Writing Inrochester

In a classic movie from The Golden Age of Hollywood, “The Best Years of Our Lives,” Myrna Loy tells her daughter, Teresa Wright, that during the course of a long marriage, you have to make yourself fall back in love with your mate, over and again.

It’s a poignant moment, to be sure, and the message is an unusual, but insightful one.

Affection takes energy and focus, and positive feelings generally don’t burn brightly unless we’re willing to periodically increase the wattage or fix the wiring.

What applies to loving someone also applies to the less intense emotion of liking someone.

Sometimes it takes effort, but generally, it’s worth it.

When we show we like someone else, it comes back to us. They find a way to like us, because they like being liked.

This is one of the great insights into growing your personal popularity, whether you’re a high school sophomore or a candidate for political office.

Simply put, if you want to be liked, like them first.

This also applies to being a popular speaker before seminars or groups of any kind. If you want their approval and positive word of mouth advertising, find ways to send them the signal that you like them.

Here are five ways of doing it:

(1) Smile, especially at the beginning of your talk. This can be difficult if you’re nervous, but it’s necessary, even if you have to crank up those lips, mechanically!

(2) Tell pertinent, but fun stories, and position them as “gifts.” By saying, “I think you’re going to like this one,” you’re saying that you’re customizing your talk to them and that they stand out in your mind as a unique group.

(3) Compliment them, directly. Some of the groups I train are very, very sharp, and I tell them. “You know, it’s a pleasure working with a group this smart because we can cover so much ground, so quickly!”

(4) Before a break, say, “I hate to cut off this great discussion but let’s take our break and get back to this in 15 minutes.” This gives them ownership of the session and they’re going to like what they build more than something that’s built entirely for them.

(5) Tell them they’ve been a great group (if you believe it!) before the evaluations are done. Remind them of all of the material that you covered together, and the special insights THEY GAVE YOU.

While you’re at it you can say YOU had a great time, again, if it’s sincere.

I qualify this because if it’s apparent that the class was rough on you, or markedly difficult, you don’t want to say it was fun.

You might point out that the material was challenging, the discussions stimulating and at times pointed, but in the long run everyone benefited.

And you can commend them for their perseverance, if nothing else.

Whatever you do, find a silver lining and end on the most positive note possible.

The message they should get is: Tough or easy as a group, you still liked them.

For having said that, they just may fall in love with you again!

Dr. Gary S. Goodman is the best-selling author of 12 books, over 600 articles, and the creator of numerous audio and video training programs, including “The Law of Large Numbers: How To Make Success Inevitable,” published by Nightingale-Conant-a favorite among salespeople and entrepreneurs. For information about booking Gary to speak at your next sales, customer service or management meeting, conference or convention, please address your inquiry to: mailto:gary@customersatisfaction.com gary@customersatisfaction.com.

Have you ever had anyone criticize your writing? Maybe they were just having a bad day. After all some people just can’t seem to say anything nice.

Not everyone is comfortable with criticism, but there may be times when it provides just what you need to move forward in your writing.

There is a man that’s been called the “Simon Cowell of Christian Publishing”. A few quotes from Chip MacGregor might allow you to see that he’s far from being the touchy-feely type. The following quotes were part of a July 2006 interview with Chip MacGregor who is the Associate Publisher with Hachette Book Group USA. The quotes are part of a lengthy interview conducted by the staff at Novel Journey.

“The reason most wannabe authors remain unpublished is because they just aren’t willing to put in the time, to do the hard work and become better at the craft of writing. In other words, laziness will keep you from being a great writer.” – Chip MacGregor

“Some people (many people) seem to be fans, and send me nice notes on occasion, like when they’ve gone off their meds or had too much to drink. Others clearly do NOT like me. Especially nice church ladies who can’t understand why I’d say that a book is bad or a writer has done a terrible job.” – Chip MacGregor

“The only way I could finish the stupid thing was to tear out the pages I’d read and light them on fire, in hopes that occasionally sticking my hand into the flames would keep me awake. Mourn the trees that died so this tome could see print.” – Chip MacGregor

“I’d suggest that many of the Old Testament prophets helped the culture make strides not by being nice, but being honest – even blunt. Ditto Paul. Ditto Jesus, for that matter (take a peek at his criticisms of the upstanding church leadership of His day).” – Chip MacGregor

“So what’s the harm in being honest? Even brutally honest? Can’t we all admit we’ve got stuff to learn?” – Chip MacGregor.

“90% of the stuff I reject is rejected for one reason: it isn’t good enough.” – Chip MacGregor

MacGregor does have advice for writers that may make them cringe a bit less, “I think writer’s conferences are a great way for newbies to get educated in the process of writing. Hanging around a bunch of experienced people in your chosen field is ALWAYS an excellent idea… It’s nice to find somebody a bit further down the path.”

