It’s tough. Many immediate barriers jump out at me. For instance: spelling, constructing sentences [not to mention I hate commas and where to put them]. I still don’t really know the difference between a colon and semi-colon and furthermore: what the heck does pluperfect mean or future indefinite?

Now, the truth is, none of the above could matter less when it comes to what writing is really about. Grammar and syntax are “tools of the trade” – the writers trade – and have nothing to do with creativity, thoughtfulness, integrity or passion. Writing has only to do with what you want to say and anything that gets in the way of what you want to say is obviously going to be a problem.  So, the very first thing we must learn to deal with is the unnecessary intimidation caused by rules and regulations. If rules and regulations are your primary concern – you’re in trouble. So what do we do: “there are no rules”.

Technicalities that intimidate can prevent the guts of what you want to say from reaching the page. The page is all that matters: the page and what you want to put there. Therefore, put all thought of craft and technique behind you until you have put whatever you want to say on the page. Never think unconsciously of form. The form will declare itself in the doing. Grammar and syntax come after the fact, not before it. In truth, all rules and regulations come after the fact, because it is only after the fact has been established – the writing on the page – that you can recognize what does and does not work. Put it this way: when we are starving and are given food, we get the food to our mouths however possible – often times just stuffing it in our mouths. It is only after we have fully recovered that we even begin to think of where the dessert spoons are laid. If the blank page is starving, are you going to sit around refusing to feed it because you don’t know where to lay the commas? Give it the words: that’s all it wants.

Okay! There is one more essential that must be stated and that is: if you are a writer, you will know it. Others will know it, too. The voice of the true writer is always recognizable. It is recognizable in precisely the same way that we recognize any other natural talent, from basketball to skating to playing the piano. This is what Michael Jordan and Sidney Crosby and Yanni have in common with J. K. Rowling: all of them found their own unique voices and the voices were basketball, skates, piano keys and pens. All of you have to do it verify the trueness of these voice is try to imagine J. K. Rowling playing for the Chicago Bulls or Yanni  in skates. This is not, of course, to say that these particulars don’t dance or that women don’t play hockey. It is simply to say that an Atwood attempting to find her voice on skates, and Gould, his voice in ballet shoes would have been tragically prevented from fulfilling their potential. Beyond the finding of the voice lies endless work and effort – but without the voice, the work and the effort could go on forever and nothing would ever come of it.

Why am I saying this? I’m saying this in order to demonstrate the truly compliant role that grammar and syntax, rules and regulations play in the making of good writing. No amount of perfect understanding concerning the craft of writing will ever produce a writer. Gertrude Stein wrote that she had once had a very sad conversation with an aging, ambitious but not very fitted artist whose whole career had been an attempt to emulate Picasso “…but only Picasso can be Picasso,” she told him. What a pity the aging artist had not attempted to be himself – [via Mike Robbins].

I suppose, when all is said and done, there are two areas of the writing process that I could define as being the “toughest”. The first of these would be articulation and the second would have to involve the final decisions concerning edits.

Achieving articulation is quite a long process for me. Every line – actually – every word must be made to do its job, but every line and every single word must be made to seem effortless. Seams must be invisible. The reader must never be aware that anyone has been “at work here, taking pains”. Unfortunately, what guides each writer through the articulation process is necessarily private and unique, therefore, there are no guidelines or any general rules concerning articulation, barring the single rule: be true to your own voice. Nevertheless – for me, at least – the articulation of precisely what is being said inevitably involves the longest and the hardest slugging in terms of sheer labour.

Psychologically, the toughest moment in all writing for all writers probably comes during the final editing sessions. This is when you must make your final draft and hand it over to the publisher. This is when you give it up and commit to finalization. This is the moment that William Faulker defined as the time to “kill all your darlings”. I for one couldn’t have said it any better myself. Let them go. The work is all that matters.

Wrong: “sell everybody. Hi my name is I love ccp, check out my websiite.”

2. Trust

But I can’t guarantee your success because your business is your life. Your life is your success.

