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This week: Edited by: phil1861
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| We’ve all crammed for exams. Why? We either used our time for something else until the last moment in foolishness or were plagued with poor planning. Sometimes we use it as a badge of honor to proclaim that we stayed up all night studying. Our performance may have suffered, but if it were performance we really were interested in we wouldn’t have crammed it all in one sitting. |
| ASIN: 197380364X |
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Amazon's Price: $ 15.99
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I recently returned from a week in Dallas, Tx for a professional certification boot camp. The certification was Microsoft’s MCSE 2003. I’ve been an MCSE since 1999. The certified systems engineer certification is a mark of ability, experience, and salary that the holder can command when job hunting or negotiating for a higher salary. It is a tough exam and you need seven of them. As a current MCSE I only needed two. But, with each change in technology I needed to update my certification lest I find that later on I need to take more exams just to keep up.
So, for an entire week I did nothing but sleep, eat, go to class, eat, go to class, study, eat, study, and sleep to start it all over again with more study and the exams. I had nothing to worry about but passing the tests. I was fed, I was housed, and I was kept track of by the couple running the boot camp so that all I really needed to do was study and take the test. That was it. Eight days of concentration on the materials and taking practice exams. I have never before spent that many days so narrowly focused on one thing. I read until the words danced around the page and I could no longer take on board what was in front of me. I woke up each day with the thought of how many hours of study could I fit in with everything else that I needed to do and then went to it. No television was on in my room for most of those days (rarely was there anything on worth watching) and even music became a distraction in my studies. Coffee and walks around the hotel were my only diversions.
Now, take this to any endeavor you wish to accomplish and apply it. What does that mean? It means you either have the focus of a laser beam in any given surroundings or you get your butt someplace that will give it to you. After trying for several years to self study for my upgrade and failing the exams I decided that I needed the boot camp to finally get it over with. You can’t always afford to spend the 3.6K that I did for the privilege, but you can ratchet up the same mental state of cramming for finals with your writing. Getting started and finishing something is when we most need this distraction free environment. You have to be purposeful, self disciplined and intense to do it even when everything is taken care of for you.
My wife and I plan artist retreats now and again to put us into a place that is free from the things that normally demand our time and attention, fostering a time of more intense creativity. There was nothing creative about those eight days and they left me drained and tired. But, one thing they did do was to allow me to see what effort is needed to accomplish something successfully.
Beginning an edit or starting a written project demands the same narrow focus sometimes. You need to turn the television and music off in order to hear your own thoughts and achieve silence. Sometimes you need to get out of the house and change your surroundings. These times can be treats, but they can also be as serious as meeting a deadline. NaNoWriMo is fast approaching and I know of no better way of getting a start than to be shut off from normal surroundings and distractions. We are famous for our starts but not so much so for our finishes. Perhaps the novels you’ve started need some of that intensity time to complete. The outlay of even a weekend at a decent hotel with the goal of getting in five to six hours of writing time can make a difference in where a story goes. NaNo is also good practice for melding the weekend away and the everyday life of writing by forcing you to a ridiculous deadline. You have to make that intense creativity time in order to finish the goal.
One can’t do this all the time. The energy needed is taxing and the focus is draining. But, for a little while it might be worth the expense in time, money, and effort. Think about how you can make your everyday surroundings a little more conducive for intense creativity. Find parts of your own town that might give you an hour or three of this weekly. Do whatever you need to do to allow for maximum creativity for minimum distraction. The television and internet can be great robbers of time. Use them wisely and get away from them when you need to.
phil1861
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Since NaNo is coming up and requires the same intensity of purpose and focus as my boot camp, I found some items that might help other prospective NaNo-ists get themselves going.
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#1330040 by Not Available. |
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Have an opinion on what you've read here today? Then send the Editor feedback! Find an item that you think would be perfect for showcasing here? Submit it for consideration in the newsletter!
https://www.Writing.Com/go/nl_form
Don't forget to support our sponsor!
| ASIN: B085272J6B |
Product Type: Kindle Store
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Amazon's Price: $ 9.99
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Feedback from the 9/19/07 NL
Elfycia Lee ☮ 
Submitted Comment:
Hi, hi there. Thanks for the newsletter. It opened my mind really. Likewise, Bloomsbury was never famous until J.K. Rowling made it famous. I think you do have a point there. I've been thinking for ages if I should self-publish, about the cost, the marketing, the possibilities of this and that. I do agree it is Word-of-mouth too. Powerful stuff. That's how her books made it as well, didn't it? You know, she did say she leave the marketing bit to others, didn't she mean publishers?
Thanks and have a good weekend ahead.
Luv,
Ely.
{suser:cybersock
Submitted Comment:
Dear mister editor
I liked what you had to say yes I'll agree you sound cynical and it pissed me off but I thought about it and you've bee in there a while maybe you need to change your occupation.
I wrote a book and I let one of my friends read it and when they were done she told me it was great that she would have bought it and I thought ok maybe she was just being nice however I feel that for some parts to my romance novel I have to change some of the words find the words that mean the same thing but give it an edge. So down the raod here where would I go to get my story published? Would submitting it to one of your publisher? how do you find a good one?
{c/blue}Who to submit to really comes down to your goals for publishing. Your market segment and the reach you wish to have all come down to how you go about it. Traditional or self publishing hinges upon these goals after you’ve made them. There are limitations to both. Finding a good publisher means research just like finding a good self publishing company.
RVMama 
Submitted Comment:
As a Newbie, I too have great aspirations to see my words in print. I have often wondered, however, which is the best route to take...traditional book in hand or the new, somewhat "iffy" ebook. I have a long way to go on my novel before making a choice so this newsletter was a great help to me!
{suser:bigjayjay
Submitted Comment:
An insight that has been too long in coming to pass. Your personnel insight has to be praised, because without articles such as yours we would all be at the mercy of the dragons of print-media.
Once again, thank you.
Johnny_mac
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| ASIN: B01FST8A90 |
Product Type: Toys & Games
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Amazon's Price: $ 24.95
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For Authors: October 17, 2007 Issue [#2009]
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