Month: May 2021

Time Management Doesn’t Work

Neera

Late in the nineteenth century, Frederick Taylor grabbed a stopwatch, stood next to a worker, and instructed him to pick a chunk of iron and move it using a specific set of movements. He then timed him. 

He did this repeatedly until he had the perfect combination of movements for moving the chunk of iron efficiently.

Taylor then taught those prescribed moments to other workers in the yard of Bethlehem Steel. As a result, the productivity of the plant quadrupled.

This was the birth of “time management.”

The concept swept through the industrial world, and productivity became the aim of each industry. 

Before Taylor’s stopwatch measurement of performing a task, no one thought of the time that way. 

Most people worked on farms. They were decided what to do and when to do it based upon the movement of the sun rather than the movement of hands on a dial. Their schedules were determined by the sun, moon, and seasons rather than the watches and calendars. 

The truth was most people didn’t even know what day or time it was.

Taylor’s big contribution to productivity was that he thought of time as a “production unit.” 

Add more time, get more output.

Do more work within that time, get more output.

Today we still think of time as a “production unit,” this attitude is so ingrained in our culture that we are hardly aware of it.

For more than a century, “time management” has dominated our psyche. 

We wake up to alarms. As we drive to work, our navigation system calculates exactly how long it will take. We work from nine to five. We estimate project cost based on how much time it is going to take to finish it. 

We diligently fill our timesheets so our employers can bill clients for our time. 

As you opened this article to read, you probably checked the time it would take you to read it.

Everything around us is set up with the assumption that time is precious. 

Whatever is your goal, if you reached it in less time, that’s a good thing. 

Time is money. That is the mantra.

But there was a major problem with this concept.

The time as a production unit has its limits. 

Even Taylor observed that if he tried to fill all of his worker’s time with efficient movements, he didn’t get what he expected. After a while, the worker gets tired and does less and less. 

This concept in economics is known as the “point of diminishing returns.” That is when each additional production unit doesn’t get you the same output as the previous production unit.

If Taylor wanted to get a full day’s work out of a worker, Taylor needed not only to prescribe movements to that worker; he also needed to prescribe rest to that worker.

The “point of diminishing returns” is more evident in knowledge workers.

In today’s world, where creative thinking is the key to being productive, you can’t get more output simply by optimizing time.

Yet this is what we try to do all the time. We cram our schedule, multitask, and always in a hurry. Any opportunity we can find to do things faster, we take it without realizing time is not the only factor we need to take into consideration.

There is another factor in play — energy.

While time is precise, our energy level is not the same throughout the day.

Time management works well if every hour were identical in terms of energy. 

But our energy levels go up and down all through the day. So we recharge them either by taking breaks, naps or taking a walk, or watching mindless TV. 

The way to work with your energy is to make sure you know when your energy levels are at the peak and use them well. 

I divide my energy levels into three categories:

  • Peak Energy Level. It is when I am well-rested, emotionally sound, and at peace with myself. This peak energy is the creative energy, when I conceive new ideas, can go deep into a topic, and learn new things. Usually, for me, it is mornings. This is when I do most of my fresh writing.
  • Medium Energy Level. This is when I am a bit tired and not in a mood to tackle heavy thinking work. But I am still quite alert. My afternoons and evenings are like that. I use this time for researching, editing, sketching, and painting.
  • Low Energy Level. Each day I reach a point of exhaustion when I can’t do work that involves thinking or concentrating. At these times, I don’t push myself to write or do anything that involves heavy thinking. But surprisingly, I am still good to read a book or watch a Masterclass video. This is the best time to wind down watching TV, surfing the net, or checking social media. 

Now that I am aware of my energy levels, I am well equipped to manage them.

I am very vigilant of my peak energy periods and don’t waste them doing tasks that I can do with medium or low energy levels. That is why doing research or checking social media in the mornings is a big no-no. 

Sometimes both “time” and “energy” are not enough to be productive. 

I have been trying to write an ebook for a long time now. In fact, I have several in draft mode. But, unfortunately, every time I make time to work on those, and I have selected peak energy hours, I hardly make any progress. 

It is not the lack of time or energy that stops me from writing those books (it is not even the skill level). It is the mindset. 

