April 24, 2008
by Rhonda Warren
Are you a work at home parent or striving to become one? During your day as a work at home parent it is easy to get involved in other things around the house that keep your pretty much pre-occupied from your business. Which in turn leaves you feeling that you have accomplished nothing at all. During these times it is truly important to remember your “Why”. Why did you begin building your business or working from home in the first place? You need to keep your why handy so that during tough set backs or tough days in your business you will be able to pull it out as a reminder to why you are building your business in the first place.
A good thing for you to do is to write your “Why” on an index card or on something that you can keep close to your desk. You should look at this a few times throughout the day. It’s easy to get frustrated when the day isn’t going exactly as planned and again forget why you chose to work at home. I know with me a lot of times my children will catch me on the phone and think its party time. It is then time to tear the house down. So I keep my composure while I continue my call, once off of the phone you sometimes just feel like crying. But, if you actually take the time to stop and realize that this is why you wanted to be home in the first place it becomes much easier to deal with.
I know a lot of times with my own children they will act up when they are bored, or tired. So this is the time that I simply stop and take a break. I use this time to eat lunch with the kids, read them a story, watch a cartoon with them or something that they may enjoy. Usually once they have had some time with you they are fine with you getting back to work.
You want to make your work at home experience pleasant for both you and your family.
Just remember your Why!
Article Source: http://www.articlesforwahms.com
This article was written by Rhonda Warren. She is the owner of Mentoring WAHMS www.mentoringwahms.com where she is living out her passion of mentoring other women online. You can also see what she is up to at www.rhondawarren.com.
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April 22, 2008
by Lucia Zimmitti
Every writer knows the publishing world is grindingly competitive. Despite that truth, previously unknown authors break into print each year.
Don’t think of getting published as an amalgam of mysterious formulae that only an elite few understand. Treat each day as an opportunity to practice habits that will inch you toward your goal.
7 Habits of Highly Published Authors:
1) WRITE
It may sound like a no-brainer, but there are many aspiring writers out there who aren’t writing. There are understandable reasons for this evasive block. Fear is a big one. (You can’t fail at something you don’t attempt.)
Sneak up on your fears by writing anything–even nonsense–and declare victory if you stay seated at your desk for a designated number of minutes. You can raise the bar as you go.
Carving out regular writing time is the first step in establishing a writing habit. Commit to fifteen minutes on most days of the week. Eventually, once the act of regular writing becomes habitual and almost reflexive, you can increase your time.
2) READ
Can you imagine a musician who goes through life wearing earplugs because she doesn’t want to listen to someone else’s music? But there are people out there who want to be writers and who never crack open a book. The simple truth is that your writing won’t improve if you don’t read.
Read like a writer. Read everything in your genre (especially newly published works). Read things outside your genre. Reread the works you love in order to learn from them–dissect the author’s approach so that you can put it in your toolbox. When you come across something you dislike, try to figure out why–intellectualize your reaction.
3) REVISE
Revision literally means re-vision, seeing again. As much as it may hurt, you must be willing to cut huge chunks if they don’t contribute to the piece as a whole (that might include scenes, chapters, even characters, beloved though they may be). And you may have to write new scenes to fill gaps you couldn’t recognize until you looked at the piece as a coherent whole instead of sewn-together parts.
Just like you can’t cook a great meal if your kitchen stays clean, you can’t write a satisfying book if your first draft doesn’t undergo cutting, pasting, reworking and rethinking.
4) Hand off your work: the value of another perspective.
Islands can’t write effectively for publication. No matter how hard you may try to be an island while you write (solitude is necessary then), you have to let the drawbridge down (or send a ferry over to the mainland) when you’re ready to publish.
Never let an editor or agent be the first person to see your work. Find thoughtful readers willing to give you honest critiques and you’ll dramatically boost your chances of publication.
5) Submit and Persist
When it’s ready, send your work out–another no-brainer, right? Still, you’d be surprised at how many writers — serious writers who want to be published more than almost anything — write and write and never send their pieces in for consideration. Who can blame them? You pour your whole creative self into this artistic endeavor; you know the odds are stacked in favor of rejection, so why would you volunteer for the guillotine?
Instead of thinking of rejection as a personal blow, try to think of it as a numbers game: every time you get rejected and re-submit, your odds of getting a “Yes” in return increase.
Rejection stinks, it really does. And it stings. But since there’s no way around it on the road to publication, the sooner you accept it as a necessary evil, the better.
And the truth is, getting rejections means you’re in the game. It’s a concrete sign that your writing life has progressed from a solitary activity at your desk to an exchange with the world at large.
