Define Your Success

Goal setting, Inspirational, Workshops, Writing, Writing
Success means different things to different people. The media often portrays success as a house, a long-term partner, kids and money. Your family probably has their own definition of success, based on both the media's definition success and their own feelings. Your friends probably each have their own definition of success too. Even the strange old hermit down the street has her own definition of success. Though success is only one word, it has as many definitions as there are people. What is true for everyone, though, is that you will never be truly happy if you don't strive to reach your own definition of success. Too many people go chasing after their parents' ideas of success, and end up with diplomas and careers they care nothing for. They gain…
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Freedom

Blog Stuff, Mental Health
Last Friday the doctors freed my wrist from its prison. It's only been a few days but I can already feel the difference in my psyche. I'll be wearing it to bed for another two months, which is a cakewalk at this point. I've already seen an increase in productivity--though it may be imagined because I'm happier--but it's going to take me a while to get back into my routine. I never managed to finish my edits of Moonshadow's Guardian, which is my first priority this month after paid work. It's going to take me a while to get back into my routine. My wrist is in a particularly fragile state after a month of disuse, and I'm still battling the depression that came with the splint. Unfortunately this means…
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Growing Your Blog

Blog Stuff, Writing
Once you've launched your blog comes the long term task of maintaining it and nourishing it so it grows. Hopefully you've already got a few weeks worth of posts drafted--not that this means you should stop writing new ones, in fact you should try to write one every day or every other day so that you'll have lots of back up posts if there's a crisis. So today I'd like to give you some strategies for finding more followers, and a couple to help you find ideas for your blog posts. Let's start with how to get more followers... Pay attention to and utilize social media. For most of my blogging career, throughout my various old blogs, I've been awful at this. I'll admit that even now I'm not a…
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Preparing for Your Blog Launch

Blog Stuff, Writing
For the last few weeks we've been talking about the process of creating your own blog, from choosing and testing a blog topic to the design of your blog to creating a coherent marketing strategy for your blog. If you followed my suggestion and have written a blog post every day since you started planning your blog, you've got about a month worth of posts ready to go--and it's time to start thinking about your blog launch. When planning your blog launch, there are three important questions to ask yourself: What should my first post be about? You want your first post to give readers an idea who you are and what your blog's about, but don't leave it at just that: you want your first post to touch on…
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Creating a Coherent Marketing Strategy for Your Blog

Blog Stuff, Writing
You might think that once you've set up your blog and started posting your brilliant thoughts and diatribes that people will flock to your writing and become your adoring fans almost instantly. You're terribly wrong if you think that. There are millions of blogs, and every minute hundreds more are created. Everyone and their mother has a blog, and nobody has time to look through them in search of brilliance. In order to be heard over the millions of voices clamouring for attention on the world wide web, you need to make yourself visible in different arenas, particularly in the world of social media. Remember that in the blogging game content is always king. Without clear, interesting and useful information, your blog will wither and die, read by no one…
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The Design of your Blog

Blog Stuff, Writing
This weekend an unexpected trip out of town without my laptop saw to it that my post didn't make it from notebook to Wordpress until now, and reminded me why I need to have back up posts scheduled here. But today, although having a back up plan is important, I'd like to talk to you about the design of your blog. Blog design is incredibly important. You want your design to draw people in and to make them want to come back. Think of your blog like an online writing profile: you want it to look friendly and professional but still true to yourself. Clashing colours, distracting background images and unusual fonts that don't read well across all browsers can all keep people from coming back to your website. Many…
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Reaching Out to Readers: Creating Your Own Blog

Blog Stuff, Writing
I'd planned a dialogue workshop for this month, but then I realized something: I've never really delved into the subject of writing a blog. Blogging allows you to reach out to readers all over the world for free and to build your own little community. It also gives you a place to showcase your professional work to potential clients. Maintaining a scheduled blog also helps you build a writing routine. Not only that, but most of the time, it's fun. So why not create your own blog? It's free, it's easy to set up and it's the most reliable--or at least easiest--way of getting your work out to readers. If you're looking for a summer project that will help your writing career, creating a blog is the thing to do.…
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Writing for Blogs Not Your Own

Blog Stuff, Writing
I dream of someday making a living from my fiction. This blog is about that dream and how I'm going to reach it. Unfortunately, there are a hundred writers for every fiction market, and so far, my fiction hasn't seen the light of day. Instead, I've found my early successes in the realm of non-fiction: from September to December I worked as a youth blogger for Now Hear This, I've written articles and interviewed authors for Penumbra during my internship, and just this Friday I had my first real guest post(as in the first one I queried myself) published at My Name is Not Bob. All of these non-fiction experiences have been a lot of fun, and I've learned something from each of them. Most importantly, I've learned that I…
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