Things are not difficult to make; what is difficult is putting ourselves in the state of mind to make them. — Constantin Brancusi

I have no problem writing an article a day now. Just a few weeks ago, that was an unthinkable proposition. So when I announced my intention to write 100 Articles in 100 Days, I was in the right mindset to take the challenge. 

Nothing changed between that day and one week before other than my mindset.

I am sure one day I will be in the right frame of mind to tackle the ebook. 

Sometimes our mind is better suited to think creatively. Other times it’s better suited to think analytically. Sometimes we’re in a mood to do some research. Other times, we’re better off taking care of little details.

Manage your creative energy so that instead of going through a to-do list in order of priority, tackle it in order of mood priority. Ask yourself, What work am I in the mood to do right now?

In Summary

Time Management is an outdated concept. It only takes “time” as the production unit and assumes your energy levels are the same at all times during the day.

But we have all fallen into energy black holes.

Rather than managing time, manage your energy.

Do the tasks that require thinking and a high level of concentration when your energy levels are at the peak. 

Make sure you don’t waste them; otherwise, you will feel crappy, and it will create a doom loop of lower energy.

Mindset is the third factor of productivity. Our mood dictates what is the optimum thing to do at a given time. So rather than fighting it, how about we listen to it. After all things, we do wholeheartedly turn out to be our best creation.

Photo by Katie Harp on Unsplash

You Only Need To Learn Five Types Of Sentences To Write Fiction

Neera 2 Comments

In the summer of 2015, I wrote the first draft of my first novel. 

Like the thousands all over the world, I wanted to see whether I could churn out 50,000 words in one month while participating in NaNoWriMo.

I did.

But it was not a novel—just words.

Then began the laborious process of turning those words into a novel. Over the years, I converted that first draft into a compelling story with a strong protagonist and an engaging opening scene. 

But there was still one problem with it. My story sounded terrible. It was failing the sentence level.

I had never written fiction before, not even short stories. Embarking straight onto writing a novel meant I made every single mistake I shouldn’t.

The worst thing you can do is to write the sloppy first draft. If you write the sloppy first drafts you will be spending much more time in revision. — M. L. Ronn

I had two options — throw it in the bin and start the next one or fix it.

I chose the latter.

With that started my learning of how to write a novel — at the sentence level.

There are thousands of books, articles, and blog posts on how to write a novel, and most of them are very helpful, but none of them addressed how to write a novel at the sentence level.

But why at the sentence level?

Because sentences are the building blocks of writing.

Whether it is fiction or non-fiction writing, you construct it by laying a block over a block. Just like a stonemason does or children do with their Leggo blocks.

A group of words forms a sentence, a group of sentences forms a paragraph, and a group of paragraphs forms a piece. Simple as that.

But it is not that simple. 

Not any group of words can form a sentence. A good sentence has a structure. A good sentence is grammatically correct. A good sentence sings.

Good sentences make good writing. The more shapely and elegant one’s sentences are, the sounder they are structurally, the better one’s writing is.

Besides being the building blocks of a piece, sentences perform another essential function.

Sentences are the conduit to carry information.

In its basic form, storytelling provides information — a sequence of events that happened at a particular time and space to a set of characters, their response, and the conclusion.

Sentences answer questions that arise in a reader’s mind. What happened? Why did it happen? Who did it? Why? How? In a seasoned writer’s hands, sentences are like a string of beads, each providing a little bit of information. Each sentence answers a question much before it arises in the readers’ minds. 

Each sentence is there for a reason. It has a special function to perform. If it doesn’t do that, it is superfluous.

In fiction writing, a story is told by writing five types of sentences over and over again.

I didn’t know that until I stumbled upon a video by Michael La Ronn, a science-fiction and fantasy writer.

Michael makes the case that is what the bestselling authors do, all that time.

He urges that if you want to excel at writing fiction, you must master these.

I decided to check Michael’s theory with my own research. I took three novels from my bookshelf, picked random sentences from each one of them, and tried to see if they fit in one of five sentence types. 

They did.

All of them.

In fact, most of the sentences were simple sentences. They didn’t draw attention to them by being overly smart and complicated. They were practical technical, and functional sentences. Sentences that were doing their job.

Fiction writers such as Nora Roberts or Michael Crichton don’t write convoluted, complex sentences. Instead, they write sentences that do their job.

