Hey folks
As you can probably guess by the title this post will be about Heidi Grant Halvorson's book 'Succeed'. (Or so I thought until it turned out my own experiences could become a prime example of why Grant Halvorson makes such a good point in her book). Succeed is one of the quickest and most useful reads (at least in the first third) I've read in the past few weeks (and if you're following my blog you'll know I've been reading a lot. This read at least 1 hour a day thing is working out well for me).
It's my fourth finished book in 2019. (Yes I'm just showing off with this statement.)
Anyway. I never thought I'd relate to someone who uses their children in examples as much as Grant Halvorson does. Seriously. There is something about them in almost every chapter post the one-third mark of the book. This doesn't so much offend me (no matter what that first line might sound like) as it actually intrigues me because this author (as opposed to other self-help book writers) brings almost as many day-to-day examples from her own life than just random laboratory situations into the book. That is enjoyable and reads a bit like a memoir rather than strictly aloof science.
I digress with the examples though. We want to get to the meat of the story.
Let's start with the most important message of the book: It is better to be someone who wants to learn and improve rather than someone who just wants to be good. Why? Because being good leaves you in a huge depression if at some point it gets so hard you're no longer incredibly good or find your work easy.
Case in point: WriteBot.
WriteBot has a history of finding things very easy and not challenging enough. WriteBot does... a little less than its best and still passes every test and project and problem with flying colours. Until it doesn't. And if it doesn't it gets depressed and can't work for months. Story of my life. You'd think a mechanical entity that lives only to write would do great at writing... and yet often there are problems not pre-configured in WriteBot's algorithms. These make WriteBot insanely unhappy when they cannot be solved as near-instantly as all other problems.
A lot of these effects (depression or feeling unmotivated or like a failure) come from what Grant Halvorson calls 'be-good' goals - which are essentially there to allow you to show off. In fact this 'be-good' mindset is a concept she talks about a lot - you have a certain skillset and you're good and you strive to show everyone how good you are. This works when you're trying to hit deadlines maybe or when you want quick results. Any results in these cases is often better than none. Not so in other areas of life/work.
Grant Halvorson then goes on to reinforce (for me) what I've learned after I realized being-good (her label for the kind of thinking described above) just didn't work. The only way to continue after you're somewhat successful and want to reach that HUNDRED MILE ALL IMPORTANT GOAL is to change your mindset to a learning mindset. This, Grant Halvorson calls getting-better mindset, as opposed to the be-good show off mindset mentioned above.
The rest of the book basically builds on those two concepts. There are optimists who often rush rush rush through tasks and do them well but maybe not excellent (be-good mindset). They won't put much thought into what they are doing because they believe they will succeed either way. And on the other side of the spectrum you have pessimists. The ones who think of everything that could go wrong and work much more conservatively. Those are often the people who take their time and try to get-better at things.
Of course it's not that simple. There are other factors to take into consideration as well but this post is simply an overview of the most important point in the book.
That being said... I do recommend you read it. It's short. It's written in an easy-to-understand way (while still being backed by scientific data of Grant Halvorson's and her colleagues' experiments) and the first third in which she explains why be-good can sometimes have disadvantages to getting-better goals is really worth it. The last two thirds are somewhat vague and perhaps a bit rushed for the pages they are given but all in all the book has given me some good information with which to work on my own goal setting skills. I hope it might do the same for you!
Have a good night/day!
WriteBot.
PS: tomorrow I'ma make Kimchi. I'm hyped.
Showing posts with label goal setting. Show all posts
Showing posts with label goal setting. Show all posts
Friday, January 11, 2019
Saturday, January 5, 2019
The Best of Non-Fiction 2018 (complete list)
Hey folks
This is a complete list of the two posts The Best Non-Fiction of 2018 Part I and The Best Non-Fiction of 2018 Part II combined and sorted by best book in each category (also sorted by best category) for your convenience.
Top Tier:
The Courage to be Disliked by Ichiro Kishimi: I love this book. There has been no better book in my life ever before. I actually loved it enough to buy a paper copy after reading it on my Kindle just to have it on my shelf (and that doesn't happen very often at all). This book (not 12 Rules) IS the Holy Grail of learning to live with yourself and working through/DESPITE your past traumas in a non-pretentious way. It refers heavily to the philosophy of Alfred Adler and I promise you it is impactful. If you read any book from my list at all then it should be this one.
The Magic of Thinking Big by David J. Schwartz: Another book right up there with The Courage to be Disliked and How to Win Friends and Influence People. It's on an entirely different topic (The 10X Rule was inspired by it) but so so worth it! If you read two books from my list it should be The Courage to be Disliked and this one. It's so much more accessible than the somewhat reckless airy-fairy tips of The 10X Rule and written so much more humanly relatable. In essence it's a simple guide on how to improve your life by dreaming well (however without any affirmation or visualization crap like you find in some of the more etheric self-help books) and by working on bigger and more fulfilling projects than you believed yourself capable of/could even conceive of.
Eat That Frog by Brian Tracy: This one was great and definitely deserves the light red colour. In fact it should probably be pink to do it justice.
The title of the book refers to its content: Do your most important task (the biggest frog) first. I wrote a full blog post about it here: Review of Eat That Frog but for the sake of this list the gist of why it is so impactful is that:
a.) Brian Tracy does not waste words. He starts with relevant information and sticks to it. He does not add any fluff to his text and stays fully on course throughout. This is why the book is only 100 pages long (depending of course on your format) but it's so densely packed with information on how to get started and finish your most important projects it's 100+% worth the money spent on it.
b.) Tracy's tips are practical and can be used immediately. Do you want to become more productive in your most important work (your biggest frog)? Then read this book.
12 Rules for Life by Jordan Peterson: This was the first non-fiction of 2018 I actually LOVED. You can say what you want about JP as a person (and I'll not join that particular debate) but 12 Rules is highly relevant to everyone who wants to improve themselves/their outlook on life and the world. Of course, not all Peterson writes is Holy Grail material, and I would argue not much actually is, BUT in every chapter, there are nuggets you can pick up to improve your life and relationships. You can pick and choose what you wish to incorporate in your life or not. As such, the book is definitely worth a read.
How to Win Friends and Influence People by Dale Carnegie: It took me a long time to get to this book. I knew it existed for almost a decade but couldn't bring myself to read it because the title sounds pretentious and fake as all heck. However... after hundreds and hundreds of recommendations I decided to give it a try... and it's great! It truly is an amazing book and not in the least pretentious or fake. A lot of people think 'But it will teach me to be false in order to make friends' but FAR FROM IT! The main body of the books deals with no-brainer tips everyone knows (such as smiling at people to lift both of your spirits and taking care of yourself) but needs to be reminded of because they are so easily overlooked. It also teaches you that when you are fake people will know and they won't respond to you at all - so it's the opposite of what a lot of people fear the book will try to make them do. I'll add my voice to this particular book's value: It's definitely worth it.
Second Tier:
Becoming a Writer by Dorothea Brande: This book is great! It talks a lot about the day-to-day business of writing and the fears you might encounter (and how to conquer them!). I recommend this for anyone who wants to be an artist.
Wake Up and Live by Dorothea Brande: The same as above but not focused on writing alone. It's a great book for everyone who feels slightly lost in life (I know I do...)
The 10X Rule by Grant Cardone: I've written a longer post about this one here. It's quite good if you want to have an overview of how much work you will be required to do in order to get ahead. It tells you basically to multiply every effort by 10 if you truly want to succeed. If you plan to contact 10 customers in order to sell your product, instead make it 100. If you plan to make 100,000 extra money the next year, plan to make 1,000,000 instead. In essence, it is better to fall short of HUGE goals than small goals. I believe this should be read once simply so you get the concept (and possibly change your working style for the better).
Give and Take by Adam Grant: A great book about leadership and becoming successful. The most important message of this book is (obviously) the importance of giving - not just in order to get, but simply to enhance your life. The book attempts to give you a blueprint on how much giving you should do and when/how to expect something back (to take).
Undoing Depression by Richard O'Connor: Highly useful/relevant if you struggle with mental health issues. You'll have to read it yourself to see the value of it. I simply can't sum it up well enough. Suffice to say it shows you how to deal with your dark thoughts and how to improve your life even if your depression cannot be entirely cured.
Atomic Habits by James Clear: A long review can be found here. This book is definitely worth the buy and read. It will reach you to REALLY improve your life - and in a sustainable way rather than all those 'just change/just do it' books. Any change happens gradually and in increments. Atomic Habits drives home that point and shows you how you can make habit changes permanent. It's really a useful book!
The Hungry Brain by Stephan J. Guyenet: This is a bit more in the health niche - specifically how the brain regulates how hungry we feel at any given point and what drives people to overeat. About 60% of it are incredibly useful and highly informative but the last three or so chapters drag. Here's a complete Review of The Hungry Brain. I personally read this book because I tend to stuff my face if there's something tasty around. It's gotten much better in recent years (after I started focusing on my health) but I notice that when there's something really tasty it's often very difficult to stop myself eating more than my stomach feels comfortable with. This book then was a way for me to understand why this happens (when consciously I don't want/need any more food but I still feel the urge to eat) and it did it's job! Recommended also if you're trying to lose weight!
The Runner-Ups:
Barking Up the Wrong Tree by Eric Barker: This one is actually good! It looks at what successful people do different than most (spoiler: the most important difference as Simon Sinek says: They have a WHY that affects other people) that leads to them being successful in the first place. It shows you how many of your learned mantras about success (just imagine yourself being successful already!) are wrong and do not help you in any way. You should rather look at your own skills and/or weaknesses to find things you excel at.
The Compound Effect by Darren Hardy: On the coattails of James Clear's Atomic Habits. A longer review again here. I would not read The Compound Effect without having first read Atomic Habits. All the concepts of TCE are related to (and mostly the same as) Atomic Habits - but it's not explained or written as well by Darren Hardy as by James Clear. This book is best read to deepen your understanding of atomic habits after you've read James Clear. I sort-of recommend it but it's not a necessary read if you've read Atomic Habits.
The Artist's Way by Julia Cameron: This book was very hyped... but I found it mediocre at best. It has some good ideas but isn't in any way exceptional. It's a good read, still, and I do recommend at least looking at it to see if the content speaks to you, but don't force it if you don't like it.
A Handbook for the Productive Writer by Bryan Collins: Meh. I wouldn't recommend this. It's just a whole lot of blabla you can actually get for free on the Internet (and concisely from my writing tips page: http://jasmingelinck.com/resources).
The Science of Rapid Skill Acquisition by Peter Hollins: I don't actually remember this book at all. I think it's just one of those publish-as-many-as-you-can-to-make-money life-advice craps. Not recommended.
As you might notice there is one book (The Subtle Art of Not Giving a F****) that I left out. This is intentional. I did not like this book and found it useless. That's why it doesn't even get a spot on the runner-ups.
WriteBot.
This is a complete list of the two posts The Best Non-Fiction of 2018 Part I and The Best Non-Fiction of 2018 Part II combined and sorted by best book in each category (also sorted by best category) for your convenience.
