy promoting the training side of the business and there will be some exciting news about that later in the month. I have also been asked to provide a motivational speech at a McGuire programme course for recovering stammerers in Swindon on Friday 18 February. I stammered myself as a child and was fortunate that my parents took me to speech therapy to help me overcome it, so it’s a pleasure to be able to help others.

Another speaking engagement that I am looking forward to soon is at a Young Enterprise awards ceremony where I have been asked to provide a keynote speech a little later in the year.

Well, that’s it for now – I have to prepare a session for a Toastmasters training event in Essex tomorrow and write some more of my story!