What are the five fictional sentence types?

Fiction writing needs to convey a lot of information. That information needs to be conveyed in such a way that the reader feels what the protagonist is feeling. The story should unfold rather than be told after the incident has already taken place. 

According to Michael La Ronn, there are the following five types of sentences:

  1. Character’s opinion about a setting or the situation 
  2. The backstory of the character
  3. Action
  4. Dialogue 
  5. Sensory Details

If you look at any fiction piece, you will find that most of the sentences fit in one of these categories to some degree.

Let’s take them one by one.

Character’s opinion about a setting or situation

Often, the first few sentences in a novel fall in this category. A setting is the description of the time and the place where the story is occurring and is usually written from the main character’s perspective. 

Have a look at the following example:

May in Ayemenem is a hot, brooding month. The days are long and humid. The river shrinks and black crows gorge on bright mangoes in still, dustgreen trees. Red bananas ripen. Jackfruits burst. Dissolute bluebottles hum vacuously in the fruity air. Then they stun themselves against clear windowpanes and die, fatly baffled in the sun. — Arundhati Roy, The God of Small Things

A situation is what is happening at a particular point in the story. Mostly a situation arises through dialogue or action. But sometimes, a situation is revealed through a character’s monologue, as it is in the following example:

It was midnight in Grinder’s Alley. The gas lamp flickered in the darkness. Somewhere in those shadows lurked the larrikins of the Push, with their hot breath and cold knives. — Jackie French, A Waltz For Matilda.

The first two lines describe the setting. The third line describes the situation where the protagonist is worried about the danger lurking in the background.

Take away:

You should write sentences that describe the setting in your story. Every time you introduce a new place or location, you should describe it in a few sentences so that the readers can see it clearly in their minds. 

In the same way, you should write sentences to describe a character’s monologue so that readers know what is going on in the character’s head. That takes the readers inside the story world rather than observing it from outside.

The backstory of a character

There is a whole category of sentences that tell the backstory of the character. All novels have the backstory spilled here and there and dispersed throughout the novel. They give us insights into who the character is and why they are the way they are. As it is in the following excerpt: 

Matilda put her chin out. The jam factory was only three streets away from Mrs Dawkins’s.She’d managed to escape the Push before. She’d make it tonight too. — Jackie French’s novel, A Waltz For Matilda.

The third bolded line tells that Matilda has encountered the Push before and has escaped them. That background information is important as it implies she might be able to escape this time too. 

Take away:

Sprinkle enough background information in your stories so that the readers are informed enough about the main character’s reasons and motives.

Action

Action is straightforward. It is what a character is doing. It is best written as showing. Not telling. Make sure you write it in such a way that it unfolds rather than reported a moment after it has already occurred. The action that unfolds is gripping and engaging. See the example below:

She hurled herself over the fence, landing hard, heard boots thud onto the ground next to her. ‘Got yer, yer little-’

Todger screamed. It was a good sound. Matilda stood, trying to get her breath, as Bruiser tugged and tore at the young man’s arm. Blodd dripping onto the gravel. — Jackie French, A Waltz For Matilda.

Take away:

Most of the sentences in a novel other than dialogue are written action sentences. They are active sentences with appropriate verbs describing the action. You should master them. They make your write come alive.

Dialogue

We all know what dialogue is. I will not go too much in detail here as most fiction writer knows what a dialogue sentence is like. Here is an example:

‘Matilda…’ Her eyes darkened. ‘Rabbit, what’s wrong?’

How could she think she’d hide the truth from Mum? The tears that wouldn’t come before erupted in a giant choke. ‘Tommy. There was an accident at the factory. He’s burned.’

‘How bad?’

Mum’s voice was just a thread; there was no breath behind it. One thin hand touched hers its fingers long and soft. The nails had grown since she’d stopped sewing.

‘I don’t know. He’s at the hospital. They said they think he’ll live…

‘Oh, my little rabbit.’ Matilda could feel Mum’s warmth as she lay next to her, the comfort of her arms. ‘Come, lie down. He’s strong, little rabiit. He’ll pull through.’ — Jackie French’s novel, A Waltz For Matilda.

Notice how there are monologues, and action types of sentences are strewn with dialogue in the above example. 

