The "Who Am I?" Journal

I subscribe, via email, to "Thought for Today Newsletter" from Oprah.com. Recently the following "thought" caught my attention and I wanted to share it with you.

The link is: http://www.oprah.com/spirit/The-Who-Am-I-Journal/1

Who am I? It's a lifelong question. It's not about labels—"I'm a mom," or "I'm a good employee", or "I'm a Christian." It's, "When I was born, what was the plan for my life?"

Dr. Robin suggests writing in your discovery journal every night. Concentrate on moving beyond labels and appearances.

"If you work on the question—Who am I?—every day you'll start recognizing that this is the very question you've been avoiding," Dr. Robin says, even if you only write, "I don't know."

Prior to starting this journal, you've stopped yourself from feeling. This is about getting those feelings to return. It's going to be a struggle and confusing to really start pondering, "Who am I?" but don't minimize what could happen if you make a commitment every night to be writing something about who you are.

The "Who Am I?" Journal does not need to be exclusively about your failures, mistakes and missteps. Keep in mind good things about yourself that will balance your answer to the essential question in your journal

Do you have a "Who Am I" journal?

The Power Of Quotes

"Each human being is a gift, and we each have our own unique dream and purpose for living. We each must mine our imaginations, creativity and souls to uncover our true purposes and passions." --Sandra Magsamen

From time to time I like to share some writing quotes that I come across. One of my fascinations with quotes is that I find them to be so inspiring and/or motivational. They convey a message with the simplest use of words. If I am looking to jump start my creativity, I read quotes (not only on writing) to get my creative juices flowing. They help me get unblocked and are great writing prompts. These are some of my favorite writing quotes:

"Procrastination is the art of keeping up with yesterday." --Donald Marquis

"An essential aspect of creativity is not being afraid to fail." --Edwin Land

"It is never too late, in fiction or in life, to revise." --Nancy Thayer

"A musician must make music, an artist must paint, a poet must write, if he is to be ultimately at peace with himself. What a man can be, he must be." --Abraham Maslow

"There is as much dignity in tilling a field as in writing a poem." --Booker T. Washington

"Easy reading is damn hard writing." --Nathaniel Hawthorne


In what way do quotes inspire you?

Three Rules Of Writing I Live By

1. Write what you know and research the rest.

2. Take writing as an opportunity and an open door to new worlds and experiences.

3. Be the main character of your story, so that your writing is real and embellish on the details to make the story come alive.

What rules of writing do you live by?

WHY YOU SHOULD WRITE FOR JUST ONE READER

By Daphne Gray-Grant

Daphne Gray-Grant is a writing and editing coach and the author of the popular book 8½ Steps to Writing Faster, Better. She offers a brief and free weekly newsletter on her website. Subscribe by going to the Publication Coach.


I've been given a great deal of advice over the years -- some of it silly ("don't go swimming until an hour after eating"), some of it useful ("wear a pedometer to track your walking") and some of it both silly and useful ("turn on the vacuum cleaner to soothe an unhappy baby"). But by far the best piece of entrepreneurial counsel I've ever received has been this:

Market locally; sell widely.

What does this mean? Well, for example, let's imagine you run a bookstore specializing in new age books. You suppose your typical buyer to be a man or a woman somewhere between age 35 and 49. You also suppose that they don't watch much TV, that there's an excellent chance they're vegetarian and that they like cats. So, as you ponder which books to buy and where to advertise your store, you keep this description in mind.

In fact, if you're really smart, you go a little bit further and you name your key buyer. Let's say you call your female buyer Vanessa and your male buyer Todd. And as you run your bookstore -- perhaps as you're redecorating the shop -- you regularly ask questions like "would Vanessa find these colours attractive?" and "what would Todd think of this incense? " If you decide either of them would dislike your changes, you don't make them.

In other words, you work hard to appeal to a small and very specific group of people. This is marketing locally.

But what happens when a 20-year-old university student walks into the store? Do you turn her away when she wants to buy a book? Likewise for the 58-year-old retired logger. Do you tell him to get lost? No! Of course you sell your books to anyone who wants to buy them. You may not market to them but you will certainly sell to them. In other words, you sell widely.

A similar philosophy applies to writing. I express it as:

Write for one person; be read by many.