It is safe to say that the thrust of MacGregors ‘honesty’ it to try to challenge writers to be the absolute best they can be. This often means forcing ourselves to work harder at our craft and refusing to use a specific genre as a crutch for mediocre writing.

Scott Lindsay is a web developer and entrepreneur. He is the founder of FaithWriters ( faithwriters.com faithwriters.com) and many other web projects. FaithWriters has grown to become one of the largest online destinations for Christian writers. Members include writers from all around the world. Please visit the website at: faithwriters.com faithwriters.com

I used to work with a woman who had a strange outlook on what was considered romantic. Her idea of a perfect evening with a man was chili dogs at the truck pulls. Do not bringing her flowers and chocolate, it would not get you past the front door.

Another co-worker was just the opposite. He felt the need to hold the door for ladies, pay for dinner, and basically shower them with romance. He was the man all of the women who worked there wanted to find, even the ones who were already married.

So imagine our surprise when these two co-workers not only met, but fell in love with each other? Not a single person in the shop saw that pairing coming. And as you would think, their romantic beginnings did not run smoothly.

Physical attraction between your hero and heroine is important. It is the basis for their initial meeting and is what gets their hearts pumping for romance. But what keeps a relationship going, and makes the attraction turn into deep, meaningful love is what is going on inside your characters. How their personalities mesh with one another. That is the meat and potatoes of any romance.

The old saying “opposites attract” is a wonderful conflict mantra but be careful. Making your hero and heroine too different can make for a very bumpy romantic road for them to walk. You want them to have enough in common that they are willing to work out their differences. Too much alike and it will be a boring story. Complete opposites and it will make the changes they both have to go through unbelievable, not to mention difficult to write.

Giving your character’s flaws, fears and personal convictions that are opposite enough to make them question how they could fall in love with someone like that. The easiest way to do this is find a common thread between them, then choose opposite ends of that thread to place them on. Use those traits to increase the conflict and the emotional tension in a romance story.

If your heroine is a crusader trying to save the rainforest, make your hero someone who works for a corporation that is destroying it. If your hero is a die-hard biker dude, make your heroine afraid of anything on two wheels.

You get the idea. Give them something they do not agree on, right from the start. By creating something they can disagree on, you are putting a wedge between them, romantically. Remember, this can be anything you wish; it does not have to be a major thing. It just has to be something they both care deeply about and are willing to disagree over.

As they get to know each other, and fall more in love, you need to show their personalities and convictions changing. You do this by putting them into situations that test their convictions, and push them to the limits. Make them sweat, and suffer, before they come to their realizations. That is what makes great conflict and what romance readers want.

But what of the couple I spoke about at the beginning of this article? What happened to them? Well, as I said, their relationship started off pretty rocky. For a while there, we all thought they would give up and start seeing other people. But in the end they surprised all of us. Last I heard, they were celebrating their 15th wedding anniversary, and had four kids. In time, he learned to like truck pulls and she decided that getting flowers was not the end of the world.

Just what every reader wants, a happy ending.

Dawn Arkin is an author on Writing.Com/ Writing.Com/
which is a site for Writing.Com/ Love Poetry. Her portfolio can be found at darkin.Writing.Com/ darkin.Writing.Com/ so stop by and read for a while.

The Hero’s Journey (Monomyth) is the template upon which the vast majority of successful stories and Hollywood blockbusters are based upon. In fact, ALL of the hundreds of Hollywood movies we have deconstructed (see URL below) are based on this 188 stage template.

Understanding this template is a priority for story or screenwriters. This is the template you must master if you are to succeed in the craft.

[The terminology is most often metaphoric and applies to all successful stories and screenplays, from The Godfather (1972) to Brokeback Mountain (2006) to Annie Hall (1977) to Lord of the Rings (2003) to Drugstore Cowboy (1989) to Thelma and Louise (1991) to Apocaplyse Now (1979)].

THERE IS ONLY ONE STORY

THE HERO′S JOURNEY:

a) Attempts to tap into unconscious expectations the audience has regarding what a story is and how it should be told.

b) Gives the writer more structural elements than simply three or four acts, plot points, mid point and so on.

c) Gives you a tangible process for building and releasing dissonance (establishing and achieving catharses, of which there are usually four).

and more…

ABRIDGED TIP(S):

*****Physical Change*****

It is during the First Threshold Outer Cave Trial that a physical change (most often a wound) is inflicted. This is where blood is most often seen. The wound is symbolic of the beginning of the Physical Transformation. As the wound heals, so it represents the Hero’s Changing (the Transmogrification). In Bonnie and Clyde (1967), the shopkeeper shoots Clyde. In Brokeback Mountain (2005), Ennis and Jack fight and bloody each other’s noses.