Take away:

Sentences belonging to the dialogue category occupies most of the real estate in a novel. Get good at writing dialogues as they are the bread and butter of fiction writing.

Sensory Details

This is one category of fiction sentences where most of the new writers fail. Perhaps because we rely too much on our eyes than other senses, other than eyes, we have four more senses — taste, touch, smell, and audio. If you want your fiction to work and want your reader to experience what the character in your story is experiencing, you need to describe the places, things, and people using all five senses. 

The sensory detail is a great tool to turn your writing from telling to showing. 

Have a look at the examples below.

Ah, Ching’s smile changed: became deeper, gentler, rich in understanding. He picked out a second peach, then held it out to her, bowing.

She looked at him, speechless, then unwrapped it slowly, letting the smell seep into her nose. The first bite was like slipping into the waves at the beach or clean white sheets. The juice exploded down her chin. She wiped it. embarrassed.

 — Jackie French’s novel, A Waltz For Matilda.

Take away:

Including sensory details in your description is one area where you can turn ordinary sentences into evocative sentences. It is not hard to master skills. Once you become aware of it, you will describe a place, person, or thing each time you start engaging all your senses.

Summary

Fiction writing consists of just five types of sentences. 

  1. Character’s opinion about a setting or the situation
  2. The backstory of the character
  3. Action
  4. Dialogue and
  5. Sensory Details

You win half the battle when you become aware of them. 

Rest is won when you master writing them.

Next time when you read a novel, pay attention to sentences. See which category they belong to. It will help you in more than one way —  you will see how established writers convey so much information in so few sentence types and how they make those sentences work.

Next time you go ‘wow’ while reading a sentence, ask what caught your attention. What element made you go wow. And what you can learn from it.

Photo by Keren Fedida on Unsplash

The Blessed (Fiction – Short Story)

Neera

If you ever get a chance to come to the South of India, close to either the state of Karnataka or Tamilnadu, I urge you to come and visit me. I reside on a hill almost at the border of two states, mere 20 km east of Bengaluru and about 230 km from Chennai.

I stand forlorn and deserted overlooking the valley, crumbling with the winds of time, thinking about the days when I was revered and famous. Hardly anyone ever comes to my altar to pray these days, but there was a time when worshippers surrounded me. My tapering ceilings decorated with amorous apsaras, posing gods, and bellowing elephants touched the skies; the sound of bells and prayers filled the morning air, and beggars came from all around for their daily meal. Dignitaries and commoners from far and near came to seek blessings of the stone statues that resided on the alter clad in finest linen in bright colors.

Over the years, I have heard countless mantras chanted by thousands of priests who prayed in my belly. I have swelled with the songs of gratitude and praise from the zealot on the fulfillment of their desires. Then, on the other hand, I have been saddened by the grievances of the worshippers and wails of the sufferers. I have witnessed childless women praying for sons, unmarried young women seeking worthy husbands, young men seeking blessing for success in their endeavors, older men asking for prosperity and peace.

Today in my twilight years, I have nothing better to do but go over the days of my glory. I reminisce about my devotees and wonder what happened to them. Their stories keep me wondering. 

If you care to listen, I can tell you a story each night. I remember them as if they happened yesterday.

This one is about a young girl of marriageable age in the thirteen century. 

I was young too then. Recently built. Still getting to know my role in society. Three priests were responsible for my upkeep, taking turns in doing prayers and building my reputation. An army of devotees kept the premises clean and collected offerings.

Her name was Champa. She came with her parents, carrying a silver platter full of offerings to ask for a worthy husband. 

She was fresh like the jasmine flowers she wore in her hair. Fair-skinned, short-statured, her sensual body she was not easy to forget. Maybe that is why she is still stuck in my memory. 

Gods probably also noticed her because they granted her wish.

Less than a year later, she came back. This time with her husband, the only son of a personage. The parents accompanied the young couple too. They did puja and asked for an offspring to complete their happiness. 

There must be something lacking in their prayers. This time, gods didn’t respond to their prayers for many years.

It came to the point that the young man’s family started pressuring him to seek another wife. “The girl might be barren,” was their argument. But the young man was hopelessly in love with the girl and wouldn’t hear of any alternative. 

The doctors couldn’t find anything wrong with the couple. “This is something in God’s hands” was all they could offer. 

A few more years passed. 

