My life changed in an instant. One moment I was outgoing and sociable, impulsive and carefree, bordering on irresponsible. I was an optimist operating on blind faith, the type who jumped in first and worried about consequences later. A moment later, I became someone who preferred solitude to the point of being reclusive. I was careful and methodical and my view on life was realistic, if not pessimistic. What changed in that one moment? My sign. As I switched from one website to another, I transf...
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business
Missed Communications And The Rise Of The Emojis
I had another topic in mind for this week’s blog post, but I started reading comments from beta readers (first readers who critique a writer’s manuscript) for The Conflagration, Book 3 in my supernatural thriller series, and it got me thinking about how people communicate, and fail to communicate, in today’s world. The readers of this draft of The Conflagration raised questions about plot points and characters that I had thought I’d written clearly. One bit of crucial information about who is se...
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Entrepreneur Or Ne’re Do Well?
A boyfriend I had in my early twenties was a hard worker but did not like his job. He had no interest in going to college, and he was unimpressed by how long it took most people to build businesses from the ground up, so he looked into various get-rich quick-schemes. He purchased a series of books on how to buy a house with no money down, fix it up and rent it out, then use equity in the first house to help buy another, and so on. The idea was not to earn income through rentals but to sell after...
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6 Things I Learned In The Last Year About Writing And Business
During much of the last fourteen years, I worked full-time--and then some--as a lawyer and wrote fiction on the side. Last year, I gradually shifted gears so that now more than half my professional life is devoted to writing and to the business side of writing. Below are a few things I've learned along the way.Get Out: Getting outside once a day, no matter what the weather, boosts my mental health. Much as writing all day at an antique desk in my home office sounds appealing when it's ten ...
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5 Ways to Be More Productive — And More Relaxed — In The New Year
Relax -- unlike some articles on productivity, the suggestions below are not meant to help you do more than you’re doing now. Instead, I hope they will help you enjoy your work more, relax more, and open up a little extra free time in the new year.1. Know your best times of day for different tasksOur brains work differently at different times of the day. Figuring out the ideal time to perform a task can make it more enjoyable and lessen the amount of time you spend on it. Most people are m...
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The Military, Make Up, and Rereading Katniss (Favorite Books Post No. 1)
Recently I reread the Hunger Games trilogy. It was great fun, and the themes seemed particularly timely. (I'll do my best not to spoil any of the plot for those who haven't read the whole trilogy.)(1) Women in Combat: In the Hunger Games, each combatant (known as a tribute) competes to become the sole survivor. The arena for the games changes from year to year and even within each game. A combatant might face mountains, drought, fire, floods, or all of the above. Author Suzanne Collins...
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