Learn more…

WRITE THAT SCREENPLAY!

The Complete 188 stage Hero’s Journey and other story structure templates can be found at clickok.co.uk/ clickok.co.uk/

The Managing Creativity and Innovation MBA dissertation, DIY creativity Audit, Powerpoint presentation and Good Idea generator software can be found at managing-creativity.com/ managing-creativity.com/

You can also receive a regular, free newsletter by entering your email address at this site.

Kal Bishop, MBA

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You are free to reproduce this article as long as no changes are made, the author’s name is retained and the link to our site URL remains active.

In the world of copywriting, there are words that you should never use. Not because somebody said so, but because studies have been made to determine what words set people off in the wrong way. These are words that will drastically kill your sales. In this article we’re going to examine five of these words and explain why you shouldn′t use them, as well as give you some substitutes for them.

The first, and probably most deadliest word you should never use in your copywriting is the word “buy.” The reason for this is because when people hear the word buy they immediately think of spending money, and people don’t like spending money. So this word will immediately turn them off on your sales copy. Instead, you want to use the word “claim” because there is no connection with spending money.

The second word you never want to use in your sales copy is the word “learn.” The reason for this is because learning is hard. Learning makes people think about what they used to do in school that they hated so much. Instead of using the word learn, use the word “discover.” This will make it appear as if the information magically entered their brain. This is a much better word.

The third word you never want to use is the word “tell.” Nobody likes to be told anything. Instead what you want to do is use the word “reveal.” For example, you might say something like, “I will reveal to you the secrets of making money online.” This is much better than “I will tell you how to make money online.” So never use the word tell. Instead, use the word reveal.

The fourth word you never want to use is the word “things.” This is one of those very general words that really doesn’t reveal anything to the person reading the copy. Instead, you want to use words like “tips,” “tricks,” and “techniques.” These words are much more colorful and descriptive and will work a whole lot better in your sales copy.

The fifth word you never want to use in your sales copy is the word “stuff.” This is another one of those words that amateurs use when that say things like “When you learn this stuff…” Absolutely horrible. Instead, you want to use the words “insider secrets” or “secrets.” So the sentence you would use would be something like “When I reveal to you these insider secrets…” and so on.

By staying away from these 5 words, you will greatly improve your sales copy.

To YOUR Success,

Steven Wagenheim

Want to write killer articles? Want your bios to sizzle? Want to get people flocking to your site like bees to honey? Check out a book that I personally wrote called “The Complete Article Writing And Marketing Guide” which you can find at stevewagenheim.com/ stevewagenheim.com/ under the products section. This is my own personal site made especially for writers and marketers where you will find articles, reviews and a wealth of information on many topics related to writing and marketing.

After twenty years of trying to get my story told how I conceptualized the museum idea on a US Navy
WWII decommissioned aircraft carrier, which I started in September of 1974. Iuniverse, a self-publishing
company finally published my book. Now the truth can be told who is the true and original founder of the
Intrepid Sea, Air & Space Museum.

Since Intrepid has been in the news these past few weeks stuck in the mud, I called The NY Times and Newsday explaining that the screws (props) were supposed to have been removed when Intrepid was in Bayonne, NJ Naval Base dry dock in 1982…who canceled the order to remove the props, I don’t know, as I was totally surprised when I learned that the Intrepid was stuck in the mud because of the screws. The Intrepid has to be towed when the high tide comes available in Dec 3/4, because, if it stays at Pier86, it’ll
wind up similar to the USS Texas, a battleship, if moved the hull will literally fall apart… besides this, it’s ashame that the intrepid Foundation has to foot the bill of the $3-million for this inexcusable mistake of not
removing the screws when they had the chance.

Besides this, we were at that time (1982) would have gotten a large amount of money for the three (I believe are magnesium bronze screws ) with one on display
on the Intrepid…I often wondered why the one propeller was never on display? Please purchase the book and read the true story,you’ll be amazed.

The book is available in soft-cover and hard-cover with 344pp with
over 100 illustrations: letters, news articles, photos, diagrams and other important documentation
indicating without a doubt, who the true original founder of the Intrepid Museum really is… more than
ninety percent of ideas of what was on the museum, before is was attempted to be towed, were my ideas.