Top Tier:
The Courage to be Disliked by Ichiro Kishimi: I love this book. There has been no better book in my life ever before. I actually loved it enough to buy a paper copy after reading it on my Kindle just to have it on my shelf (and that doesn't happen very often at all). This book (not 12 Rules) IS the Holy Grail of learning to live with yourself and working through/DESPITE your past traumas in a non-pretentious way. It refers heavily to the philosophy of Alfred Adler and I promise you it is impactful. If you read any book from my list at all then it should be this one.
The Magic of Thinking Big by David J. Schwartz: Another book right up there with The Courage to be Disliked and How to Win Friends and Influence People. It's on an entirely different topic (The 10X Rule was inspired by it) but so so worth it! If you read two books from my list it should be The Courage to be Disliked and this one. It's so much more accessible than the somewhat reckless airy-fairy tips of The 10X Rule and written so much more humanly relatable. In essence it's a simple guide on how to improve your life by dreaming well (however without any affirmation or visualization crap like you find in some of the more etheric self-help books) and by working on bigger and more fulfilling projects than you believed yourself capable of/could even conceive of.
Eat That Frog by Brian Tracy: This one was great and definitely deserves the light red colour. In fact it should probably be pink to do it justice.
The title of the book refers to its content: Do your most important task (the biggest frog) first. I wrote a full blog post about it here: Review of Eat That Frog but for the sake of this list the gist of why it is so impactful is that:
a.) Brian Tracy does not waste words. He starts with relevant information and sticks to it. He does not add any fluff to his text and stays fully on course throughout. This is why the book is only 100 pages long (depending of course on your format) but it's so densely packed with information on how to get started and finish your most important projects it's 100+% worth the money spent on it.
b.) Tracy's tips are practical and can be used immediately. Do you want to become more productive in your most important work (your biggest frog)? Then read this book.
12 Rules for Life by Jordan Peterson: This was the first non-fiction of 2018 I actually LOVED. You can say what you want about JP as a person (and I'll not join that particular debate) but 12 Rules is highly relevant to everyone who wants to improve themselves/their outlook on life and the world. Of course, not all Peterson writes is Holy Grail material, and I would argue not much actually is, BUT in every chapter, there are nuggets you can pick up to improve your life and relationships. You can pick and choose what you wish to incorporate in your life or not. As such, the book is definitely worth a read.
How to Win Friends and Influence People by Dale Carnegie: It took me a long time to get to this book. I knew it existed for almost a decade but couldn't bring myself to read it because the title sounds pretentious and fake as all heck. However... after hundreds and hundreds of recommendations I decided to give it a try... and it's great! It truly is an amazing book and not in the least pretentious or fake. A lot of people think 'But it will teach me to be false in order to make friends' but FAR FROM IT! The main body of the books deals with no-brainer tips everyone knows (such as smiling at people to lift both of your spirits and taking care of yourself) but needs to be reminded of because they are so easily overlooked. It also teaches you that when you are fake people will know and they won't respond to you at all - so it's the opposite of what a lot of people fear the book will try to make them do. I'll add my voice to this particular book's value: It's definitely worth it.
Second Tier:
Becoming a Writer by Dorothea Brande: This book is great! It talks a lot about the day-to-day business of writing and the fears you might encounter (and how to conquer them!). I recommend this for anyone who wants to be an artist.
Wake Up and Live by Dorothea Brande: The same as above but not focused on writing alone. It's a great book for everyone who feels slightly lost in life (I know I do...)
The 10X Rule by Grant Cardone: I've written a longer post about this one here. It's quite good if you want to have an overview of how much work you will be required to do in order to get ahead. It tells you basically to multiply every effort by 10 if you truly want to succeed. If you plan to contact 10 customers in order to sell your product, instead make it 100. If you plan to make 100,000 extra money the next year, plan to make 1,000,000 instead. In essence, it is better to fall short of HUGE goals than small goals. I believe this should be read once simply so you get the concept (and possibly change your working style for the better).
Give and Take by Adam Grant: A great book about leadership and becoming successful. The most important message of this book is (obviously) the importance of giving - not just in order to get, but simply to enhance your life. The book attempts to give you a blueprint on how much giving you should do and when/how to expect something back (to take).
Undoing Depression by Richard O'Connor: Highly useful/relevant if you struggle with mental health issues. You'll have to read it yourself to see the value of it. I simply can't sum it up well enough. Suffice to say it shows you how to deal with your dark thoughts and how to improve your life even if your depression cannot be entirely cured.
Atomic Habits by James Clear: A long review can be found here. This book is definitely worth the buy and read. It will reach you to REALLY improve your life - and in a sustainable way rather than all those 'just change/just do it' books. Any change happens gradually and in increments. Atomic Habits drives home that point and shows you how you can make habit changes permanent. It's really a useful book!
The Hungry Brain by Stephan J. Guyenet: This is a bit more in the health niche - specifically how the brain regulates how hungry we feel at any given point and what drives people to overeat. About 60% of it are incredibly useful and highly informative but the last three or so chapters drag. Here's a complete Review of The Hungry Brain. I personally read this book because I tend to stuff my face if there's something tasty around. It's gotten much better in recent years (after I started focusing on my health) but I notice that when there's something really tasty it's often very difficult to stop myself eating more than my stomach feels comfortable with. This book then was a way for me to understand why this happens (when consciously I don't want/need any more food but I still feel the urge to eat) and it did it's job! Recommended also if you're trying to lose weight!
The Runner-Ups:
Barking Up the Wrong Tree by Eric Barker: This one is actually good! It looks at what successful people do different than most (spoiler: the most important difference as Simon Sinek says: They have a WHY that affects other people) that leads to them being successful in the first place. It shows you how many of your learned mantras about success (just imagine yourself being successful already!) are wrong and do not help you in any way. You should rather look at your own skills and/or weaknesses to find things you excel at.
The Compound Effect by Darren Hardy: On the coattails of James Clear's Atomic Habits. A longer review again here. I would not read The Compound Effect without having first read Atomic Habits. All the concepts of TCE are related to (and mostly the same as) Atomic Habits - but it's not explained or written as well by Darren Hardy as by James Clear. This book is best read to deepen your understanding of atomic habits after you've read James Clear. I sort-of recommend it but it's not a necessary read if you've read Atomic Habits.
The Artist's Way by Julia Cameron: This book was very hyped... but I found it mediocre at best. It has some good ideas but isn't in any way exceptional. It's a good read, still, and I do recommend at least looking at it to see if the content speaks to you, but don't force it if you don't like it.
A Handbook for the Productive Writer by Bryan Collins: Meh. I wouldn't recommend this. It's just a whole lot of blabla you can actually get for free on the Internet (and concisely from my writing tips page: http://jasmingelinck.com/resources).
The Science of Rapid Skill Acquisition by Peter Hollins: I don't actually remember this book at all. I think it's just one of those publish-as-many-as-you-can-to-make-money life-advice craps. Not recommended.
As you might notice there is one book (The Subtle Art of Not Giving a F****) that I left out. This is intentional. I did not like this book and found it useless. That's why it doesn't even get a spot on the runner-ups.
WriteBot.
The Best of Non-Fiction 2018 (Part II)
Hey folks!
Today's entry is an addition to my recent The Best Non-Fiction Books of 2018 post. I wrote the other on December 20 so there was still plenty of time to read more - which I did. This one is supposed to simply serve as an update to highlight the last three non-fiction books I managed to finish in 2018 still.
Here we go - starting with the most useful book first.
(Note: the key to this list is as before the colour. Red = good. Light red = amazing. Black = don't bother with this one.)
Eat That Frog by Brian Tracy: This one was great and definitely deserves the light red colour. In fact it should probably be pink to do it justice.
The title of the book refers to its content: Do your most important task (the biggest frog) first. I wrote a full blog post about it here: Review of Eat That Frog but for the sake of this list the gist of why it is so impactful is that:
a.) Brian Tracy does not waste words. He starts with relevant information and sticks to it. He does not add any fluff to his text and stays fully on course throughout. This is why the book is only 100 pages long (depending of course on your format) but it's so densely packed with information on how to get started and finish your most important projects it's 100+% worth the money spent on it.
b.) Tracy's tips are practical and can be used immediately. Do you want to become more productive in your most important work (your biggest frog)? Then read this book.
The Hungry Brain by Stephan J. Guyenet: This is a bit more in the health niche - specifically how the brain regulates how hungry we feel at any given point and what drives people to overeat. About 60% of it are incredibly useful and highly informative but the last three or so chapters drag. Here's a complete Review of The Hungry Brain. I personally read this book because I tend to stuff my face if there's something tasty around. It's gotten much better in recent years (after I started focusing on my health) but I notice that when there's something really tasty it's often very difficult to stop myself eating more than my stomach feels comfortable with. This book then was a way for me to understand why this happens (when consciously I don't want/need any more food but I still feel the urge to eat) and it did it's job! Recommended also if you're trying to lose weight!
The Subtle Art of Not Giving A F**** by Mark Manson: I'm not going to say much about this. I already did a whole review and my opinion hasn't changed. This book is definitely overrated. It's not 'cool' or useful simply because it has a swear word in the title and foul language throughout. It simply re-chews and re-chews what other people have said much better already. Don't buy it. (Or do if you think you'll like it. It's your money!)
These three books about sum up my reading in the last two weeks of 2018 (good bye good year!). I read a fourth non-fiction book actually but it's even less worth talking about than The Subtle Art. It was so generic and yada yada (with the author actually recommending things like neurolinguistic programming (which is not scientifically backed to be effective at all) and psychosynthesis (which deals with personality and the human soul - the soul as if it's a scientific thing one can measure)).
Anyway! That about sums up my experience with non-fiction in 2018. I've recently read another non-fiction (my first this year!) which was Seth Godin's This is Marketing (The colour key doesn't count for this one!). It's not as good as The Dip but there will be a blog post about it on Monday where I'll be explaining my opinion on it in more detail.
What have you been reading so far? Do you have any suggestions as to books I might like considering what I've read in the last year? I'm always happy to receive suggestions! (Although my reading list is already chock-full.)
I hope you had a great first week of 2019!
WriteBot.
Today's entry is an addition to my recent The Best Non-Fiction Books of 2018 post. I wrote the other on December 20 so there was still plenty of time to read more - which I did. This one is supposed to simply serve as an update to highlight the last three non-fiction books I managed to finish in 2018 still.
Here we go - starting with the most useful book first.
(Note: the key to this list is as before the colour. Red = good. Light red = amazing. Black = don't bother with this one.)
Eat That Frog by Brian Tracy: This one was great and definitely deserves the light red colour. In fact it should probably be pink to do it justice.
