I'm a Socially Anxious Introvert Who Oddly Tells All as a Writer

Start Here to Learn What Honestly Human Is All About

Hi, I’m Rick

I’m a socially anxious introvert who now makes his living as an author, professional speaker, and the founder of an online writing community.

I played Santa Claus at a local mall when I was 15 years old, fell off a 12 foot unicycle in China, got chased out of Australia for street performing, presented once to an audience that included Bill Gates, toured 70 cities with the Broadway musical Barnum, lived on an ashram, hand washed 5,000 dishes in one night, did a standing backflip at age 50, raised 3 kids, and lost ten-thousand dollars trying to purchase an oil well.

In Honestly Human I share all of these stories and many more about my oddities, neuroses, eccentricities, a lifetime of traveling, performing and speaking, 30 years of parenting and relationship, inner fears, outer flaws, multiple failures and occasional successes.

My writing community Write Hearted is my primary focus these days, although public speaking continues to keep me on the road collecting adventures.

Here at Honestly Human, free subscribers get a weekly story from me, while paid subscribers also access to a basic membership in my Write Hearted community, providing an opportunity to learn more about how to find, remember, and share their own life stories to better connect personally and professionally with other humans.

I’ve been astounded over the 45 years I’ve been a professional presenter how many doors have opened, resources have flowed, friendships and business relationships I’ve gained, just from being willing to speak up at the front of the room.

In the last few years I’ve discovered the same kind of serendipity can be activated through writing. The core principles of connecting are the same.

• Share your stories.

• Reflect on their meaning and value.

• Show interest in the stories of others.

In addition to writing hundreds of essays, publishing 5 books, and presenting live to more than 1 million people, I've left over 6,000 comments on the work of other authors in the last two years on Substack. It’s where I discovered my joy for supporting other writers and storytellers. Honestly Human is the evolution of my passion for conversations that matter, and my natural affinity for supporting creators, leaders, change-makers, and artists.

In my experience, anyone who is willing to be authentically human is in the best position to inspire, educate, and serve others.

Real human stories are the shortest distance between you and anyone you’d like to connect with.

I can give a taste of what those kinds of stories look like, and for those who want to go deeper, how to share those stories yourself.

Just be real. Just be you.

Funny how that takes a little practice.

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MEMBER BENEFITS

Free Subscribers

Weekly stories from my own life adventures, fumbles, embarrassing thoughts, hard-won insights, and colorful history.

Paid Subscribers

Get basic access to my Write Hearted online community for connection and conversation with like humans who want to learn to share their own life stories.

You’ll get access to 1 weekly community led Story Gym, 2 weekly community led Writing Gyms, and 1 monthly Substack strategy session if you want help and support for publishing on Substack.

You’ll also get access to the community publication space to get a distribution boost for your own writing, access to the community chat space where you can meet other story loving authors, and paid only posts.

Founding Member Subscribers

You’ll get everything from the paid subscriber tier, basic membership to Write Hearted, as well as lifetime access to the Life Story Challenge workshop, where you’ll get guidance for finding your best 30 life stories for sharing with others and a lifetime account with the All My Stories app to organize a chronological inventory of your life history. This is incredibly useful for writers, speakers, memoirists, teachers, and coaches