Tag Archives: pearls of wisdom

8 rules for lending books

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Filed under Books, Reading

RDC_Lending_Books

Lending our books out is emotional. We love our books. Part of us worry about our precious books. We wonder if we’ll ever see them again (the books, not our friends). The other part of us is busy trying to give the worrying part of us moral support for the tumult felt deep within our soul, which is also equally torn.

Setting rules for others to borrow our books is easy.  We can half-jokingly say “Lose it or hurt it, and I will hunt you down.”

Setting rules for ourselves is harder. I love lending books. I love hearing how much that person enjoyed book that they would otherwise not have read. I love hearing differing opinions and perspectives when they don’t.

I also have rules for myself about lending my books. I set us both up to not sweat the small stuff. Continue reading →

Taking care of your inner hamster

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Filed under Copywriting, Creativity, Fear Busting, Writing

Drawing a Blank

Your writer’s muse is undependable. You’ve got deadlines? The muse is outta there; you’re on your own. Mine lets the door slam behind her on the way out as she calls “Bye, Felicia!” over her well-groomed shoulder as she takes off to enjoy herself while I work.

I’m a copywriter. Deadlines are my daily norm, and I need a source of creativity on which I can rely. I call that source of creativity my little hamster Hortense. When the muse abandons me, Hortense is the one who helps uncover the creative gems that get the job done. She’s not in it for the glamour; she’s there because we have a job to do and we’re in it together.

You, too, have an inner source of creativity.

Take care of it, it’ll take care of you. Continue reading →

Writing Prompt Friday (fish)

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Filed under Creativity, Writing, Writing Prompt

Rubber Ducky Copywriter - Writing Prompt FridayHello and welcome back to Writing Prompt Friday! This week I was surprised at work. I won an Excellence Award, which includes a certificate, a trophy and a cash bonus. While those are lovely and deeply appreciated, I appreciate them more because of the person who nominated me. His opinion carries weight. He doesn’t give compliments cheaply. His friendship is earned, not freely given. For him to nominate me is a high compliment. For others to approve it (and for so many people to congratulate me) means more than the award itself.

People are looking even when you don’t realize it. And they’re talking.

Now, on to this week’s prompt… Continue reading →

100 Projects to Recenter

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Filed under Creativity, Failure, Fear Busting, Writing

Evil Plans LOL Cat

Life happens. Constantly. We’ve all gone through those phases in which work overwhelms us and so does family and so do these commitments and so does this and so does that. The list never ends.

As I covered in my previous post, this year has been especially, well, full. I lost track of my inner duckyness. I was getting by and handling business, but I wasn’t having a whole lot of fun. Okay, no fun. I was having zero fun. And it was exhausting.

This kind of life creeps up on you. Before you know it, you can lose track of all your hobbies and outlets that make you your awesome self.

A friend of mine recently went through the same lack of joy. And she had a great idea, which I’m sharing with anyone whom I think could use a recenter.

She calls it the “100 Project.”

Continue reading →

To edit or not to edit?

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Filed under Copywriting, Uncategorized

star-trek-grammer-lolcat

“Please don’t judge my spelling, I know you’re a writer.”

“I’m sorry for my sloppy email, I know you’re a writer.”

“I apologize in advance for my crappy IM, I know you’re a writer.”

– Lots of people

I hear these fearful phrases (and similar) more often than I’d like, usually from people who are about to put something in writing for me to read.

Colleagues, new friends, old friends, casual acquaintances, passersby on the Internet—you name it, too many people are afraid I’m going to point out their mistakes just because I’m a writer.

But I’m not.

I’m not a member of the grammar police. And I don’t know a writer who is. Yes, we’re sticklers and yes, we do enjoy a good Oxford comma debate. But I’d like to think enough of us know when to turn it off.

But it does make me want to ask—when is it okay to edit and when is it not?

Continue reading →