Recently many high-output online article authors have been condemned by top-notch copywriters and editor type authors. These copywriter type authors and writers believe that many high-output authors do not take the time to carefully edit their work before submitting them and thus detract from the Internet and affect the over all content available on free online article submission sites. Whereas this maybe the case in many regards is it justified considering the low reading levels of the average person?

What I am saying is that the average readership and their searches on the Internet are lacking of any potential intellectual capability. Some say we should write articles, which give at least some new or interesting information to the viewer, which makes sense otherwise why read the article in the first place? Yet; If we are to suggest that you give the reader only one tidbit of new information in each article, then sure you can do that. It is probably all the reader can handle anyway, yet in doing so aren’t we driving down the society? Or could you say that most information on the Internet is completely worthless and has no worthy information and thus one tidbit is better than none, so we are driving it upward, albeit in a very small increment? In which case why bother?

Additionally if I write an article on the Mars Rover, which is a high-hit Google search for 2005, but it gets buried in the Search Engine and no one reads it and in 8-months gets 97 article views. But if I write an article of ridiculous nature such as 2006 Paris Hilton Hair Cut and it gets 158 hits the very first day, before it even hits the search engines, then quickly climbs to 900 in three weeks. If this is the case then what we have is problem with humanity. So if I give one “secret tip” on Paris Hilton’s hair is the reader really served and what could you possibly write about Paris Hiltons public or private hair, which is not already on the Internet in full-motion video? I would encourage dialogue on this issue. Because from what I see quality articles is completely subjective and has a lot to do with what the people want, rather than one’s writing ability to deliver real quality. Think this in 2006.

“Lance Winslow” - Online WorldThinkTank.net/wttbbs/ Think Tank forum board. If you have innovative thoughts and unique perspectives, come think with Lance in the Online Think Tank and solve the problems of the World WorldThinkTank.net www.WorldThinkTank.net/

Some people, like me, pick up pen and paper or go to the computer when sorrow, grief, or other trouble strikes. The need to put emotion, especially that caused by trauma, into words becomes overwhelming. Words spill across the page or screen, allowing us to cope with the pain swamping our spirits.

Does verbalizing help us cleanse the poison of suffering from our hearts and minds? Or, are our words a cry for help? Perhaps, we need to verbalize and receive help in order to heal. In fact writing therapy is a recommended way of dealing with problems of all kinds.

Putting my emotions into words helped me survive the death of my baby. I thought I was going crazy as the dreams came each time I slept: dreams of holding her, caring for her, dreams too real. I’d awaken to the reality of my loss and empty arms again and again. Finally I started writing each time I awoke. I poured my thoughts onto the multicolored pages of a tablet and stuck the written words in the family Bible. As time passed, the grief became bearable. Writing helped me survive for my other children and my husband.

As I sat beside my mother’s side after her stroke, I knew she probably wouldn’t live, couldn’t live. I grabbed scrap paper and jotted my feelings into lines of poetry. When my former son-in-law “stole” two of my grandchildren the day after their great-grandmother died, the emotions that never die gave realism to a novel about a young woman whose ex-husband takes their children.

As Robert and I lived through the time he was in hospice nearly two years ago, knowing that his life was ending, I questioned God, begged Him to touch Robert. Then I turned to writing again. I used words to cope with the pain of watching my husband suffer. Writing allowed me to stay strong for him. Then when Robert no longer was considered terminal, I knew that writing had helped me keep my sanity again.

Poetry especially grants me release from whatever emotions I may experience; writing the concise, precise words in poetic language becomes my therapy. Many lines of poetry fill the folder on my hard drive or reside in a published book. One time when extremely angry, I wrote the following:

Anger

Black, billowing smoke, fed by blazing flames,
Twists the mind and soul like a blade
Turning within a blast furnace of molden steel.
Thought becomes muddled with blasts of agony;

Nothing is clear or positive, but all confrontational,
Filled with the desire to hurt, to maim, even kill.
The pounding of one’s heart closes his ears
To reason, to the cry of control, of restraint.

When the final explosion destroys all reason,
What is left is ashes of physical insanity,
The remains of emotional destruction,
The exhaustion felt by losing all inhibition.

Joy becomes a dim memory lost in violence.
(© 2006 by Vivian Gilbert Zabel)

Anger dissipated as the words appeared on the computer screen. For some reason, putting what I feel into words helps me deal with the emotion and become stronger.

Putting emotions into words does help many to better understand, in time, and to deal with traumatic emotions. We can write our way through troublesome times.

Vivian Gilbert Zabel, a retired teacher of English and composition, is an author on Writing.Com/ Writing.Com/ which is a site for Writing.Com/ Poetry. Her books Hidden Lies and Other Stories and Walking the Earth: Life’s Perpectives in Poetry can be ordered through Amazon.com or from most book stores.