2. Nothing sucks more than that moment during an argument when you realize you’re wrong.

3. I totally take back all those times I didn’t want to nap when I was younger.

4. There is great need for a sarcasm font.

5. How the hell are you supposed to fold a fitted sheet?

6. Was learning cursive really necessary?

7. MapQuest really needs to start their directions on #5. I’m pretty sure I know how to get out of my neighborhood.

8. Obituaries would be a lot more interesting if they told you how the person died.

9. I can’t remember the last time I wasn’t at least kind of tired.

10. Bad decisions make good stories.

11. You never know when it will strike, but there comes a moment at work when you know that you just aren’t going to do anything productive for the rest of the day.

12. Can we all just agree to ignore whatever comes after Blue Ray? I don’t want to have to restart my collection…again.

13. I’m always slightly terrified when I exit out of Word and it asks me if I want to save any changes to my ten-page technical report that I swear I did not make any changes to.

14. “Do not machine wash or tumble dry” means I will never wash this ever.

15. I hate when I just miss a call by the last ring (Hello? Hello? Damn it!), but when I immediately call back, it rings nine times and goes to voice mail. What did you do after I didn’t answer? Drop the phone and run away?

16. I hate leaving my house confident and looking good and then not seeing anyone of importance the entire day. What a waste.

17. I keep some people’s phone numbers in my phone just so I know not to answer when they call.

18. I think the freezer deserves a light as well.

19. I disagree with Kay Jewelers. I would bet on any given Friday or Saturday night more kisses begin with Miller Lite than Kay.

20. Sometimes, I’ll watch a movie that I watched when I was younger and suddenly realize I had no idea what the heck was going on when I first saw it.

21. I would rather try to carry 10 over-loaded plastic bags in each hand than take 2 trips to bring my groceries in.

22. The only time I look forward to a red light is when I’m trying to finish a text.

23. I have a hard time deciphering the fine line between boredom and hunger.

24. How many times is it appropriate to say “What?” before you just nod and smile because you still didn’t hear or understand a word they said?

25. I love the sense of camaraderie when an entire line of cars team up to prevent a jerk from cutting in at the front. Stay strong, brothers and sisters!

26. Shirts get dirty. Underwear gets dirty. Pants? Pants never get dirty, and you can wear them forever.

27. Is it just me or do high school kids get dumber & dumber every year?

28. There’s no worse feeling than that millisecond you’re sure you are going to die after leaning your chair back a little too far.

29. As a driver I hate pedestrians, and as a pedestrian I hate drivers, but no matter what the mode of transportation, I always hate bicyclists.

30. Sometimes I’ll look down at my watch 3 consecutive times and still not know what time it is.

31. Even under ideal conditions people have trouble locating their car keys in a pocket, finding their cell phone, and Pinning the Tail on the Donkey – but I’d bet my ass everyone can find and push the snooze button from 3 feet away, in about 1.7 seconds, eyes closed, first time, every time!

[via Alex King]

I found the drawing in my office when cleaning it out. I decide to keep it. No trace of author, just the signature on the bottom right. Really Really good sketch – it probably didn’t take that long either.

Keyword-positioning-monitor-report-service

What is KPMRS?

KPMRS is a website rank monitoring SEO tool for free. It tracks your website positions for keywords phrases for a specific URL on Google, Yahoo, Bing and provides a nice report of your site’s rankings over time. Try now by submitting your targeted keyword and URL in the search box above.

I haven’t used it myself yet, but I wanted to post this quickly to make sure it reaches a wider audience.  While you’re reading this post, I’m probably already using the tool. I found it neat because you can track where you rank or at least what keywords on your website; where they rank on the 3 biggest search engines (google, yahoo, bing respecitvely).

Other reviewers have found that it is:

• Handy and usable interface (I like the way you can quickly switch between domains and keywords);
• Email alerts once your rankings change;
• Ranking history (graphed on a flash chart);
• Exporting and printing options;
• Social activity tracker;
• Backlink tracker (it’s just about the number of your site backlinks based on Yahoo! and Alexa);
• Facebook integration (to “share your rankings with Facebook friends”).

I’m going to find that out now and make a snazzy youtube video all about it. Stay tuned for inside-scoop details.

CAN ANYONE LEARN HOW TO WRITE SALEABLE ARTICLES?

This is a natural question to ask. It is one I have been asked hundreds of times. And the answer is – NO!

Quite a number of people who have no real desire to write, look on writing as an easy way of getting a little extra pin-money. They imagine that they have only to write something, and there is an editor (or internet website) who will be willing to purchase what they have written. This type of person never gets far – if, in fact, he or she gets anywhere at all.