The title of the book refers to its content: Do your most important task (the biggest frog) first. I wrote a full blog post about it here: Review of Eat That Frog but for the sake of this list the gist of why it is so impactful is that:
a.) Brian Tracy does not waste words. He starts with relevant information and sticks to it. He does not add any fluff to his text and stays fully on course throughout. This is why the book is only 100 pages long (depending of course on your format) but it's so densely packed with information on how to get started and finish your most important projects it's 100+% worth the money spent on it.
b.) Tracy's tips are practical and can be used immediately. Do you want to become more productive in your most important work (your biggest frog)? Then read this book.
The Hungry Brain by Stephan J. Guyenet: This is a bit more in the health niche - specifically how the brain regulates how hungry we feel at any given point and what drives people to overeat. About 60% of it are incredibly useful and highly informative but the last three or so chapters drag. Here's a complete Review of The Hungry Brain. I personally read this book because I tend to stuff my face if there's something tasty around. It's gotten much better in recent years (after I started focusing on my health) but I notice that when there's something really tasty it's often very difficult to stop myself eating more than my stomach feels comfortable with. This book then was a way for me to understand why this happens (when consciously I don't want/need any more food but I still feel the urge to eat) and it did it's job! Recommended also if you're trying to lose weight!
The Subtle Art of Not Giving A F**** by Mark Manson: I'm not going to say much about this. I already did a whole review and my opinion hasn't changed. This book is definitely overrated. It's not 'cool' or useful simply because it has a swear word in the title and foul language throughout. It simply re-chews and re-chews what other people have said much better already. Don't buy it. (Or do if you think you'll like it. It's your money!)
These three books about sum up my reading in the last two weeks of 2018 (good bye good year!). I read a fourth non-fiction book actually but it's even less worth talking about than The Subtle Art. It was so generic and yada yada (with the author actually recommending things like neurolinguistic programming (which is not scientifically backed to be effective at all) and psychosynthesis (which deals with personality and the human soul - the soul as if it's a scientific thing one can measure)).
Anyway! That about sums up my experience with non-fiction in 2018. I've recently read another non-fiction (my first this year!) which was Seth Godin's This is Marketing (The colour key doesn't count for this one!). It's not as good as The Dip but there will be a blog post about it on Monday where I'll be explaining my opinion on it in more detail.
What have you been reading so far? Do you have any suggestions as to books I might like considering what I've read in the last year? I'm always happy to receive suggestions! (Although my reading list is already chock-full.)
I hope you had a great first week of 2019!
WriteBot.
Friday, December 28, 2018
Review of Brian Tracy's Eat That Frog
Hey folks.
I finished Eat That Frog as the 72nd book this year. I thought I wouldn't get above 71 but Eat That Frog was short and... very useful. I sped through it and plan to read it a few more times (I rarely re-read books in general so that's saying something).
All right. Let's talk about frog eating.
I guess the first thing you have to know that this isn't some weird book of the French culinary art. A frog (in Brian Tracy's case) is a task. A big frog is a big task and tadpoles are small and (often) unnecessary tasks. This means when he's talking about eating frogs he refers to effectively tackling tasks at work (or home).
Two things I immediately liked about the preface (surprisingly because usually I skip prefaces or am bored throughout them):
1. He promises not to waste time explaining what others have said already -the psychological and emotional explanations for procrastination and poor time management. He goes straight to the point - straight to the reason why most people bought his book.
2. The hook (the core of the book) is right there in the first few paragraphs: The ability to concentrate single-mindedly on your most important task, to do it well and to finish it completely, is the key to great success, achievement, respect, status, and happiness in life. (This is also, coincidentally, one of the most useful sentences in the book.)
Already in the first two pages of Eat the Frog it is clear Brian Tracy knows what he is talking about and it's also clear to the reader (in this case me) that their time will not be wasted. In the first chapter I already learned more from two sentences than I did in the whole of Success Principles. These sentences are:
1. [...] your ability to select your most important task at each moment, and then to get started on that task and to get it done both quickly and well, will probably have more of an impact on your success than any other quality or skill you can develop. (Later on in the book he mentions this again but in a more poetic way: The sun's rays do not burn until brought to a focus - a quote apparently stolen from Alexander Graham Bell but cited. Tracy's a polite thief let's say.)
2. Do something every day that moves you towards your goal.
Here are more:
3. The second rule of frog-eating is this: If you have to eat a live frog (by which Tracy means 'do a hard but important task') at all, it doesn't pay to sit and look at it for long.
4. Successful, effective people are those who launch directly into their major tasks and then discipline themselves to work steadily and single-mindedly until those tasks are complete.
5. The more important the completed task, the happier, more confident, and more powerful you feel about yourself and your work.
6. One of the keys to living a wonderful life [etc etc.] is to develop the habit of starting and finishing important jobs.
7. A simple formula I created out of a longer sentence in the book: Decision + Discipline + Determination = success-habits (concentration / focus)
What else can you learn?
You can train yourself through repetition and practice to overcome procrastination and get your most important tasks completed quickly. This involves a lot of planning as good plans = ability to get straight to work = no need to procrastinate. A lot of people seem to procrastinate because they don't know what to do/how to reach their goal - because they haven't planned how to achieve it.
I will try one of Tracy's tips immediately: Write a LIST of what you plan to do the next day to get further along with your goal
-> list of everything you want to do in the (near-ish) future
-> monthly list (made at the end of one month for the next)
-> weekly list (made at the end of the week for the next)
-> daily list (made at the end of one day for the next day)
As a person who suffers from depression a lot, it can be very harsh to have nothing to do, to feel unanchored, and I spent a lot of time chasing new experiences just to feel 'occupied', but after years of this not working out, I've begun to try new things. These new things involve planning my day (and meals, etc.) ahead, which means most of what I'm doing during any given day will be worked out by the time dawn comes around and which in turn makes downtime less painful to my brain. And if there is (unscheduled) downtime then the best way to spend it is to read on new tactics to plan/achieve my goals.
This daily planning also includes (as the book suggests as well) to have everything prepared for the day before you start. All your utensils, notebooks with thoughts, resources, and other material should be right there even before the work day starts. This puts a brake on procrastination, as it can be daunting to search for material, and it will already take a lot of your energy. If you did it the day before in your planning phase, then in the morning when you sit down, everything is ready to go, go, go!
Another useful insight connected to the daily planning mentioned above:
The 10/90 rule. The first 10% of your available time spent planning will increase your effectiveness of actual work. It will save you some 90% of the time necessary to finish a job once you started it.
These are the most useful tips in the book. They can be applied almost instantly and you'll immediately see the results (I have personally incorporated a few of these tricks in my daily schedule already and I've noticed a difference in my mood/productivity).
There are however much more tips than just these but I didn't want this post to be a replica of the book itself. All I can say is that Eat That Frog is definitely worth it. It is an incredibly useful book and it's so short you can read it in two hours (which means you can re-read it easily and quickly should you suddenly despair about your work at some point). It's right up there on my Best Non-Fiction Books of 2018 list in a very bright red.
It definitely gets a recommendation from me if you're one of the people who always want to improve themselves and how they work. It's a more than just 'useful' resource to have on your shelf and I'm certain to try out more of Brian Tracy's books as a result of reading Eat That Frog.
Do you think you want to try out Eat That Frog? You can get it on Amazon at a decent price!
Let me know if it was useful to you if you decided to read it!
WriteBot.
I finished Eat That Frog as the 72nd book this year. I thought I wouldn't get above 71 but Eat That Frog was short and... very useful. I sped through it and plan to read it a few more times (I rarely re-read books in general so that's saying something).
All right. Let's talk about frog eating.
I guess the first thing you have to know that this isn't some weird book of the French culinary art. A frog (in Brian Tracy's case) is a task. A big frog is a big task and tadpoles are small and (often) unnecessary tasks. This means when he's talking about eating frogs he refers to effectively tackling tasks at work (or home).
Two things I immediately liked about the preface (surprisingly because usually I skip prefaces or am bored throughout them):
1. He promises not to waste time explaining what others have said already -the psychological and emotional explanations for procrastination and poor time management. He goes straight to the point - straight to the reason why most people bought his book.
2. The hook (the core of the book) is right there in the first few paragraphs: The ability to concentrate single-mindedly on your most important task, to do it well and to finish it completely, is the key to great success, achievement, respect, status, and happiness in life. (This is also, coincidentally, one of the most useful sentences in the book.)
Already in the first two pages of Eat the Frog it is clear Brian Tracy knows what he is talking about and it's also clear to the reader (in this case me) that their time will not be wasted. In the first chapter I already learned more from two sentences than I did in the whole of Success Principles. These sentences are:
1. [...] your ability to select your most important task at each moment, and then to get started on that task and to get it done both quickly and well, will probably have more of an impact on your success than any other quality or skill you can develop. (Later on in the book he mentions this again but in a more poetic way: The sun's rays do not burn until brought to a focus - a quote apparently stolen from Alexander Graham Bell but cited. Tracy's a polite thief let's say.)
2. Do something every day that moves you towards your goal.
Here are more:
3. The second rule of frog-eating is this: If you have to eat a live frog (by which Tracy means 'do a hard but important task') at all, it doesn't pay to sit and look at it for long.
4. Successful, effective people are those who launch directly into their major tasks and then discipline themselves to work steadily and single-mindedly until those tasks are complete.
5. The more important the completed task, the happier, more confident, and more powerful you feel about yourself and your work.
6. One of the keys to living a wonderful life [etc etc.] is to develop the habit of starting and finishing important jobs.
7. A simple formula I created out of a longer sentence in the book: Decision + Discipline + Determination = success-habits (concentration / focus)
What else can you learn?
You can train yourself through repetition and practice to overcome procrastination and get your most important tasks completed quickly. This involves a lot of planning as good plans = ability to get straight to work = no need to procrastinate. A lot of people seem to procrastinate because they don't know what to do/how to reach their goal - because they haven't planned how to achieve it.
I will try one of Tracy's tips immediately: Write a LIST of what you plan to do the next day to get further along with your goal
-> list of everything you want to do in the (near-ish) future
-> monthly list (made at the end of one month for the next)
-> weekly list (made at the end of the week for the next)
-> daily list (made at the end of one day for the next day)
As a person who suffers from depression a lot, it can be very harsh to have nothing to do, to feel unanchored, and I spent a lot of time chasing new experiences just to feel 'occupied', but after years of this not working out, I've begun to try new things. These new things involve planning my day (and meals, etc.) ahead, which means most of what I'm doing during any given day will be worked out by the time dawn comes around and which in turn makes downtime less painful to my brain. And if there is (unscheduled) downtime then the best way to spend it is to read on new tactics to plan/achieve my goals.
This daily planning also includes (as the book suggests as well) to have everything prepared for the day before you start. All your utensils, notebooks with thoughts, resources, and other material should be right there even before the work day starts. This puts a brake on procrastination, as it can be daunting to search for material, and it will already take a lot of your energy. If you did it the day before in your planning phase, then in the morning when you sit down, everything is ready to go, go, go!
Another useful insight connected to the daily planning mentioned above:
The 10/90 rule. The first 10% of your available time spent planning will increase your effectiveness of actual work. It will save you some 90% of the time necessary to finish a job once you started it.