6) Ask “What if?“
Look at the world and question everything. Peer past the obvious. Peel back the veneer of appearances and ask yourself, What if….? It’s a valuable way of imagining and visualizing, and asking it often will enhance and enrich your creative life.
The late author Robert Cormier said that his novel The Chocolate War was born one ordinary day while he watched his son walk out of school and toward the car carrying a large box of fundraiser chocolates. Cormier asked himself, “What if my son decided not to sell the chocolate this year?” and the idea was hatched for a vibrant, compelling, enduring novel.
7) Start something new.
Okay, so you finished a project and put it in the mail. Then you weathered your first rejection and put the work in the mail again. And you wait. And wait. Warning: if you’re waiting for the Yea or Nay to define your identity as a writer, you’ll stall the potential on future work.
While you’re making the rounds with your first piece, throw yourself into a new project. There’s nothing more effective for breaking you out of over-attachment to any single piece of your writing than excitement over a fresh endeavor.
To discover more ways to making your writing habit more efficient and satisfying, visit http://ManuscriptRx.com and sign up for “Write Through It,” the FREE monthly e-newsletter that offers practical writing advice and anecdotal wisdom.
Lucia Zimmitti, a writing coach and independent editor, is a member of the Society of Children’s Book Writers and Illustrators and the Editorial Freelancers Association. Her fiction and poetry have been published in various national literary journals, and she has taught writing at the high school and college levels.
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April 21, 2008
by Lucia Zimmitti
You’ve probably reflected on your overall temperament and how it impacts your relationships. For instance, you have some idea about what kind of friend you are, what kind of parent or sibling or spouse or significant other. But have you ever thought about what kind of writer you are? Finding out can shed new light on your relationship with writing.
Because writers are individuals (and highly creative and enigmatic individuals, I might add), it’s not a simple matter of settling on one category and fitting yourself into it. Instead, you may share traits with several of the most common writing personalities.
Honestly assessing your writing temperament and holding an awareness of it as you work can help you avoid time-wasting habits and ultimately be more productive. And since so much of writing is putting yourself on the page (regardless of your genre or subject), if you have a clearer picture of your writing self, your finished product will reap the benefits.
(Note: to avoid s/he overload, I’ve decided to alternate pronouns from article to article. In no way do I mean to imply that certain genders are more likely to exhibit certain tendencies at the writing desk.)
Here’s the complete list of common writing temperaments:
1) Sir Starts-a-lot
2) The Perfectionist
3) Fool for a Deadline
4) The Island (includes (a) The Over-confident Island and (b) The Fearful Island)
5) The Tofu Artist (a.k.a. The Feedback-Dependent Writer)
(I’ll devote a separate article to each temperament.)
1) Sir Starts-a-lot
Someone with this writing temperament is always starting a new project. Sir Starts-a-lot recognizes enormous potential in his latest project, and he is genuinely invested in seeing this idea through to completion. At least that’s what he thinks when the idea is still new and fresh. The next time you bump into him at your favorite wireless hotspot, you’re amped up on café lattes (how many, you don’t know, since you lost count at fourteen) and he’s amped up on a brand-spanking new idea. That’s right. The aforementioned Big Project (The One) has been shoved aside to make room for a “Really, Really Great Idea.”
But he seems so happy, in harmony with his muse. His enthusiasm is so overt and contagious that it makes you rush back to your seat, ready to dig in. (You regret that, in your haste, you sloshed scalding coffee on a lady knitting in a club chair.)
Sir Starts-a-lot shares similarities with an infatuation junkie, someone who craves the beginning of relationships with all that heady euphoria and seemingly endless, shining hope. True, we all love that phase, but the infatuation junkie discards the whole relationship when the all-is-fun stage inevitably passes. Once Sir Starts-a-lot gets to the really tough part of the book/story/article (i.e., the middle), he’s lured away by the siren song of a new idea.
No matter how an idea shimmers in the early stages, it usually starts looking dull and wooden when we spend enough time with it. Those normal middle-of-the-book doldrums don’t mean the idea isn’t worthwhile. But to the writer who starts and starts but doesn’t finish, those blah vibes signal a need to exit fast.
The BENEFIT of this temperament: If this is your overall tendency, you probably have a good time at your desk. Let’s face it: new ideas are exciting. They are brimming with possibility, and you haven’t committed to them yet, so you still feel free. And you just know that this idea will be The One to get you to the finish line. You’re constantly buoyed by the steady wave of creative ideas. It’s like permanently existing in the best part of romantic relationships, where both parties are putting their best feet forward and you don’t need to make accommodations for annoying habits or complicated in-laws.