The very fact that you are reading this goes a long way to show that you have this necessary urge within you.

Take a piece of white card and print on it, in block letters:

I MUST WRITE SOMETHING EVERY DAY. Pin the card over your desk and let it serve as a constant reminder that success depends vary laragely upon your putting this suggestion into practices.

Finding Ideas:

An idea is the the first requisite to successful writing. You haven’t any? Well, get one! How? I will try and show you.

In the first place, think of yourself. Interview yourself.. What are your interests? What people have you known? What trips have you taken? What exciting things have happened to you? What are your Hobbies? Dozens of ideas will spring from your answers to these questions, and the more you think about them, the more you will discover in the way of ideas.

Examine your hobbies from all possible angles. If you collect coins, for instance you need not confine your writing to articles about the actual collection of them, the groups into which they fall, and so on. Quite an interesting article could be written about the different metnals they contain, another about their shapes, and a third about the inscriptions on them.

As an example let us consider tennis for a moment and see how this game might be approached. What is tennis played with? A racket and ball. Very well, why not an article describing how tennis balls are made, and another how rackets are made? Well illustrated, both these articles should sell easily. And what about choosing a racket? There are surely several useful hints regarding this which could be passed on to beginners.

Let us now turn from ourselves and our own interests to other people and their interests. It is said that every person can tell at least one good story. Endeavor, then, to get a story from every person you meet. This is not as difficult as it may seem if you bear in mind the fact that the story is likely to be connected with the person’s chief interests.

Some time ago I read an article which dealt with methods of creating idea. I have never found it necessary to experiment with any of these methods myself, but they struck me at the time, as being promising ones. One of these, I remember was to write down a number of stock ‘forms’ of titles and to juggle with them until a suitable subject suggested itself. Here are some suggested forms: “How to -”; “- something to”; “Too many -”; “Choosing a-”. Having made a list, the method consists of replacing the blanks with suitable verbs or nouns.  For instance: “How to fix a chair”; “Teching a puppy to rollover”; “Too many holidays”; and”Choosing a hobby”.

Writing the Article:

Every article must have an Opening, a Body, and an Ending.  Let me give you some examples of good openings:

1. “Although you cannot possibly control the amount of dust that comes into your house, you can control, to a certain extent, the place where it collects.” (Article entitled: Dust on the Walls)

2. “A building that, when completed, will be one of the wonders of the world is being erected on a mountain side in America.” (Article entiteld: House that Cannot be Destroyed)

Titles:

90% of titles are rejected by Internet Traffic because They Suck!

It is too much to say that a first-class title will sell a poor article, but it is not too much to say that a fairly good article may sometimes be rejected on account of a clumsy title. Many papers stand or fail based on their titles.  What is a good title? A good title usually consists of a few words, put together in an original form, giving a fair indication of the contents of an article.

In light of the definition I have given, consider these examples. They are titles which have appeared above my own articles, at one time or another:

Film Laughs are no Joke
Do you Need a Baby’s Love?
Stars Hitched to a Wagon

The first had to do with the cost of film comedies in terms of cash and human suffering; the second with child adoption; and the third with the caravan experiences of well-known Hollywood screen stars.

The average beginners would have given these particular titles like the following:

What Film Laughs Cost
How to Adopt a Baby
Starts and Their Caravans

Do you not see how commonplace such titles are?

Let us sum up this advice in a few words and print those words in capitals so that they will more readily impress themselves in your mind:

CONCENTRATE ON A FEW MARKETS.

STUDY THEM. CONTINUE TO SUBMIT WORK UNTIL YOU BREAK IN – THEN KEEP IN.

At home, sailers were confident, they knew that they were out to find treasure.

Much time passed; some sailors began to not-believe in cortez. A belief that there was no treasure.  Cortez had stopped at cuba, where he dropped off all the sailors who didn’t believe in him. Then he set to sail again.  He now taught his team of sailors new strategies, new mindsets before battle before the war: Cortez said – Burn The Boats because we wasn’t going home unless it was on enemies boats. This story was not meant to be read by anyone but myself, but I thought I would publish it as a reminder.

You can judge the size by the man or the woman, by the size of the obstacle, that it takes to overcome them.  When you market to everyone, you market to no-one.