Want to Know the Truth About BLOGS?

Recent studies have found people take about three hours and sixteen minutes to write a blog post. 

That's a 26 percent increase 
over the same surveys last year. 

However, the studies also found that “twice as many bloggers are now spending 6+ hours on their average post.”

THAT'S QUITE AN INVESTMENT.

ARE WE GETTING AN APPROPRIATE 
RETURN ON IT? 

WHAT DO YOU THINK?

Research shows the average blog is dead 
after a mere 100 days.

OUCH!

That number also means that the average blog 
that launches in the next couple of weeks 

will already have died by Christmas!

Yes, that’s a depressing thought.

But don't quit!

Make connections where you can.

Look for forums related to your topic. 

Look for active Twitter chats about blogging.

As I've found writing my novels ...

 a funny thing begins to happen as you continue doing something you enjoy, 

even when no one else is watching quite yet: 

 you get better at it. 

The quality of your content improves. 

Then, as people slowly do find you, 

you have a growing body of work that’s getting continually better, 

which encourages those first-time readers to become multiple-time readers.

 It’ll take work, and it’ll take longer than you expect to get noticed.

But it’s worth it when it happens.

What do you think
of the return on
your blog efforts?

EVEN WHEN YOU THINK YOU KNOW - YOU DON'T

EVEN WHEN YOU THINK YOU KNOW 

YOU DON'T

 

   Remember junior high and high school?  You thought you knew about your parents, about life, about your friends. 

 

   Then came college or the job(s) and/or marriage with or without children -- and you went:

"Oh, man, I had it all wrong.  This is what life is all about."

 

   And you were wrong.

 “Life has no meaning. Each of us has meaning and we bring it to life.

It is a waste to be asking the question when you are the answer.”

― Joseph Campbell

 

 

   Old Joe has a point:

 

   We bring the meaning to each stage of our journey.  The paths ahead look without number.  When at the end, we look back, we will find only one. 

 

   That path, good or bad, will be the result of our many life choices.

 

“To be what we are, and to become what we are capable of becoming, is the only end of life.”

― Robert Louis Stevenson, Familiar Studies of Men and Books

   You may think you know the meaning of your book.  You are wrong.

 

   The meaning of your book is the one the reader assigns to it as you assign the meaning to your own life -- but it will change as the reader and you change.

 

   The you that you are and the reader that the reader is at the start of your book will not be the same person at the end.

 

“There is not one big cosmic meaning for all; there is only the meaning we each give to our life,

an individual meaning, an individual plot, like an individual novel, a book for each person.”

― Anaïs Nin, The Diary of Anaïs Nin, Vol. 1: 1931-1934

   You think you know why you started your blog.  But the why of its origin is not the why of its continuing.

 

   John Steinbeck, in his journey across America in 1960 described in TRAVELS WITH CHARLEY (his giant French poodle) seemed always lost. 

 

   Yet, where he ended up usually held more truth and meaning than the rare times he actually arrived at his stated destination.

 

   Gary Sinse, by the way, does a haunting performance of the book in audio.  Do yourself a favor and listen to it:

https://soundcloud.com/#penguin-audio/travels-with-charley-in-search

 

 

“However vast the darkness, we must supply our own light.”

― Stanley Kubrick

 

That light for me, besides the Great Mystery, is the caring others I meet in this life.  Each soul casts a light of its own. 

As Samuel McCord says in DEATH IN THE HOUSE OF LIFE:

http://www.amazon.com/dp/B00HIU5O38

 

Each of us is a walking shadow.  The people in our lives are lights, varying in brightness and color. 
As they pass by us, our shadows move and change with each light, becoming something different with each one. 
We become a living dance of light and shadow with the people entering our lives … and leaving them.

I guess maybe we all become different people in response to different times and places, different duties. 

Maybe in a lifetime we become a small number of different people, when, in fact, we could become many, many more –

 if only life moved us around more.

COURAGE TO BE YOURSELF

 

“To be nobody

-but-yourself — 

in a world which 

is doing its best, 

night and day, 

to make you everybody else — 

means to fight the hardest battle 

which any human being can fight.”

 - E.E. Cummings

Most of us really know in our heart of hearts 

that our constant focus on cell phone/internet communication 

deprives us of having real human interaction.

 Even more importantly, 

this kind of communication may keep us from having meaningful communion with ourselves.

Being alone allows you to drop your “social guard”, thus giving you the freedom to be introspective, to think for yourself. 

 Know that line from Jerry Maguire, 

“You complete me"?

I know it’s very romantic 

but what does it really say? 

That we’re not complete 

without another?

Being alone allows you to think the thoughts that shape you into a complete human being.

You need to be a complete person before you can support a healthy relationship with someone else.

Even though you may want to be in a relationship, 

could you be in a meaningful relationship with yourself if you had to?

Our world is noisy and loud,  

The noise is always there, even at night.

The wail of ambulances,

the rumble of car engines,

the  laughter or curses in the

apartment next door 

The Song of the City

As soon as most enter their residences, 

they turn on the TV, radio, or Blue Tooth.

Most Can’t Stand to Be Alone 

With Their Thoughts.

Can You?

Why?

Why not?

