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A palindrome reads the same backwards as forward: tit, dad, mum, did, etc. The below video text reads backwards as if does forward. Not only does it read in the opposite but the meaning is the exact opposite as well.
This short video, Lost Generation, was submitted to an AARP contest by a 20-year old male. This young man’s entry to “u @ 50″ won second place.
When first shown, everyone in the room was awe-struck and broke into spontaneous applause. The message is so simple and yet so brilliant.
Photos for all my friends across the globe: I have had many emails asking how I am going and what I am doing since I quit my job. You all know that Jade had her second baby and that child three is back home again. Life is indeed good and I am writing daily. I have begun my Masters degree in writing, have several freelance writing jobs and am generally having a ball.
If I was out working that time stealing job that I’ve just left, I would not be able to do this:
Writer’s become constipated, you know. All those words block up their grey matter and thinking of what to write sometimes becomes hard! Working it out with pen and paper is almost impossible. Similarly, writer’s become overwhelmed with what to write and where to start. Unfortunately, many writers opt not to start or to take a laxative!
Overcome the tyranny of the writer by playing with daily writer’s prompts. The prompt can be a word, a sentence or a picture. There are some great prompt generators available across the web and some writer’s sites offer competitions and carnivals based on a prompt. But, Megan Bayliss has started a new prompt service for brave writers who want to encourage each other and publicly play with different voices and genres.
I have revamped an old free blog, a Blogger blog, to incorporate a daily photo: Writer’s Prompts Daily. The photo is your prompt. Look at it. Listen to it. What does it tell you? Write to your blog, short or long, what ever genre you choose. Leave a comment on my writers prompt daily blog so that all of us who are playing can promptly come and read your photo-senses.
Writing is a discipline and a craft. Practised daily, writing develops. Stepping out and trying a different voice or genre is extending your skill. But how do you do that unless you are challenged with something visual that kicks the cognitions and then behaviours into change? I challenge you to a practice dual: En garde.
Your practice writing need not be long: a paragraph, a poem, a reflection. The important thing is that you write daily. Are you disciplined enough to become a writer?
Who wants to join in? Go and look at the writer’s prompt (the big picture under the header) and get writing on your blog….every single day. I’ll be putting up my practice writing on the Writer’s Prompts Daily site…even if the only time I get is five minutes to write a sentence. Elite performers do as they say and I am an elite performer who wants to publish, publish, publish. I’d love to have your company along the way.
Go the broke Mum brigade. Australian mother of four young boys, Rebecca James, finally had her manuscript accepted and has hit the big time: Australia’s JK Rowling
Rebecca’s story is one of inspiration to aspiring writers everywhere. NEVER give up. Manuscript rejections are to be expected. Rebecca had in excess of 50 rejections before a publisher in the UK picked her up. In just six months, Rebecca has gone from flat broke to 1.2 million. Go the bionic woman!
As with all achievements, you will never get there unless you actually have a go. That manuscript sitting in your file will stay a manuscript until you SEND IT! Expect the rejections as they are part of the process.
My first manuscript rejections were crushing. I was married to my characters and really believed my writing style and voice were gorgeous. Ho hum….without the rejections and some feedback I would never have re written and produced manuscripts worthy of being published. Those rejections were what got me published!
Do it. Pull out a short story, a manuscript, a poem or an anecdote. Send it in TODAY. Send it anywhere appropriate, even to Reader’s Digest or a school newsletter, just begin the process of sending your work to the right publishers. The quicker you get rejected, the quicker you get published.
Here’s Rebecca’s blog. Go and see what a normal person she is. She’s done it. Will you?
Book Review of Beautiful Malice, Rebecca’s Young Adult novel, by Australian Women Online.
In a constipated employment market, job seekers need a competitive advantage to get a job. A competitive advantage is a quality or skill that will win you a job over the 100 other people also attempting to get that same job. My competitive advantage is my education, my experience and my profile. Add to that my tenacity, my self esteem and my work ethic and I am exactly the sort of person I would employ. How about you though? What makes you job ready?
We are assisting our 16 year old daughter to get a job. She has dropped out of her final year of high school, refuses to go back and would rather earn some money than pursue other education at present. She wants to do Aquaculture but the course does not begin until next January. Off to work then, but…..she has little experience and is very naive.
In a tourist mecca where the bottom has fallen out of tourism due to the Global Financial Crisis, jobs are scarce. Jobs for unexperienced 16 year olds are even scarcer. Sixteen year old girls need a competitive advantage to get jobs.
Daughter wants to work with animals. Damn but I had NO IDEA that the animal industry was so competitive. Many people have told us stories of how they did two years of volunteer work at RSPCA or YAPS prior to getting a job in a pet store as an assistant! The local tropical Zoos even suggested that degreed zoologists needed to volunteer prior to securing employment at the Zoos (above pic is me at the Tropical Zoo asking the wise old man to give my daughter a job).
Not prone to give up, we did the rounds of the pet stores and handed in resumes, jut in case a job came up while 16 year old was doing some volunteer work at RSPCA. On leaving a pet store I noticed a window sign: Casual Junior required. Experience necessary.
With a little coaching and a pep talk, daughter went straight back in and made the Pet Store Manager an offer: daughter used the only competitive advantage available to her at 16 years of age.
“I am prepared to do volunteer work at the RSPCA so I am therefore prepared to work for free for you for two weeks in return for the experience required to do the casual junior position. At the end of the two weeks you can decide to employ me or not. For now though, I can clean cages, I am great with people and I have a keen and growing interest in fish and Australian marine life.”
She starts her pet store work experience on Monday.
Identify your competitive advantage by turning your thinking on its head. If you think the same way you will get the same results. Think differently and you open a range of options and personal advantages. Instead of thinking, “I won’t get the job,” think, “I have qualities that nobody else has and I will utilise them to get myself a job.” Instead of thinking, “What can I get out of the job,” think, “What can I do in this job that value adds to more than myself.”
Happy think differently job hunting. Your mind is your biggest selling point. Think differently and you will be different. Dare to be different and get the job you really want.