Did you know that people buy with their hearts and not their mind? In other words, it is actually the power of emotions that turn prospects into buyers, not logic.

There are several hot emotional buttons that you can push to make people eagerly buy from you. If you can identify these buttons and bring them into play in every promotional effort you run, then you will see a hefty spike in your sales conversion rates.

Not long ago, I read an interesting ebook written by Cris David Young that reveals all the 22 hot emotional buttons that if we push them throughout our copywriting, we will be able to sell more things to more people more often.

I was very surprised to discover all of these precious theories in his copywriting tips and started to realize that the big copywriters have been using and exploiting these same hot buttons all this time to drive hordes of sales!

To make it more uncomplicated, all of these 22 hot emotional buttons can actually be classified into 6 groups:

Basic Human Needs Buttons

We always try to avoid pain and maximize pleasure. We seek for security, power, acceptance, freedom, community, and more. Fear, self-centered, curiosity, free and sex-appeal are hot emotional buttons related to basic human needs.

Feel Good Buttons

We always want to feel good and pursue any route that leads us to certain condition that can fulfill this need. Instant gratification, enthusiasm, specificity, exclusivity, five-senses, acknowledgement and flattery are hot emotional buttons that can make people feel good.

Easy Buttons

All of us want everything done as easy as possible. We always look for solutions so we can work less and spend less money. All-in-one concept and convenience are hot buttons in this subject.

Don’t Worry Buttons

People usually have objections and sales resistance. If you can understand what your target market is worrying about, you can overcome that feeling to make them feel safe. The fear of making a mistake, credibility, consistency and truth are hot buttons regarding to people’s objections and resistance.

People Like Me Buttons

For most of us, agreeing with others is more comfortable than going our own way. The hot emotional buttons related to this tendency is the social proof and authority buttons.

Trust Buttons

There are people who are skeptic and pessimist. These people need to trust you as the person or business behind the product who will guarantee satisfaction. So you have to know the “Oops I did it again” button, the “common ground” button and the “unique” button to turn this kind of prospects into sold customers.

If you can push these hot emotional buttons in your copywriting and fulfill the combination of these needs, then selling your product is a snap.

Honestly, I am very amazed at how Cris explain these buttons in a clear and concise way. They are absolutely the gems of copywriting tips that once mastered, can be very rewarding for a long time.

Discover the complete

Writing articles as I am sure many of you know is a very popular way of increasing the amount of backward links that you have pointing to your site. In theory, the more of these backward links we are able to obtain, the more traffic our site should receive. There are however some very important things to take into consideration when writing and submitting your articles as you do not want to be wasting your time and you do not want your site to get dropped by the major search engines or put in some sort of sandbox.

The first thing to remember is that Rome was not built in a day. What I mean is if you have a new website, about for example hair loss, you may want to reach the top ten in Google for your keywords within say six months. You hear that one way to do this is by building up good number of backward links to this hair site. You think that the more the merrier and start pounding out one article after the other and are very proud of yourself after the first month because you were able to write fifty articles all pointing to your new hair website.

I believe this approach to be totally wrong. The hair loss websites which are in the top ten of Google have probably been around for quite a number of years and will without doubt have a number of quality backward links. If your site sticks around for a long time and you continue to build up its backward links it will go higher and higher in the search engines over time.

The one thing you do not want to do is to raise any red flags with the search engines. A new site which has eight hundred backward links after one month could raise this red flag. The search engines will now probably not trust this site and could easily put it in some sort of sandbox until it decides whether it is kosha or not.

In my opinion it is important to build up the number of backward links to a new website fairly slowly. When writing articles, I would personally only write one article with a link to a new website per week. Of course if you have ten websites, you are able to write ten articles if you only decide to have one link on each article etc.

I also think that it is very worthwhile to only submit the same article to around five or six of the different article directories. I would submit the article in total to around twenty-two article directories but would have around four variations of it etc. The differences in each article are not massive but are big enough to make it more original. There is a big thing being debated at the moment in webmaster circles about the potential damage that can be caused by duplicate content. From what I have read, everybody seems to have a different opinion on this subject. My opinion is that it is better to be safe than sorry, therefore why take the risk? It would be good however if the major search engines could clarify their position on the subject, but lets face it, that is never going to happen.

In conclusion, my advice is to enjoy writing articles, have patience, build up the number of backward links slowly and to submit different variations of the same article to the directories.

Stephen Hill helps to promote a number of websites including:

stammering-stuttering.co.uk stuttering treatment

radiantyouth.com guide to anti-aging

blog.stop-smoking-tobacco.com/blog quit smoking tips