These are the most useful tips in the book. They can be applied almost instantly and you'll immediately see the results (I have personally incorporated a few of these tricks in my daily schedule already and I've noticed a difference in my mood/productivity).
There are however much more tips than just these but I didn't want this post to be a replica of the book itself. All I can say is that Eat That Frog is definitely worth it. It is an incredibly useful book and it's so short you can read it in two hours (which means you can re-read it easily and quickly should you suddenly despair about your work at some point). It's right up there on my Best Non-Fiction Books of 2018 list in a very bright red.
It definitely gets a recommendation from me if you're one of the people who always want to improve themselves and how they work. It's a more than just 'useful' resource to have on your shelf and I'm certain to try out more of Brian Tracy's books as a result of reading Eat That Frog.
Do you think you want to try out Eat That Frog? You can get it on Amazon at a decent price!
Let me know if it was useful to you if you decided to read it!
WriteBot.
Sunday, December 2, 2018
Review of Darren Hardy's The Compound Effect
Hey folks
I've been listening to the audio book
these last few days (I don't usually like audio books at all but non-fiction seems to be easier to listen to than fiction) and wanted to give you a review of it!
All right. The Compound Effect. Most of the book's advice is pretty generic and
not actual fresh and/or unique research. It's the sort of book that tells
you 'The more you practice the luckier you get'. (The usual spiel
about people not being actually 'lucky' but working hard so that when the
opportunity arises they can take it. Whereas other people don't work
hard enough so they cannot get 'lucky' when an opportunity presents
itself.)
The author also likes to pat himself on
the back with how many famous people he knows at different companies
(Apple for example) and how their CEOs personally interacted with him
at some point. That can be a bit annoying.
The gist of the book is hard/diligent/persistent work over time =
success.
A piece of important information in the
book is that small changes (in things such as habits) should be
pursued over time rather than every big change you'd like to have in
your life all at once. This means when you want to exercise regularly
and get a better body it's important to start small-ish (say about 20
minutes of exercise a day) because if you start big (2 hours of
exercise a day) then you won't be able to keep it up infinitely. It
is important to create small habits that over time will compound into
big habits with visible effects.
The concept is very similar to James Clear's
Atomic Habits. Review of Atomic Habits here.
As Hardy explains his concept of compounding effect he also cautions against giving up
too easily. It's quite obvious that if you go to the gym twice or eat
one less meal once (if you're trying to lose weight) you won't
immediately see the benefits. The same goes for writing. If you want
to write a book, write 500 words on two days, then give up because
you don't have a book yet, your whole endeavour is somewhat
pointless. If, however, you keep going to your desk and you keep
adding words, 500 words a day will eventually stack up, and in less
than a year your novel of 100k word will be finished (as finished as
a first draft usually is in any case). At the start of any endeavour
you don't want to burn yourself out with either exercise (2 hours a
day) or writing 9000 words a day (been there done that) and then not
have the energy to finish at all. If you're just starting out it's
fine to write 100 words a day. Or 200. And maybe exercise only for 20
minutes or only do 10 push-ups instead of the 100 you're yearning to
do (crazy folks!).
You can obviously increase the amount
of x you do once you get better at it. If you start small you can up
the ante after some time: If you're used to writing 200 words a day
it's much easier to make the jump to 300 and later 500. In no time
you'll be writing those elusive 2000 (or even 5000/10.000) words a
day.
However. The compound effect does not
only refer to creating good habits but also how the small little
tasks you do every day (conscious or not) make up your bad habits.
This could be for example eating a piece of chocolate every day after
lunch because you crave it (I usually crave something sweet after
lunch). It doesn't matter much on one day, but if you do it every
day, it has the same effect as writing 500 words a day. After a while
it will become a detriment to your health. This is why Hardy also
talks about how to break bad habits. He suggests to write down your
habits in a list in order to easily see what you could 'drop' so to
speak. An example he gives is saving more money than usual. How can
you see where you're spending money unnecessarily?
You are to write down every single
thing you spend money on during the week.
A cup of coffee at Starbucks? A candy
bar from the shop to treat yourself after work? That's a few dollars
right there you can save if you know about them. And in a week, or
month, if you buy these things regularly, the amount you can save
instead of spend will exponentially increase. The same goes for
calories when you're trying to lose weight. Are you actually eating
more than you need? Tracking your habits will tell you exactly WHERE
you can change your behaviour to go from loss (for example of money
by spending on 'little things' or loss of health by eating too many
'little unhealthy things') to gain.
The same loss goes for accumulating
knowledge (in the news) that you will not use and which therefore
goes to waste. Ask yourself: Do you really need to watch/read the
news three times a day? How much of 'useless' knowledge are you
gaining this way? Wouldn't it be better to spend the time to read up
on information you can actually put to use (perhaps a book on weight
loss/nutrition/personal finance/other hobbies you have long been
interested in)?
Hardy also maintains that as you're doing
all these little things to improve yourself it's also important not to be discouraged. As with
anything you do there will be setbacks. If after two months of
training at the gym or writing on the novel you still don't have that
thin stomach or the complete novel, it's easy to become lazy. It
takes a lot of time to obtain significant results. (Here the old adage
comes into play, doesn't it? 'Nothing worth having comes free'.)
You're guaranteed to want to quit at some point (can confirm this
from personal experience with both exercise and writing!), but then
you must become the proverbial tortoise and soldier on. Slow and
steady wins the race. You put your head down and you take one step at
a time. One scene at a time. One minute of exercise at a time.
I hope you enjoyed this review. If you'd like to check out Hardy's book on account of this review it's probably best to buy it at Amazon (am still not affiliated with them). The Kindle ebook is somewhere around $7 and from the audio book it sounded like a fairly easy read. Although if you've already bought James Clear's Atomic habits it might not be as relevant for you any more.
WriteBot.
Wednesday, November 28, 2018
2019 Book List
Hey everyone!
This year's almost over (one month to go!) and I've just finished the 64th book this year. That in turn got me thinking about next year. What would I like to read? I have a truly enormous reading list in general but have decided to already prepare (by buying books and making them 'available' on my devices to read whenever fancy strikes) a list. That way I won't get hung up on what I should read next/where to get it/and so on.
Here's the list (so far) that I want to go through in 2019:
1. Undersea Fleet
2. The Kraken Wakes
3. Ascension (Water)
4. Boundary
5. The Compound Effect
6. The Success Principles
7. The Hungry Brain
8. Brain Food
9. Fasting and Eating for Health
10. Intermittent Fasting for Women
11. The Life-Changing Magic of Tidying
12. The Complete Guide to Fasting
13. Halfway Human
14. Black Leopard, Red Wolf
15. The Departure
16. Rebel of the Sands
17. Autobiography of Black Hawk
18. The Individual Psychology of Alfred Adler
19. The Abyss Surrounds Us
20. The Deep Woods
21. The Dreaming Stars
22. Smoke in the Sun
23. Of Fire and Stars
24. The World Walker
25. The Assassin's Curse
26. Forgotten Places
27. When the Future Comes too Soon
28. Sky Dancer
29. Sky Song
30. The Winter of the Witch
31. Tides of the Titans
32. Darkdawn
33. Lonesome Dove
34. All the Crooked Saints
35. Autobiography of a Geisha
36. Change your Brain, Change your Life
37. The Evolution of God
38. Lotus War 1
39. The Man in the High Castle
40. The Future of Humanity
41. Godblind Anna Stephens
42. Start with Why
43. Leaders Eat Last
As you can see my reading list is wide and varied. It contains fiction and non-fiction. It contains YA books as well as adult books and most especially in the non-fiction category some books on leadership and healthy food (brain food actually).
I am however still lacking 17 books to reach my goal of 60 books a year. (This year's was 52. I overshot it by some and wanted to make 60 a regular number instead.) That means I'm looking for suggestions! Can you recommend any books you absolutely loved? Is there a book coming out you think absolutely fits on this (messy) list? I'd love to know it! I'm always open to new and good material to read.
Have a recommendation? Post it in the comments! All suggestions welcome!
WriteBot out.
This year's almost over (one month to go!) and I've just finished the 64th book this year. That in turn got me thinking about next year. What would I like to read? I have a truly enormous reading list in general but have decided to already prepare (by buying books and making them 'available' on my devices to read whenever fancy strikes) a list. That way I won't get hung up on what I should read next/where to get it/and so on.
Here's the list (so far) that I want to go through in 2019:
1. Undersea Fleet
2. The Kraken Wakes
3. Ascension (Water)
4. Boundary
5. The Compound Effect
6. The Success Principles
7. The Hungry Brain
8. Brain Food
9. Fasting and Eating for Health
10. Intermittent Fasting for Women
11. The Life-Changing Magic of Tidying
12. The Complete Guide to Fasting
13. Halfway Human
14. Black Leopard, Red Wolf
15. The Departure
16. Rebel of the Sands
17. Autobiography of Black Hawk
18. The Individual Psychology of Alfred Adler
19. The Abyss Surrounds Us
20. The Deep Woods
21. The Dreaming Stars
22. Smoke in the Sun
23. Of Fire and Stars
24. The World Walker
25. The Assassin's Curse
26. Forgotten Places
27. When the Future Comes too Soon
28. Sky Dancer
29. Sky Song
30. The Winter of the Witch
31. Tides of the Titans
32. Darkdawn
33. Lonesome Dove
34. All the Crooked Saints
35. Autobiography of a Geisha
36. Change your Brain, Change your Life
37. The Evolution of God
38. Lotus War 1
39. The Man in the High Castle
40. The Future of Humanity
41. Godblind Anna Stephens
42. Start with Why
43. Leaders Eat Last
As you can see my reading list is wide and varied. It contains fiction and non-fiction. It contains YA books as well as adult books and most especially in the non-fiction category some books on leadership and healthy food (brain food actually).
I am however still lacking 17 books to reach my goal of 60 books a year. (This year's was 52. I overshot it by some and wanted to make 60 a regular number instead.) That means I'm looking for suggestions! Can you recommend any books you absolutely loved? Is there a book coming out you think absolutely fits on this (messy) list? I'd love to know it! I'm always open to new and good material to read.
Have a recommendation? Post it in the comments! All suggestions welcome!
WriteBot out.
Monday, November 26, 2018
WIP Progress Report
Hey everyone!
It's been a long day already for me. I finished editing Catching Fireflies's bonus draft (I did not choose the adding-another-8k-words-to-the-story life! The adding-words-life chose me!) and it's complete at 9k words. These 9k words were edited over the last three and a half weeks since my post on 10X WIP here.
Today I'd like to report on my progress and show you what I have done since I started setting actual tangible goals to work on every day. If you want, you can read my initial post about these 10X WIPs (by the way from Grant Cardone's The 10X Rule) through the link above.
Let's get started with my WIP list as it was three and a half weeks ago.
I've so far done:
I have also edited Immortal, which was not on the list to begin with, and am writing two more short stories as well. These are a bit more difficult and longer than my 9k average short story word count. In addition to this I'm committed to one blog post a day (at least) and have been actively improving my author profiles on various sites and finding/hiring new artists for book covers.
