On Writing

It only makes sense when a  very popular and best-selling writer pens autobiography, which is - On Writing.
Stephen King, the fiction author has done wonderful work.
He recollects his childhood, youth and recent days to share with world.
In midst of it, he shares his thoughts about writing, for those who aspire to do something in here.
Like all successful people in any field you name it, he is darn serious about taking writing seriously.
And then he shares some tricks to apply as and when you dive deeper.

Like -
Work on first draft door closed. Do not share.
Start with a story. Have characters come to life. Let them handle their own challenges.
Let them make way through situations on their own. See them do that. And write only the truth you see.
Write as if you are telling a story for only one person in the world. (for him, its his wife.)

Then forget about it for a while till you find your own write-up as someone else's.
Then read it, and take notes for places to improvise, clarify and cut short.
Second draft = first draft - 10%.

Now you are ready to show it to others. To the person, you wrote for.
Send copies to select friends willing to give feedback. That is important, and better be incorporated while revising.
Second draft is the time when the theme is made more clear and story is made relevant.

Last round is to rectify silly mistakes, spell-checks and tenses and grammar.
And we are ready.

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more to come.

Social Intelligence

"Social Intelligence" is a wonderful book.
I see that the style of writing is really engaging. The chapters are of just proper length. From start of chapter, you can link through towards end, without missing the point. Like other psychology writings, this also is backed with case studies and surveys and ample of references for almost every point it makes.

It starts with technical details, like- what fires where - inside the brain, when something happens in outside world. Then we move on to expressions and working with them. It talks of rapport and harmony, which when present - flourish relationships and when absent - make life valueless, in one sense.

By and by, it gives out certain clues about what little things help or spoils successful social encounters. It gives out signals in clear about the wrong habits or signs of disorders, only to beware of and rectify them if possible. Then it dives into love-relationships.

All in all, Daniel Goleman, in this book walks by us like a master knowing intricacies of interactions, guiding our way, to make lives better, happier, content and successful.
It is always beneficial to have a master with us...

This wonderful wonderful Posterous !

I've had a try at how anyone can publish a blog, just like that, without any account;
some time around 3 years back.

Today, I create an account on posterous, co-incidentally, with same email-id as the previous post.

Lo and behold !
The "Space" they now call it, readily shows what I had scribbled for a simple trial.

This is such a wonderful experience, just like you find a diary years after you have forgotten, and therein lies a precious memory..

And, by the way, my opinions in general seem to be almost similar to those 3 years back..
hmm...

Thing I thought was blog

I've been looking around lots and lots of people writing lots and lots of stuff here and there and wherever they can about which mostly contains statements like "I think ...., I like ..., I thought...., for Me it'd have.... yadayadayada".... Its all about I, Me, Myself, most of the time...

Second type of blogs I found was all about You..
What You should do to lose weight, to earn more money, to control your life, to know your inner self, to understand inner workings of Your brain and blah blah blah... All about You...
These kind of blogs may have higher probabilities of more number of hits, because reader thinks its about Me...

Third are of those types where, people, from all walks of life, share their valuable experiences in all the time they'd been around in their field...
which is again very much informative, though such kind of matter could be unique- once in a lifetime kind of scenario, most of times...

It'd  really be a wonderful study if some enthusiastic philanthropist decides to find out about 'to how many peoples does a blog actually reaches, before its own writer forgets about it...'

To my perception, not even 1% of blogs could be called universally known (not even popular...), where in people could find something intriguing, useful, enriching and long lasting....

This post belongs to remaining 99% lot.
;)