Just as our bookstore owner needed to visualize the core buyer, so, too, you need to be conscious of your core reader. I've written about this in my own book, but I really want to emphasize the point here.

The biggest benefit of creating imaginary people like Vanessa and Todd is that you stop thinking about yourself. Instead of focusing on your own needs and problems, you're suddenly thinking about what the client or the reader cares about. And by giving your core reader a name and a face you transform him or her from an anonymous mass into a real human being.

I do this all the time with my own writing. For example, I produce this newsletter for non-fiction writers. I've never written fiction and I don't regard myself an expert on the topic. That said, I know that many of my subscribers are, in fact, fiction writers. Do I turn them away? No! They find what I say useful. I know I've even sold books to many of them. So, while I don't write specifically for them, they find my work helpful.

For any writer, the core reader needs to become a key part of your daily life. That way, every time you review your work, one of your first questions will be, "Would Vanessa/Todd (or whatever you name them) find this useful or interesting?"

Don't ever believe that your writing is going to appeal to everyone. The words you produce will move some people strongly and leave others cold. That doesn't make you a bad writer. It's just reality.

So go to town with the core reader concept. Give this person a name, a face, a place where he or she lives and a little history. And if you're having a hard time with this, use someone you already know well -- your best friend, your mother, your brother, a cousin.

However you do it, write for this one person. Ironically, you'll reach more people this way because the alchemy of engagement will automatically make your writing more interesting.

How do you write for just one reader?

Write Your Story

I know many aspiring authors want to write a good story, usually fiction, that will engage readers and ultimately make them some money once it becomes published. I have not had an easy time of coming up with a fictional story line, characters, etc. to write about. There are some plot ideas that have popped in my head that might make for a good story, but the words just have not flowed from my brain to the page. Poetry comes to my mind more readily, and lately, I have been thinking about writing non-fiction. Perhaps this is my "calling" so to speak, to write from experience, tell about lessons learned, to touch someone in similar circumstances, and to give hope.

We each have life stories to tell and while you may think your life is boring, unexciting and uninteresting, I am sure you can pull a lot of worthwhile facts from it, to make a story. I want to write about my life, drawing from my earliest childhood memory to the present, leaving my children my legacy, of sorts, so that they can add their own story to it and pass it on to their children. As we get older and life happens, it is so easy to forget things, whether good or bad, and in the daily grind, everything starts to meld together and the past becomes fuzzy. I believe that reliving your life through writing is a form of cleansing your soul, liberating us from past hurts, painful losses and bad relationships, while at the same time, filling us with joy as we recollect those memories that are most dear to us.

As this new year start, I am thinking about writing about myself, my family, friends, enemies, and anything that I have learned and want to pass on to my children, friends, etc. In a way, I want to be like a historian, and collect information from relatives, friends, and go as far back as much as I can with my family tree.

My life story outline:

1. Title
2. Prologue (optional)
3. Chapters: Each chapter will have a title and significant events that occurred in my life and lesson learned from it, or just an entertaining story that meant something to me
4. Epilogue (optional)
5. Dedication of book

I have not started this yet, but I plan to do so soon and will post excerpts on my blog as I go along.


What do you think about writing your life story?

Platform Resolutions For Writers 2010

by Christine Katz

Before writers establish an author platform, they typically establish a writer platform. Over the past decade, thousands of writers have parlayed established influence into traditional book deals. Landing a traditional book deal is still an effective way to exponentially increase your credibility and visibility.

Your “platform” refers to what you do in the world with your professional expertise that makes you visible and influential in the world. Having friends on Facebook or followers on Twitter is not your platform, unless the majority of those people know who you are, what you do, and are enthusiastic about your work.

I thought I would offer some advice about how to slowly and steadily establish a lasting platform. You may note the lack of fanaticism in this advice and the emphasis on enduring success instead. I’m a mother and a wife, a freelancer, a speaker, a teacher, and a blogger, so aiming for balance is the only way I can afford to work if I plan on sticking around for the long haul.

This advice has worked consistently for my students over the past several years. I think you will find that a grounded, step-by-step approach works just as well for you if you choose to follow it:

1. Develop a platform topic that you love and can work on tirelessly for the next few years. Your passion of the moment should come in second to the topic you could delve into deeply for a good, long time. Prior professional education and a depth of personal experience are going to be a boon to your platform if you have an eye on a future book deal.

