The Ghost Life

A part of my existence is lived as a ghost.

Over the past four years or so I’ve quite accepted this life. In fact, it’s kind of fun.

As a copywriter and marketing strategist my role is to give flesh and blood to the dreams and ideas of others. I realize that not everyone can do this. In fact, at times I’ve struggled. After all, in order to focus on other people’s dreams, I’ve got to set aside my ego. If it isn’t, the results my clients expect won’t be realized.

Like anyone else, I’ve got an ego. I take pride in my work, and I like to be recognized for the fruit my work  produces. As a ghostwriter, though, there is really just an audience of one: the client.

This can be a challenge for many solo service professionals like me. Unlike those selling a product that can be sold to hundreds or thousands of people, we live one client at a time. When we add a new client, it’s a time of real celebration. Lose one, and there is grief.

So, as a professional ghost, my clients give form to my work and practice. They are the life energy giving flesh and blood to my dreams. And I’m extremely grateful for each of them.

One of the really cool parts of my job is that I have the opportunity to form relationships with each of my clients. In fact, while I completely respect the fact they’ve hired me to do specific things, I value the relationship more than anything else. As their writer, I get to know them, going below the surface, learning their values, their dreams, their art. This process is every bit as fulfilling for me, as their scribe, as it is for them when their dreams are fulfilled. From this perspective I love every one of my clients.

In this techno world, in which internet marketers are driven to produce thousands of anonymous hits on their website, never knowing the names of the people who find them, it is this ind of love that is lost. The great salesmen of old, people like Walter Hailey, Zig Ziglar and Mary Kay Ash, they understood the value of loving their customers. In their world service came before self. And, while they received ample compensation for their service, I’m certain that the love they generated was worth ten-times what was deposited into their bank accounts.

So, unlike the mass marketers who may have 2,000,000 people on their mailing list but know nothing about any of the people they sell to, I want to know the names of my clients. I want to know about their lives. I want them to know I value them enough to find their unique voice and deliver their message with integrity and truth. That’s what drives me.

And that’s my life as a ghostwriter. My treasures aren’t just in my bank accounts, but rest in the relationships I’ve come to enjoy with my clients.  And so, this post is meant as a thanksgiving for them because being a ghost has proven to be substantially fulfilling.