Let me give you some thoughts on how planning is working out for me.
1.) Having goals actually makes me sit down and work
2.) I often don't feel motivated to write still but I do it anyway. I have a goal to hit.
3.) The more often I sit down to write the more often I will find SOMETHING to write
4.) In the last three and a half weeks I've been more productive than during the last two years before them
I think the last point is the most important. I started to plan as an experiment (I'm usually someone who does not like to plan what they will do and when) and to be able to talk about my experience with it. As soon as I sat down to plan I found out I actually LIKE planning. I just don't like when my plans go awry. (But of course they do). Still. The numbers don't lie and the numbers are quite awesome (see 4.) again!).
Why don't you join me in my experiment? Come and be productive with me! I promise you'll still be able to procrastinate (still working on getting rid of that habit...) BUT you will also get much more done than you ever thought you could!
Try it out? Tell WriteBot about your own experiment! Let the comment section be open!
Have a good day/night! WriteBot
It's been a long day already for me. I finished editing Catching Fireflies's bonus draft (I did not choose the adding-another-8k-words-to-the-story life! The adding-words-life chose me!) and it's complete at 9k words. These 9k words were edited over the last three and a half weeks since my post on 10X WIP here.
Today I'd like to report on my progress and show you what I have done since I started setting actual tangible goals to work on every day. If you want, you can read my initial post about these 10X WIPs (by the way from Grant Cardone's The 10X Rule) through the link above.
Let's get started with my WIP list as it was three and a half weeks ago.
- editing the fairy tale Catching Fireflies.
- editing Of One Mind.
- editing Eye in the Sky.
- editing Hourglass.(And the other books in the series)
- finishing Ris's story.
- writing the NEW STORY.
- publishing short story collections. Into the Deep, Xenos, and (placeholder name) nice magical stories.
- publishing Elegy of the Stars.
- publishing Warlike/The Torn Earth.
I've so far done:
editing the fairy tale Catching Fireflies.(The updated version will be on KDP tomorrow! Yey! Hype!)editing Of One Mind.editing Eye in the Sky.- editing Hourglass.(And the other books in the series)
- finishing Ris's story.
- writing the NEW STORY.
- publishing short story collections. Into the Deep, Xenos, and (placeholder name) nice magical stories.
publishing Elegy of the Stars.publishing Warlike/The Torn Earth.
I have also edited Immortal, which was not on the list to begin with, and am writing two more short stories as well. These are a bit more difficult and longer than my 9k average short story word count. In addition to this I'm committed to one blog post a day (at least) and have been actively improving my author profiles on various sites and finding/hiring new artists for book covers.
Let me give you some thoughts on how planning is working out for me.
1.) Having goals actually makes me sit down and work
2.) I often don't feel motivated to write still but I do it anyway. I have a goal to hit.
3.) The more often I sit down to write the more often I will find SOMETHING to write
4.) In the last three and a half weeks I've been more productive than during the last two years before them
I think the last point is the most important. I started to plan as an experiment (I'm usually someone who does not like to plan what they will do and when) and to be able to talk about my experience with it. As soon as I sat down to plan I found out I actually LIKE planning. I just don't like when my plans go awry. (But of course they do). Still. The numbers don't lie and the numbers are quite awesome (see 4.) again!).
Why don't you join me in my experiment? Come and be productive with me! I promise you'll still be able to procrastinate (still working on getting rid of that habit...) BUT you will also get much more done than you ever thought you could!
Try it out? Tell WriteBot about your own experiment! Let the comment section be open!
Have a good day/night! WriteBot
Friday, November 23, 2018
Review of Grant Cardone's The 10X Rule
Hi folks!
As promised, today's post will be a review of Grant Cardone's business (actually 'life') advice book The 10X Rule.
You might wonder why an author would read a book that's so much geared towards success in your business. That's a valid question. But let me just tell you: The 10X Rule isn't only valid for business. It can actually applied in every area of your life and work. It's one of those concepts that can be used to improve yourself in every possible way.
Let's get started on how.
The 10X Rule is actually quite a short book. I read it in two days after buying it. I bought it primarily because I was intrigued by the title. The 10X Rule and success strategies (sounds corny, yes)? I had to know what this was about.
And I found out quite quickly after the (somewhat annoying because I wanted to KNOW THE RULE!) introduction.
The 10X Rule in a nutshell is that with everything you do/plan/start you are supposed to plan 10 times as much work. This means that if you for example you plan to write one book per year, you're instead asked to plan 10. If you have it in mind to write ten short stories a year, then plan to write 100. If you plan to make 1.000.000 dollars/euros/monies with your company this year plan to make 10.000.000 instead.
This is the most important piece of information in this book. To plan 10 times as much as you initially intended. To put in 10 times as much effort as you believed would be required. To do 10 times more work when others are already relaxing in front of their PCs/TVs.
Why?
I think Cardone sums it up quite eloquently when he says: (paraphrased) 'I would rather fall short of a TOO BIG goal than too little'.
As well as: If you plan big your mind starts to think in different pathways. If you plan too little there's always the chance that you will a) put off the work (e.g. if you have a whole day spare and you tell yourself you'll write 1000 words... well there are always other things you could be doing!) or b) your mind simply won't commit fully to the work that needs to be done.
This made a lot of sense to me when I read it. I had to backtrack a bit to my own work and was then able through examination of my working style to determine that the 10X Rules is very accurate indeed. Take for examples all those failed drafts in that hidden folder on my PC. They failed because I had very little goals when I started writing them. There is one story called 'Leshen!' (working title obviously) that deals with a police officer's slightly paranormal case of a creature called leshen (Witcher 3 players will know that creepy lvl7 forest where the creepy lvl20 leshen jumps onto you out of nowhere) being sighted. As she tries to figure out what's going on things quickly get darker and darker... and then they just end because I had no idea what to do with the concept.
I thought Leshen! would be an easy book quickly written and edited. It wasn't. I thought it would top at 60k words max. It didn't. It's barely 40k words at this point (and probably won't get any longer). You could say that's because I did not plan it through (I admit I didn't). Or because the topic isn't really my thing (although I used to enjoy NCIS a lot on the TV I find crime novels boring). But there's more evidence of the 10X Rule in my life.
Leshen! isn't the only book wasting away in my hidden folder. There are plenty others. And do you know what they all have in common? They're unfinished. They topped at 10k, 20k, 30k, 40k words, and the just sizzled out, because most of the time I wasn't prepared to write as much as would have been required.
Yes, most of these books are also not really about topics I LOVE, but that only proves the point. I was not excited about the concept. I did not want to spend the 10 times time that was required to finish them. I had it in my mind to finish them quickly, rush, rush, rush, and write something else instead. This lead me to underestimate the amount of work necessary. I did not heed the 10X Rule.
If I had - perhaps I wouldn't have started them in the first place. Or perhaps I would have been able to get to 60k words (a perfect word count for a short crime novel) and finished Leshen! anyway. But I didn't. I didn't prepare to put in 10X as much work as I thought was needed. I wasn't able to reset my brain to the point where I could.
The same goes for diets. If your goal is to eat 1200 (the usual intake goal when trying to lose weight) calories, then set it to 900 (which is admittedly not 10 times lower but you can still see how the rule works in this case) or 1000. If you limit yourself to 900, 1200 will be much easier to achieve.
Don't set your sights too low. Set them too high. Create BIG GOALS to fall short of instead of small ones. That's basically all Cardone's book is about.
Of course, there are plenty more tips and tricks in the book, but I'm focusing on the most important part in this post. That being said, The 10X Rule is well worth the read. It's short, concise, and with Cardone's writing style you're not at risk of falling asleep either.
WriteBot thinks this is a good book if you're trying to be more productive!
Have a good evening/day!
As promised, today's post will be a review of Grant Cardone's business (actually 'life') advice book The 10X Rule.
You might wonder why an author would read a book that's so much geared towards success in your business. That's a valid question. But let me just tell you: The 10X Rule isn't only valid for business. It can actually applied in every area of your life and work. It's one of those concepts that can be used to improve yourself in every possible way.
Let's get started on how.
The 10X Rule is actually quite a short book. I read it in two days after buying it. I bought it primarily because I was intrigued by the title. The 10X Rule and success strategies (sounds corny, yes)? I had to know what this was about.
And I found out quite quickly after the (somewhat annoying because I wanted to KNOW THE RULE!) introduction.
The 10X Rule in a nutshell is that with everything you do/plan/start you are supposed to plan 10 times as much work. This means that if you for example you plan to write one book per year, you're instead asked to plan 10. If you have it in mind to write ten short stories a year, then plan to write 100. If you plan to make 1.000.000 dollars/euros/monies with your company this year plan to make 10.000.000 instead.
This is the most important piece of information in this book. To plan 10 times as much as you initially intended. To put in 10 times as much effort as you believed would be required. To do 10 times more work when others are already relaxing in front of their PCs/TVs.
Why?
I think Cardone sums it up quite eloquently when he says: (paraphrased) 'I would rather fall short of a TOO BIG goal than too little'.
As well as: If you plan big your mind starts to think in different pathways. If you plan too little there's always the chance that you will a) put off the work (e.g. if you have a whole day spare and you tell yourself you'll write 1000 words... well there are always other things you could be doing!) or b) your mind simply won't commit fully to the work that needs to be done.
This made a lot of sense to me when I read it. I had to backtrack a bit to my own work and was then able through examination of my working style to determine that the 10X Rules is very accurate indeed. Take for examples all those failed drafts in that hidden folder on my PC. They failed because I had very little goals when I started writing them. There is one story called 'Leshen!' (working title obviously) that deals with a police officer's slightly paranormal case of a creature called leshen (Witcher 3 players will know that creepy lvl7 forest where the creepy lvl20 leshen jumps onto you out of nowhere) being sighted. As she tries to figure out what's going on things quickly get darker and darker... and then they just end because I had no idea what to do with the concept.
I thought Leshen! would be an easy book quickly written and edited. It wasn't. I thought it would top at 60k words max. It didn't. It's barely 40k words at this point (and probably won't get any longer). You could say that's because I did not plan it through (I admit I didn't). Or because the topic isn't really my thing (although I used to enjoy NCIS a lot on the TV I find crime novels boring). But there's more evidence of the 10X Rule in my life.
Leshen! isn't the only book wasting away in my hidden folder. There are plenty others. And do you know what they all have in common? They're unfinished. They topped at 10k, 20k, 30k, 40k words, and the just sizzled out, because most of the time I wasn't prepared to write as much as would have been required.
Yes, most of these books are also not really about topics I LOVE, but that only proves the point. I was not excited about the concept. I did not want to spend the 10 times time that was required to finish them. I had it in my mind to finish them quickly, rush, rush, rush, and write something else instead. This lead me to underestimate the amount of work necessary. I did not heed the 10X Rule.