2. Hang back from establishing a blog on your topic until you have cultivated a wealth of content and experience working with others on specialty-related activities that lend credibility and trust to your name. Others will tell you to start blogging immediately, but don’t, if you want to be efficient with your time and money.

3. Instead, gain authority by seeking publication in established, highly visible publications both in print and online that serve your target audience. Avoid the kind of publishing that anyone can accomplish, like posting on article sites, and work on your professional communication skills instead. By all means, avoid the content mills offering writers slave wages with the promise of future earnings.

4. Don’t begin any kind of marketing campaign for any product or service offerings until you have established yourself as a go-to person on your topic, again saving you time and money. Before you look at ways to serve others directly, channel your expertise into the best service methods possible based on your strengths and weaknesses. This is a meaty topic that is covered in-depth in my book, Get Known Before the Book Deal, Use Your Personal Strengths to Grow an Author Platform (Writer’s Digest Books 2008).

5. Then, develop a product or service that can become one of several multiple income streams over time that will support your goal of becoming a published author. For example, teaching classes over the years has allowed me to re-invest more of the money I earn from writing books back into book marketing. Make sure any offerings you produce are released conscientiously and are integrated into the professional writing you already do. Otherwise, you will seem like you are all over the place and just trying to score a buck.

6. Don’t expect your platform to support you financially for at least one or two years, as you micro-invest in it, re-invest in it as it grows, and expand your visibility.

7. Once you have a professional publication track record in your niche topic, then it’s time to hang your online shingle. I’ve seen this accomplished in as little as six months by exceptionally focused students. Take a portion of the money you’ve earned writing and invest it in a professional quality online presence.

8. A low-cost way to do this is to purchase your name as a URL and use a hosting site like GoDaddy.com to host a Wordpress.org blog. I use the Thesis Theme, which you can see in action at my blog. In this way, a blog can also serve as your website where you post your published clips, offerings and bio. If you don’t have a ton of money to invest in the look of your site, you can always pay a designer later.

9. Delay partnering with others on joint ventures until you have a clear idea of your own strengths and weaknesses in and around your topic. And when you do partner with others be extremely discriminating. Make sure the partnership is going to be win-win-win for everyone involved.

10. Start an e-mail newsletter or e-zine with those who are most interested in your topic. Build your list by invitation and then grow it into a permission-based following over time. Create an expected, ongoing dialogue that is mutually beneficial to everyone involved and your list will grow.

11. Now you are ready to start blogging. And yes, I mean while you continue to do all the things we’ve already discussed. Be sure to zoom-focus your blog on what you have to add to the conversation that is already going on about your topic. Don’t just share information; make an impact. Make your blog a go-to, up-to-date resource for your audience.

12. Partner selectively with others who serve the same general audience that you do with integrity and humility. Spend time getting to know folks before you decide to partner with them. You can’t afford to taint the reputation you have worked so hard to establish by partnering with just anyone.

13. Now that you have an established niche and audience, definitely participate in social networking. I like Twitter, Facebook, and LinkedIn because they all offer something unique. The best way to learn is to jump in, spend an hour online each week until you are up and running. Follow the instructions for getting started provided by social media expert Meryl K. Evans.

This start-up plan for a writer platform will eventually blossom into an author platform. From start to finish, implementing a solid platform following this advice should take you about a year. By the end of that year, you will have established yourself as a serious contender in both professional and online circles, without killing yourself for some huckster’s promise of overnight success.

Have a plan. Leave a legacy in words, connections and professional influence. If you are consistent, by the time the year is done, you will have made effective use of your time and money in 2010.

I wish you the best of luck in your platform-building efforts!

Christina Katz is the author of Get Known Before the Book Deal, Use Your Personal Strengths to Grow an Author Platform and Writer Mama, How to Raise a Writing Career Alongside Your Kids for Writer’s Digest Books. She has written hundreds of articles for national, regional, and online publications, presents at literary and publishing events around the country, and is a monthly columnist for the Willamette Writer. Katz publishes a weekly e-zine, The Prosperous Writer, and hosts The Northwest Author Series. She holds an MFA in writing from Columbia College Chicago and a BA from Dartmouth College. A “gentle taskmaster” to her hundred or so students each year, Katz channels over a decade of professional writing experience into success strategies that help writers get on track and get published. Learn more at ChristinaKatz.com