WHAT DOES IT TAKE

TO BE A WHOLE

HUMAN BEING?

Write What YOU DON'T WANT TO KNOW

Tonight, the exterior of Meilori's 

resembled the LaLaurie Manson, 

the site of the gruesome torture and murder of countless slaves by their owners, 

Delphine LaLaurie and her physician husband.

Perhaps that is why the shadows around me had sharper than usual teeth 

as I brain-stormed how to promote my new collection of short stories, 

A Sampler of Shadows

Any of you want to help?  

I have a couple of ideas on how to do it, 

but I need a little help from my friends.

{Courtesy Allan Warren}

Since Meilori's exterior was what it was tonight, 

I was surprised when the ghost of James Baldwin sat down opposite me at my rune-carved table.

Maybe I shouldn't have been since it was his birthday two weeks ago.

Besides, Mr. Baldwin never shied away from confronting racism 

as the New York waitress who refused him service as a teen found out 

when he threw a glass of water at her, shattering the mirror behind her.

He said, "Wilde speaks highly of you.  

He suggested I speak of writing to you and those who drop by this little platform you have."

{Courtesy Carl Van Vechten}

WRITING IS DISCOVERY

"When you’re writing, you’re trying to find out something which you don’t know. 

The whole language of writing for me 

 is finding out 

what you don’t want to know, 

 what you don’t want to find out. 

But something forces you to anyway."

SO MANY LIE TO YOU; 

DO NOT BE ONE OF THEM 

"Self-delusion, in the service of no matter what small or lofty cause, is a price no writer can afford.

 His subject is himself and the world and it requires every ounce of stamina 

he can summon to attempt to look on himself and the world as they are.

No one knows your name ... not even yourself if you are honest about it."

DO NOT BE SELF-BLINDED

 "One writes out of one thing only: one’s own experience. 

Everything depends on how relentlessly one forces from this experience the last drop, 

sweet or bitter, it can possibly give. 

This is the only real concern of the artist, to recreate out of the disorder of life that order which is art."

DO NOT LOSE YOUR COURAGE

 "I find writing gets harder as time goes on. 

I’m speaking of the working process, which demands a certain amount of energy and courage (though I dislike using the word), and a certain amount of recklessness.

 Every form of writing is difficult, no one is easier than another. 

They all kick your ass. None of it comes easy."

TOUCH ONE HEART; 

CHANGE THE WORLD

 "If there is no moral question, there is no reason to write. 

I’m an old‐fashioned writer and, despite the odds, I want to change the world. 

What do I hope to convey?

 Well, joy, love, the passion to feel how our choices affect the world . . . that’s all."

TRUTH IS YOUR COMPASS

"You want to write a sentence as clean as a bone. That is the goal.

 I certainly can’t imagine art for art’s sake . . .

 that’s a European approach, which never made any sense to me. 

 I think what you have to do, which is the difficult thing about a writer, 

is avoid slogans. 

You have to have the guts to protest the slogan, no matter how noble it may sound. 

It always hides something else; the writer should try to expose what it hides."

 REMEMBER HEMINGWAY

"Write. 

Find a way to keep alive 

and write. 

There is nothing else to say. 

If you are going to be a writer there is nothing I can say to stop you; 

if you’re not going to be a writer nothing I can say will help you. 

What you really need at the beginning is somebody to let you know that the effort is real.

 I consider that I have many responsibilities, but none greater than this: 

To last, 

as Hemingway says,  

and get my work done."

HAVE YOU EVER?

Have you ever been at work on a novel when an idea you'd been toying with

 seized you and would not let you go until you started writing it into life?

IS THAT ALL THERE WAS? 

 seized me yesterday night after having slept all day to recover from the work weekend.

Even with doing the obligatory chores and paying of bills, I've written 2700 words so far.

Most of it takes place in 1959 which was quite a pivotal year:

(Image in Public Domain)

Fidel Castro comes to power in Cuba after the revolution.

The Dalai Lama is forced to flee Tibet.

 The Barbie Doll is launched.

Alaska becomes the 49th State and Hawaii becomes the 50th state, 

St. Lawrence Seaway is completed. 

(Public Domain Image)

NASA introduces America's first astronauts to the world including John H. Glenn Jr, and Alan Shepard Jr.

US Launches first Weather Station in Space.

Spookier, 

the Soviet Union crashes the Luna 2 spacecraft into the Moon, 

making it the first man-made object to reach the Moon's surface. 

OF NOTE 

Average Cost of new house $12,400.00
Average Yearly Wages $5,010.00
Cost of a gallon of Gas 25 cents
Average Cost of a new car $2,200.00

Movie Ticket $1.00
Loaf of Bread 20 cents
Kodak Movie camera $67.50
Ladies Stockings $1.00 

NORTH BY NORTHWEST premieres 

which is fitting since the nine year old protagonist of my story finds himself 

beset by intrigue, betrayal, government corruption and not being who he is thought to be.

He knows better than to tell anyone the truth: 

His body may be nine years old, but his mind is that of an old man from a future he dare not let happen.

I do not know if my tale will be a short story, novella, or novel.

Only time will tell.

HAVE YOU EVER

SWITCHED FROM ONE

TALE TO ANOTHER?