If I had - perhaps I wouldn't have started them in the first place. Or perhaps I would have been able to get to 60k words (a perfect word count for a short crime novel) and finished Leshen! anyway. But I didn't. I didn't prepare to put in 10X as much work as I thought was needed. I wasn't able to reset my brain to the point where I could.
The same goes for diets. If your goal is to eat 1200 (the usual intake goal when trying to lose weight) calories, then set it to 900 (which is admittedly not 10 times lower but you can still see how the rule works in this case) or 1000. If you limit yourself to 900, 1200 will be much easier to achieve.
Don't set your sights too low. Set them too high. Create BIG GOALS to fall short of instead of small ones. That's basically all Cardone's book is about.
Of course, there are plenty more tips and tricks in the book, but I'm focusing on the most important part in this post. That being said, The 10X Rule is well worth the read. It's short, concise, and with Cardone's writing style you're not at risk of falling asleep either.
WriteBot thinks this is a good book if you're trying to be more productive!
Have a good evening/day!
Thursday, November 22, 2018
The importance of resetting your mind when you're stuck
Hey folks!
I survived the mouth hygienist and my teeth look all fancy now. I did however bleed like someone who was stabbed... Aaaand of course they told me to floss every day. I'M TRYING! They recommended me some tools and I actually bought them. A few different kinds of sticks and pokey-thingies and brushes to clean my teeth.
Anyway. I guess that's enough about my teeth.
Today's post (as you can see from the title) will be about inspiration and ways to get un-stuck in your writing project. Let's start with inspiration itself. There are lots of people who will go around and ask authors the age-old question 'Where do you get your ideas??'.
This question is both easy and very difficult to answer. As a lot of authors have said before me 'I get my ideas everywhere!'.
But this is of course quite vague. 'Everywhere' is not a place you can go to in order to get your ideas.
So what are you supposed to do?
I think there are really only three secrets to getting fresh ideas. They all have to do with getting out of your OWN head and into someone else's. Or just out of your own head.
-read a lot
-go outside and meet people (that favourite of mothers' which is almost always ignored)
-think a lot
These are my personal favourites.
Why? Or: Why is it important to get out of your own head? It's simple. Your brain needs to reset. If you've been working very closely on something for a long time you'll eventually become biased (and usually against it). Ideas that seemed fresh and AMAZING the first time around are suddenly stale and boring and your brain keeps telling you 'no one wants to read this kind of stuff'. And anyway. You don't know what to write/edit any more either way.
When this happens this is usually a cue that your brain wants some rest. It's a good opportunity to take a break and do something else: gaming/reading/watching TV.
Will you feel guilty? Perhaps.
Will you be angry at yourself for not working on your own project? Probably.
But will it help you reset your mind and in the long run give you more and better ideas? Also yes.
If you don't have any hobbies -
If you know nothing about the world -
If you don't know PEOPLE -
If you have no experience -
What are you even going to write about? So take a break when necessary! Breaks are just as important as 'actual work'. No matter how much you love something, you can't do it 24 hours a day, 7 days a week. And you probably don't want to either.
Does this seem like a no-brainer? It is. But still a lot of people become workaholics when they truly care about a project, and they needed to be reminded every once in a while that it's ok to rest. You don't have to wear yourself out. You don't have to throw all of your splendid ideas at one project. It's fine if you wait until later with some of them.
WriteBot out.
PS: This particular piece of advice is valid not only for writers but ALL professions. If you're stuck, take a break. The world will look fresh and new pathways will open up for your tomorrow.
Enjoy your night/day!
I survived the mouth hygienist and my teeth look all fancy now. I did however bleed like someone who was stabbed... Aaaand of course they told me to floss every day. I'M TRYING! They recommended me some tools and I actually bought them. A few different kinds of sticks and pokey-thingies and brushes to clean my teeth.
Anyway. I guess that's enough about my teeth.
Today's post (as you can see from the title) will be about inspiration and ways to get un-stuck in your writing project. Let's start with inspiration itself. There are lots of people who will go around and ask authors the age-old question 'Where do you get your ideas??'.
This question is both easy and very difficult to answer. As a lot of authors have said before me 'I get my ideas everywhere!'.
But this is of course quite vague. 'Everywhere' is not a place you can go to in order to get your ideas.
So what are you supposed to do?
I think there are really only three secrets to getting fresh ideas. They all have to do with getting out of your OWN head and into someone else's. Or just out of your own head.
-read a lot
-go outside and meet people (that favourite of mothers' which is almost always ignored)
-think a lot
These are my personal favourites.
Why? Or: Why is it important to get out of your own head? It's simple. Your brain needs to reset. If you've been working very closely on something for a long time you'll eventually become biased (and usually against it). Ideas that seemed fresh and AMAZING the first time around are suddenly stale and boring and your brain keeps telling you 'no one wants to read this kind of stuff'. And anyway. You don't know what to write/edit any more either way.
When this happens this is usually a cue that your brain wants some rest. It's a good opportunity to take a break and do something else: gaming/reading/watching TV.
Will you feel guilty? Perhaps.
Will you be angry at yourself for not working on your own project? Probably.
But will it help you reset your mind and in the long run give you more and better ideas? Also yes.
If you don't have any hobbies -
If you know nothing about the world -
If you don't know PEOPLE -
If you have no experience -
What are you even going to write about? So take a break when necessary! Breaks are just as important as 'actual work'. No matter how much you love something, you can't do it 24 hours a day, 7 days a week. And you probably don't want to either.
Does this seem like a no-brainer? It is. But still a lot of people become workaholics when they truly care about a project, and they needed to be reminded every once in a while that it's ok to rest. You don't have to wear yourself out. You don't have to throw all of your splendid ideas at one project. It's fine if you wait until later with some of them.
WriteBot out.
PS: This particular piece of advice is valid not only for writers but ALL professions. If you're stuck, take a break. The world will look fresh and new pathways will open up for your tomorrow.
Enjoy your night/day!
Tuesday, November 20, 2018
Review of James Clear's Atomic Habits
Hi folks!
This post will be a quick review of James Clear's Atomic Habits. I finished it about an hour ago and found it... all right. It didn't blow me away (although some tips were useful!) and the writing was quite dry. It took me several days to finish (that should be an indicator how dry the writing was!) and I want to with this post simply give you an overview of Clear's most important (my opinion) points.
Why did I read it? I thought I could improve my work ethic when it comes to writing - but I'm not sure it actually worked. I am still tired after writing only a little bit (hello depression!) and can't think of any way to improve my habit of doing nothing whatsoever instead of writing most of the time.
All right! Let's get started.
Atomic Habits is a book about... well you guessed it. Habits. Atomic means small and therefore the book is about (guessing it again?) SMALL HABITS. And how SMALL HABITS stack up to over time become BIG HABITS/YOUR LIFESTYLE.
The first point Clear makes is that you should not try to change your whole life all at once. It's much too difficult (can confirm. I've tried it multiple times.). You're supposed to start small. AND you're supposed to change not because of the goal you want to to achieve (example: you want to lose weight and therefore decide to run) but because of the type of person you wish to become (example cont.: you want to become a healthy person at a good weight).
This way of thinking will supposedly help you stick to your habits much easier than if your goal were simply to lose a few kilos. Let me elaborate on that example a bit.
Your goal: lose 10 kilos
Your habits: eating cheeseburger every day for breakfast (don't judge. It has happened to me. Incl. pizza)
IF you only attempt to lose weight then you might do so by sheer force of will (been there done that - eat fruit/cereals instead of that cheeseburger for a few weeks). This is extremely hard and a bit pointless because as soon as you go back to your old HABITS (eating cheeseburger for breakfast) you will rapidly regain that weight.
HOWEVER.
If your goal becomes to change your lifestyle (be a healthier person) then James Clear suggests building small habits around that (as opposed to using SHEER FORCE OF WILL) will serve you better in the long run. This means you are replacing your habit of cheeseburger for breakfast with a habit of something healthy (???) for breakfast instead. This is a small change and you can even start by only going through the motions. Instead of warming up that frozen burger/pizza/sweetened cereal you'd start taking out your healthy cereals and fruit and what not. You don't even have to eat them just yet. The habit of taking them out of your storage needs to come first. You do this every day and at some point you'll be like 'heck I'm starting to make two meals (you're still taking out your burger/sweetened cereals/etc too at this point) and this is inconvenient'. 'Heck. The healthy stuff is already out - might as well eat that and then the cheeseburger if I'm still hungry'.
This is how it starts.
In a few months then you'll cultivate the habit of eating your healthy foods (the things you started taking out of storage first thing in the morning) and will (hopefully) forget all about pizza for breakfast entirely after a while.
The same principle goes for anything else you want to do. Write a book? Start by switching on your PC/writing program or carrying a notebook with you. Commit yourself to writing only two minutes a day. You are allowed only to make this SMALL CHANGE. You must do it every day. After a while you will be tempted to write more. And then more. And suddenly you have a BIG HABIT.
The second (most useful) tip in Atomic Habits is this:
Have a schedule and schedule the habits you want to cultivate one after another. This can be done by certain time or after another activity. The formula goes something like this:
If I wake up at 7:00 AM the next step in my day will be to make a cup of tea (habit you're probably already doing?). After this habit or while the water boils I will do (if you want to change to a healthier lifestyle) five pushups. This will usually be around 7:02 AM.
In this way you have two 'schedules':
1: At 7:02 AM I will do five pushups.
2: While the water boils for my morning tea I will do five pushups.
You can schedule other things this way as well.
If you want to be more productive at work: After getting on the train and finding a seat I will take out my notepad and write 2 new ideas I could develop during the day.
If you want to reduce your calorie intake: After sitting down to eat a meal I will drink a glass of water.
If you want to get better at drawing: I will draw one object every day before sleep (ca. 10 PM)
If you want to learn about physics: During my lunch break (12 lunchtime) I will read an article/watch a video on physics
You get it? After a habit you're already doing (going to lunch break/getting out of bed) you will 'stack' up another habit (referred to as HABIT STACKING in Atomic Habits).
The third piece of juicy advice:
MAKE IT EASY.
This is one very no-brain and yet very difficult to follow through with.
We all know this issue: If you're hungry you'll just grab whatever snack is available no matter if it's healthy or not. (And you're probably still hungry afterwards so have to eat a normal/healthy snack on top of it.)
We also all know this: There's an exciting book/new game/TV series RIGHT THERE when you're supposed to be doing work. What is easier? Sit back and relax or work on that difficult project you've been procrastinating on the whole week? Which one will you automatically do? Grab the controller or try to make your brain solve your work issue?
You don't have to answer that (but you can if you want to!). All of us have good intentions but rarely choose the difficult thing over an easier option.
The same it is with habits. Our bad habits are usually easy. The TV controller is right there. So is that greasy snack that won't fill you so you'll have to eat more later/immediately.
James Clear proposes this:
Make your GOOD HABITS EASY and your BAD HABITS HARD.
In practice this means:
Food: Don't buy unhealthy snacks. If you have to go to the store before you can eat them... well there's a good chance you'll be too lazy to go to the store and thus won't eat them.