The COST of this temperament: Ah, writing does not get published on ideas alone, so if you see yourself in Starts-a-lot, the major cost is that you don’t finish anything.
The fun you have in tossing around fresh ideas that hit you in the shower, on the highway, or in the dentist’s chair is offset by the frustration you feel in never having a finished product, something you can send out and someday see in print (other than your own ink jet.)
WHAT TO DO:
Don’t give in to new ideas.
That doesn’t mean ignore new ideas. It just means not to devote your precious writing time to those new ideas…just yet. Keep a small tape recorder or notebook with you wherever you go so you can record those ideas, forget about them for now, and keep them for future use. They will be there when you’re ready for them, after you’ve completed the piece you’ve already started.
Be accountable to someone.
It’s too easy to tell yourself: Big deal, no one will know if I don’t finish this; no one will care. Make someone care about what you’re working on. Enlist the help of a friend or relative or writing coach. Tell them you really need to finish this piece and that your pattern has been to abandon works-in-progress when the excitement starts to wane. Ask them to give you a first-draft deadline, and ask them to seriously enforce it.
Make the old new.
Think about that seductive sense of novelty that you find so appealing in new projects. Now channel that into the writing you’ve already begun. Infuse your work-in-progress with new life so that some aspect of it feels new. Think of a new approach, create another character, try out a different point of view…something that makes the work feel new again to you, without abandoning it altogether.
Coming soon: Writing temperament Number 2, The Perfectionist.
To discover other ways to make your writing habit more efficient, satisfying and fun, visit http://ManuscriptRx.com and sign up for “Write Through It,” the FREE monthly newsletter that offers practical writing advice and anecdotal wisdom.
Lucia Zimmitti, a writing coach and independent editor, is a member of the Society of Children’s Book Writers and Illustrators and the Editorial Freelancers Association. Her fiction and poetry have been published in various national literary journals, and she has taught writing at the high school and college levels.
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April 20, 2008
Every so often we will spotlight a work of fiction sent to us by our readers. If you have written something and would like to have it spotlighted here, please send it to us. It should be between 200-500 words. You may include a short paragraph describing yourself, your writing and a link to your website.
We look forward to hearing from everyone!
-Jolts
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April 19, 2008
by Deanna Mascle
Learning to write is a never-ending process. Improving your writing skill can be challenging and difficult even if you love writing — and incredibly daunting if you hate it. My students and readers ask me all the time how they can become better writers. So what can you do improve your writing skill? Three simple steps can help you find the writing help you need — reading, writing, and critiquing.
You cannot learn to write or improve your writing skill in a vacuum. You must expose yourself to other writers’ work. There is a wealth of writing tips available from every writer no matter their level of experience or expertise. Some writers offer ideas and fodder for your writing as well as expand your vocabulary. Other writers can provide examples of good writing, interesting style, and intriguing vocabulary or word usage. Still other writers can help you learn more about what mistakes you should strive to eliminate from your own writing.
And of course, you can seek all the writing help you can find, but without practice your writing will never improve. I always tell my students that I can only talk about writing for so long before I simply need to get out of the way so they can create and experiment to uncover their own personal writing process and writing style and discover how to work through their personal writing challenges. Writing is a very individual process and cannot be taught with a one-size-fits-all process. The more you write then the more you will learn about your own writing — warts and all. You will discover your strengths and uncover your weaknesses — then struggle to build on the former and diminish the latter.
Critiquing other writers and opening up your own writing to critique is one of the most effective ways to learn more about writing. Critiquing the writing of others can help you compare various solutions - and their effectiveness - to a variety of writing problems. It is often easier to find a solution to another writer’s problem or challenge than it is your own — and you may well find that today’s solution for another writer is a solution to your own future writing issue. You can gain exposure to a variety of writing styles. In addition, the advice of an informed reader can offer a window into your own work. We usually know what goal we set for our writing but cannot truly judge how effectively we achieved that goal. An informed reader can help us identify problem areas as well as find potential solutions.
If you really want writing help and you truly desire to increase your writing skill then you must read more, write more, and critique more. The more you read of varied genres, authors, and styles then the better writer you will become. The more writing practice you give yourself then the stronger and more confident you will become. The more you truly evaluate and investigate writing — and what works and why — then the more effective your own writing will become.
Find more writing help and information about writing skill at http://word-craft.info/
Deanna Mascle may be contacted at http://renaissancewomanonline.com
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