Pre-cut your healthy snacks during the weekend (says James Clear - but personally I think the healthy fruit and vegetable snacks he's referring to will be rather gross later on if you pre-cut them too early) so they're always ready to eat. I want to suggest rather than pre-cutting the whole week's cucumbers and apples on the weekend to simply make them more visible and pre-cut them the evening before or in the morning of. How to make them more visible? Put them everywhere. Put them in your (unhealthy) snack drawer. Put them on your tables and desks. Put them on your nightstand. (This is a trick learned from a hotel. They had apples in a basket and I was hungry. I ate an apple instead of unpacking my candy from my bag simply because it was THERE already.)
TV: If you want to reduce the hours spent watching TV - Hide the TV. This is paraphrased from Clear's idea to PUT YOUR TV IN THE CLOSET. This will automatically make you roll it out only when you DESPERATELY want to watch something. Alternatively (and easier): hide your remote or remove its batteries.
Sports: Prepare your workout clothes in advance. If you have to search for them, you're likely to skip your workout. If they're right there, well, then you're just lazy if you don't go, and nobody wants to be lazy.
Obviously this can be done with a lot more than just these three categories of habits! Try to come up with new tactics yourself! I'd love to hear about them in the comments too!
Overall thoughts:
They book was dry as Parmesan (PS: cheese should only be eaten in moderation) but had some valuable tips (as listed above). I would definitely recommend the book simply because it has more tips than what I've personally listed and everyone has their own style of learning/changing and their own goals to meet. This means that while the above advice is valuable to me there might be other important things in the book for YOU to learn.
Only YOU know what YOU need to change/learn about yourself/in your life. That is why you personally should read this book.
WriteBot thinks everyone can benefit from this book. It can be found easily on Amazon (I am not affiliated with James Clear or Amazon in any way by the way) and probably other stores and isn't very long either. You might learn something about yourself with this book!
WriteBot out.
This post will be a quick review of James Clear's Atomic Habits. I finished it about an hour ago and found it... all right. It didn't blow me away (although some tips were useful!) and the writing was quite dry. It took me several days to finish (that should be an indicator how dry the writing was!) and I want to with this post simply give you an overview of Clear's most important (my opinion) points.
Why did I read it? I thought I could improve my work ethic when it comes to writing - but I'm not sure it actually worked. I am still tired after writing only a little bit (hello depression!) and can't think of any way to improve my habit of doing nothing whatsoever instead of writing most of the time.
All right! Let's get started.
Atomic Habits is a book about... well you guessed it. Habits. Atomic means small and therefore the book is about (guessing it again?) SMALL HABITS. And how SMALL HABITS stack up to over time become BIG HABITS/YOUR LIFESTYLE.
The first point Clear makes is that you should not try to change your whole life all at once. It's much too difficult (can confirm. I've tried it multiple times.). You're supposed to start small. AND you're supposed to change not because of the goal you want to to achieve (example: you want to lose weight and therefore decide to run) but because of the type of person you wish to become (example cont.: you want to become a healthy person at a good weight).
This way of thinking will supposedly help you stick to your habits much easier than if your goal were simply to lose a few kilos. Let me elaborate on that example a bit.
Your goal: lose 10 kilos
Your habits: eating cheeseburger every day for breakfast (don't judge. It has happened to me. Incl. pizza)
IF you only attempt to lose weight then you might do so by sheer force of will (been there done that - eat fruit/cereals instead of that cheeseburger for a few weeks). This is extremely hard and a bit pointless because as soon as you go back to your old HABITS (eating cheeseburger for breakfast) you will rapidly regain that weight.
HOWEVER.
If your goal becomes to change your lifestyle (be a healthier person) then James Clear suggests building small habits around that (as opposed to using SHEER FORCE OF WILL) will serve you better in the long run. This means you are replacing your habit of cheeseburger for breakfast with a habit of something healthy (???) for breakfast instead. This is a small change and you can even start by only going through the motions. Instead of warming up that frozen burger/pizza/sweetened cereal you'd start taking out your healthy cereals and fruit and what not. You don't even have to eat them just yet. The habit of taking them out of your storage needs to come first. You do this every day and at some point you'll be like 'heck I'm starting to make two meals (you're still taking out your burger/sweetened cereals/etc too at this point) and this is inconvenient'. 'Heck. The healthy stuff is already out - might as well eat that and then the cheeseburger if I'm still hungry'.
This is how it starts.
In a few months then you'll cultivate the habit of eating your healthy foods (the things you started taking out of storage first thing in the morning) and will (hopefully) forget all about pizza for breakfast entirely after a while.
The same principle goes for anything else you want to do. Write a book? Start by switching on your PC/writing program or carrying a notebook with you. Commit yourself to writing only two minutes a day. You are allowed only to make this SMALL CHANGE. You must do it every day. After a while you will be tempted to write more. And then more. And suddenly you have a BIG HABIT.
The second (most useful) tip in Atomic Habits is this:
Have a schedule and schedule the habits you want to cultivate one after another. This can be done by certain time or after another activity. The formula goes something like this:
If I wake up at 7:00 AM the next step in my day will be to make a cup of tea (habit you're probably already doing?). After this habit or while the water boils I will do (if you want to change to a healthier lifestyle) five pushups. This will usually be around 7:02 AM.
In this way you have two 'schedules':
1: At 7:02 AM I will do five pushups.
2: While the water boils for my morning tea I will do five pushups.
You can schedule other things this way as well.
If you want to be more productive at work: After getting on the train and finding a seat I will take out my notepad and write 2 new ideas I could develop during the day.
If you want to reduce your calorie intake: After sitting down to eat a meal I will drink a glass of water.
If you want to get better at drawing: I will draw one object every day before sleep (ca. 10 PM)
If you want to learn about physics: During my lunch break (12 lunchtime) I will read an article/watch a video on physics
You get it? After a habit you're already doing (going to lunch break/getting out of bed) you will 'stack' up another habit (referred to as HABIT STACKING in Atomic Habits).
The third piece of juicy advice:
MAKE IT EASY.
This is one very no-brain and yet very difficult to follow through with.
We all know this issue: If you're hungry you'll just grab whatever snack is available no matter if it's healthy or not. (And you're probably still hungry afterwards so have to eat a normal/healthy snack on top of it.)
We also all know this: There's an exciting book/new game/TV series RIGHT THERE when you're supposed to be doing work. What is easier? Sit back and relax or work on that difficult project you've been procrastinating on the whole week? Which one will you automatically do? Grab the controller or try to make your brain solve your work issue?
You don't have to answer that (but you can if you want to!). All of us have good intentions but rarely choose the difficult thing over an easier option.
The same it is with habits. Our bad habits are usually easy. The TV controller is right there. So is that greasy snack that won't fill you so you'll have to eat more later/immediately.
James Clear proposes this:
Make your GOOD HABITS EASY and your BAD HABITS HARD.
In practice this means:
Food: Don't buy unhealthy snacks. If you have to go to the store before you can eat them... well there's a good chance you'll be too lazy to go to the store and thus won't eat them.
Pre-cut your healthy snacks during the weekend (says James Clear - but personally I think the healthy fruit and vegetable snacks he's referring to will be rather gross later on if you pre-cut them too early) so they're always ready to eat. I want to suggest rather than pre-cutting the whole week's cucumbers and apples on the weekend to simply make them more visible and pre-cut them the evening before or in the morning of. How to make them more visible? Put them everywhere. Put them in your (unhealthy) snack drawer. Put them on your tables and desks. Put them on your nightstand. (This is a trick learned from a hotel. They had apples in a basket and I was hungry. I ate an apple instead of unpacking my candy from my bag simply because it was THERE already.)
TV: If you want to reduce the hours spent watching TV - Hide the TV. This is paraphrased from Clear's idea to PUT YOUR TV IN THE CLOSET. This will automatically make you roll it out only when you DESPERATELY want to watch something. Alternatively (and easier): hide your remote or remove its batteries.
Sports: Prepare your workout clothes in advance. If you have to search for them, you're likely to skip your workout. If they're right there, well, then you're just lazy if you don't go, and nobody wants to be lazy.
Obviously this can be done with a lot more than just these three categories of habits! Try to come up with new tactics yourself! I'd love to hear about them in the comments too!
Overall thoughts:
They book was dry as Parmesan (PS: cheese should only be eaten in moderation) but had some valuable tips (as listed above). I would definitely recommend the book simply because it has more tips than what I've personally listed and everyone has their own style of learning/changing and their own goals to meet. This means that while the above advice is valuable to me there might be other important things in the book for YOU to learn.
Only YOU know what YOU need to change/learn about yourself/in your life. That is why you personally should read this book.
WriteBot thinks everyone can benefit from this book. It can be found easily on Amazon (I am not affiliated with James Clear or Amazon in any way by the way) and probably other stores and isn't very long either. You might learn something about yourself with this book!
WriteBot out.
Saturday, November 17, 2018
What are your goals this year? What will they be next year?
Hey everyone!
It's pretty late. I just came home a few minutes ago and decided to give you another post. This one is a simple question to help you think about the year ahead (2019 for those of you living under a rock). Why now? It's not even December yet??!?!
BUT: the earlier you think of YOUR NEXT GREAT GOAL the easier it will be to change this into an obtainable goal by year's end. This means you can start 2019 not with some airy fairy wish of 'oh I'd like to eat 90% less chocolate in 2019 than I did in 2018' but something realistic like 'I will not eat chocolate on one Wednesday per week!'
The questions can be answered very broadly. You can talk about your writing goals (complete ten books? Write one hundred short stories? THINK BIG!) or your life goals (finally get a dog and raise it well). You can mention your relationship goals (such as: I will surprise my partner with a little gift/flower/favourite snack once every month!) or your health goals (I want to get healthier/slimmer/smarter). I'm interested in your lives. I seriously am.Where else am I gonna learn about humans?
Do you have any goals for 2019 yet? How about your 2018 goals? What happened to them? Did you reach them?
The best advice on goal setting that I know of is this: THINK BIGGER.
WriteBot wants to hear all about it in the comments.
Have a good day/night!
It's pretty late. I just came home a few minutes ago and decided to give you another post. This one is a simple question to help you think about the year ahead (2019 for those of you living under a rock). Why now? It's not even December yet??!?!
BUT: the earlier you think of YOUR NEXT GREAT GOAL the easier it will be to change this into an obtainable goal by year's end. This means you can start 2019 not with some airy fairy wish of 'oh I'd like to eat 90% less chocolate in 2019 than I did in 2018' but something realistic like 'I will not eat chocolate on one Wednesday per week!'
The questions can be answered very broadly. You can talk about your writing goals (complete ten books? Write one hundred short stories? THINK BIG!) or your life goals (finally get a dog and raise it well). You can mention your relationship goals (such as: I will surprise my partner with a little gift/flower/favourite snack once every month!) or your health goals (I want to get healthier/slimmer/smarter). I'm interested in your lives. I seriously am.
Do you have any goals for 2019 yet? How about your 2018 goals? What happened to them? Did you reach them?
The best advice on goal setting that I know of is this: THINK BIGGER.
WriteBot wants to hear all about it in the comments.
Have a good day/night!
Thursday, November 15, 2018
About STORY PLANNING 2
Hi folks!
As some of you know, in the last couple of weeks I've tried to improve my working style by learning how to set goals.
So this post will be about goal-setting and self-improvement.
I will say without being ashamed: I'm not really good at it yet. I'm still learning how to do it. This means I've been buying and reading a lot of books. My favourite so far is The Magic of Thinking Big, by David J. Schwartz, but I also found Grant Cardone's The 10X Rule quite helpful. If I had to choose, The Magic of Thinking Big would win out. This is a book I'd recommend EVERYONE to read. It's a really really important book if you want to improve yourself. It's also fairly short.
Ok. Let's continue.
Why did I even change my happy-go-lucky style to something more SRS? Because it was no longer working out just being happy-go-lucky. I've made a couple of mistakes I would have loved to avoid. I spent a lot of money on THINGS that didn't work out (for example the start of a degree in a completely unrelated field to writing). I started a lot of stories that will never be finished. But then something else happened.
I decided IT CAN'T CONTINUE LIKE THIS. It's time to actually BE SUCCESSFUL. I bought the above mentioned books and read them in two days each.
I knew this about myself: I hate planning things out. It's just not my style. It's stifling. But also: It is important to plan IMPORTANT things out. Why? I think we all know this. There are times when you can tell by your own stories that the bigger they are the less coherent they become the more you write on them. And that doesn't encourage anyone to edit.
So here's an experiment: Plan your next story. The outline doesn't have to be finished in a day. It will probably take much longer (depending of course on the greatness and length you want in your story). Write a summary. Write two summaries (or twenty). Change the outline you have if it doesn't work the first time around (and it probably won't). What this will give you is a FEEL for the story. The more you THINK about it (don't write just yet unless you absolutely know where you're going!) the more you will know it. A lot of successful peoples' best ideas come from solitude and thinking about their goals/plans. Why should writing be any different?
A caution, however, needs to be added. There is such a thing as overthinking it. You know this is happening when you start getting impatient or just want to write (without knowing WHAT you want to write) heedlessly. This happens when you're TOO CLOSE to the material. When you stop seeing the trees because the forest became too dense.
How to know when this happens? Well, usually it is accompanied by despair, by the urge to pull out your hair (or whatever else your habit is when you're overwhelmed), by my-head-is-about-to-explodiness. Then you need to observe the unofficial Rule 3 of THE WRITING RULES. Take a BREAK! Relax. It might be hard (it is for me) but it is beneficial! Do something else. Learn something. Write on a different story. You need to clear your mind of all the unrelated and confused ideas so you can come back to your IMPORTANT WIP refreshed later!
Does this make sense? Tell me about your tips! How do you plan stories? I'd love to know!
WriteBot off... to plan STUFF.
As some of you know, in the last couple of weeks I've tried to improve my working style by learning how to set goals.
So this post will be about goal-setting and self-improvement.
I will say without being ashamed: I'm not really good at it yet. I'm still learning how to do it. This means I've been buying and reading a lot of books. My favourite so far is The Magic of Thinking Big, by David J. Schwartz, but I also found Grant Cardone's The 10X Rule quite helpful. If I had to choose, The Magic of Thinking Big would win out. This is a book I'd recommend EVERYONE to read. It's a really really important book if you want to improve yourself. It's also fairly short.
Ok. Let's continue.
Why did I even change my happy-go-lucky style to something more SRS? Because it was no longer working out just being happy-go-lucky. I've made a couple of mistakes I would have loved to avoid. I spent a lot of money on THINGS that didn't work out (for example the start of a degree in a completely unrelated field to writing). I started a lot of stories that will never be finished. But then something else happened.
I decided IT CAN'T CONTINUE LIKE THIS. It's time to actually BE SUCCESSFUL. I bought the above mentioned books and read them in two days each.
I knew this about myself: I hate planning things out. It's just not my style. It's stifling. But also: It is important to plan IMPORTANT things out. Why? I think we all know this. There are times when you can tell by your own stories that the bigger they are the less coherent they become the more you write on them. And that doesn't encourage anyone to edit.
So here's an experiment: Plan your next story. The outline doesn't have to be finished in a day. It will probably take much longer (depending of course on the greatness and length you want in your story). Write a summary. Write two summaries (or twenty). Change the outline you have if it doesn't work the first time around (and it probably won't). What this will give you is a FEEL for the story. The more you THINK about it (don't write just yet unless you absolutely know where you're going!) the more you will know it. A lot of successful peoples' best ideas come from solitude and thinking about their goals/plans. Why should writing be any different?
A caution, however, needs to be added. There is such a thing as overthinking it. You know this is happening when you start getting impatient or just want to write (without knowing WHAT you want to write) heedlessly. This happens when you're TOO CLOSE to the material. When you stop seeing the trees because the forest became too dense.
How to know when this happens? Well, usually it is accompanied by despair, by the urge to pull out your hair (or whatever else your habit is when you're overwhelmed), by my-head-is-about-to-explodiness. Then you need to observe the unofficial Rule 3 of THE WRITING RULES. Take a BREAK! Relax. It might be hard (it is for me) but it is beneficial! Do something else. Learn something. Write on a different story. You need to clear your mind of all the unrelated and confused ideas so you can come back to your IMPORTANT WIP refreshed later!
Does this make sense? Tell me about your tips! How do you plan stories? I'd love to know!
WriteBot off... to plan STUFF.
Saturday, November 3, 2018
10X WIP (How to manage all your works in progress)
Hi folks.
It's been a while but here is your one and only WriteBot!
I am currently working on 10 WIPs. They're not all books or short stories but include my marketing plans as well. I've been making many plans and trying to out more writing in the last few days (since having a complete meltdown and deciding to go ALL IN).
Here's a list of what I'm working on:
This is the point where we switch from actual craft to publishing - something that absolutely has to be done!
Last but not least we'll talk about marketing:
We all know we'd rather be writing than marketing - right? But what if you can be creative while doing it? What if you can make it actually fun with little giveaways and promotional posters as well as CUSTOM BOOKMARKS?
The plan includes:
All right! These are my plans for the rest of the year and beyond. I want to keep adding targets to work towards and really make this work. It's been a wake-up call when I (shamefully admitted) spiraled into depression even after doing very well in the last few weeks in real life. But that's a topic for another day. My goals at this point are as they stand.
It can only get better!
Remember: WriteBot Always Wins! And WriteBot will win THIS too. (PS: You can become WriteBot as well! Do it. Write, and become WriteBot! Practice your backside off! Practice some more. Push when you feel like you're being destructed at the seams like some lowly scrap bot! Keep pushing even while your partner's already watching the telly or gaming on their PC. Keep pushing towards those goals!)
WriteBot off to publish Elegy of the Stars (Jollyroger, I'm scared.).
It's been a while but here is your one and only WriteBot!
I am currently working on 10 WIPs. They're not all books or short stories but include my marketing plans as well. I've been making many plans and trying to out more writing in the last few days (since having a complete meltdown and deciding to go ALL IN).
Here's a list of what I'm working on:
- editing the fairy tale Catching Fireflies. CF will be getting another part approximately twice its length to enhance the story. It's by far my most sold story and it will be even better with the new edit!
- editing Of One Mind. This is a story inspired by psychology and the question of what will happen when people try to join themselves directly to each others' minds. It's grisly (BUT AWESOME!)
- editing Eye in the Sky (A bit of cosmic horror because that's one of my favourite genres and our Lord Cthulu has to be praised).
- editing Hourglass. This one is hard. I've been working on it for about five years by now and it's a huge project. I have written three (actually four but the fourth is a spin off) novels in this series and plan to finish the fourth main story novel within this year. It is one of the best stories I've ever written but needs much help so it'll go to another two of my beta readers on Monday!
- hand in hand with the above: finishing all of Simon Walker's adventure in the ancient world! Hourglass is the first book. There are three more (The Tower of Fear, WIP novel three, and WIP novel four.) It's such a great adventure story!
- finishing Ris's story. You remember the leshy story I posted a year (Oh My! A year!) ago? It wasn't complete then and it still isn't. But I plan to complete it still.
- writing the NEW STORY. It doesn't have a title yet but it's... already really amazing. It makes my skin tingle just thinking about it (but that might just be the mid-writing panic). This new story is pure sci-fi. It's set in a dystopian cyberpunk town called Clockwork City. It has androids, cyborgs, humans, pretty clockwork girls, and war.
This is the point where we switch from actual craft to publishing - something that absolutely has to be done!
- publishing short story collections. I am currently working on three of them: Into the Deep (mostly mysterious water-related stories such as Catching Fireflies), Xenos (weird cosmic alien stories - a bit like Solaris by Stanislaw Lem), and a new collection which doesn't have a title yet but will have mostly nice magical stories. (PS: this is the best one if you just want to read something relaxing and sweet. But it'll still make you think and consider your life.)
- publishing Elegy of the Stars. This is another story very dear to me. Very. (But then again, they all are...) It's a story that was excruciatingly hard on me if I'm completely honest. It was very emotionally taxing and I cried every time I picked it up and tried to work on it. That's probably why it took me about five years to finish even though it's a novel and doesn't have anywhere near as many words as my great epic Hourglass.
- publishing Warlike/The Torn Earth. This is a bit more YA than the rest of my stories. It's also kick-ass and you should definitely check it out once it's out. I'm currently fixing the title/name on the cover.
Last but not least we'll talk about marketing:
We all know we'd rather be writing than marketing - right? But what if you can be creative while doing it? What if you can make it actually fun with little giveaways and promotional posters as well as CUSTOM BOOKMARKS?
The plan includes:
- intelligent twitter pieces
- artwork (posters/bookmarks) to hand out on the streets
- 'free book day' giveaways on KDP (including the necessary promotion by handing out flyers and posting it on twitter)
- an appearance at ComicCon in March (that's the Dutch comic con because I live there)
- a few panels of comic for Hourglass (I'd love to fully make Hourglass a comic as well as book, but it's a huge project. That goal has to wait a bit still.)
- frequent blog posts (at least twice a week with useful content for readers and writers. By the way, this includes my
dustybook review blog, WriteBotWins!)
All right! These are my plans for the rest of the year and beyond. I want to keep adding targets to work towards and really make this work. It's been a wake-up call when I (shamefully admitted) spiraled into depression even after doing very well in the last few weeks in real life. But that's a topic for another day. My goals at this point are as they stand.
It can only get better!
Remember: WriteBot Always Wins! And WriteBot will win THIS too. (PS: You can become WriteBot as well! Do it. Write, and become WriteBot! Practice your backside off! Practice some more. Push when you feel like you're being destructed at the seams like some lowly scrap bot! Keep pushing even while your partner's already watching the telly or gaming on their PC. Keep pushing towards those goals!)
WriteBot off to publish Elegy of the Stars (Jollyroger, I'm scared.).
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