Now the family was getting really anxious. If the couple didn’t produce a son soon, the family name would vanish. 

The boy’s parents consulted the elders, the astrologers, and priests. Finally, a solution was agreed upon without the knowledge of the couple.

Next month, on a full moon night, the girl and her mother-in-law came to me with a whole load of offerings of fruits, flowers, and coconuts. The temple was kept open late that night just for them. 

All three priests were present. Led by the head priest, they performed a special puja. Champa was asked to do parikarma twenty-one times around the deities, reciting the mantra the head priest gave her. 

While she was still doing the parikarma, the mother-in-law left the temple. Fully immersed in the puja, Champa didn’t even notice her departure. When she finished the final round and stood in front of the deities, hands folded, head bent, and eyes closed. Suddenly everything went still. I drew in my breath.

Champa probably felt the stillness too.

She opened her eyes. The head priest was standing a few feet from her, leering intently. She didn’t like what she saw. Looking around for her mother-in-law, she backed towards the door. When she couldn’t find her, she ran. My carved gilded doors, which should remain open at all times, were closed.

I knew what I was about to witness but couldn’t do anything to prevent it. 

Champa banged and banged. Even I couldn’t open my own door. She begged when the head priest tore the sari from her body. He laughed at her, begging through his stained teeth. She ran back inside the temple, this time to beg the gods. It was time for me to discover that those idols whom the whole world came to get their wishes granted were nothing more than stone statues. The head priest took her, right there on the altar, followed by the other two.

My whole being shuddered with disgust. That night I learned the meaning of sanctity. A place can’t be sacred if the hearts are not. Ashamed at myself, more than anyone else, I figured out what my role was going to be—the one of a mute observer. 

A few months later, Champa came back with her husband and his family. A baby in her arms. She followed the priest’s instructions to get her son blessed.

But she didn’t bow her head, either in front of the priest or the gods.

© Neera Mahajan, December 2014

Photo by Kristen Sturdivant on Unsplash

Everything Changes When You Start Working From The Fourth Level of Consciousness

Neera

The last few days have been mind-boggling. I am witnessing a paradigm shift happening right inside me. I am amazed at my transformation and the speed with which it is happening.

Many years ago, roughly twenty-plus, I had this tiny desire to write. It was no big deal. I wanted to express myself better, record my story for my children, write some short stories, and maybe a novel someday.

But there was only one problem. English was my second language, and I was terrible at it. But the more I sucked at it; the more my desire grew to get better at it.

I joined a life story writing course and wrote stories of my growing up in India. They were pathetic. We were supposed to read them to the group, and it used to terrify me. I spent hours making my stories coherent. Still, when I read them, they were fragmented, muddled, and plain old boring.

Anyone in their right mind would have given up and picked some other hobby.

But I couldn’t

My desire to write wouldn’t go away.

So I continued. For twenty years, I agonized over my lack of skill to be able to write well. I wanted nothing more than to be fluent and original.

Persistent paid. I got better at expressing my ideas. But writing still demanded a lot of “effort.”

I got swayed by the other writers. I read all the advice there is on how to succeed as a writer. The list was very long. I myself have written many such lists.

Fast forward to Friday last week.

I was lying in the bathtub listening to random YouTube videos when a guy appeared on a video and started talking about how we operate from different levels of consciousness.

I am not new to mind-body-soul learning. But this one made me think about writing in a completely different way.

There are four distinct and unique levels of consciousness from which we operate from. These levels determine how our consciousness and our self-awareness relate between us and the world around us.

I will come to my thought process a bit later, but let me tell you what I learned about four levels of consciousness.

Four levels of consciousness.

In 1968, Alan Watts, a British writer, speaker, and Zen master, appeared on CBS with a group of students to teach a unique zen philosophy.

He asked the students three questions:

  • Who am I?
  • What do I desire?
  • What do I know?

The three questions sound simple enough, but they go very deep.

According to Alan, if you ponder these questions long enough, they will unlock many new meanings in your life.

Your answers to these questions depend on what state of consciousness you are in.

Vishan Lakhiani, a writer and CEO of Mindvalley, explains in his book “Code of Evolution” four levels of consciousness.

At each level of consciousness, you react and shape the world in different ways. — Vishan Lakniani

Level 1 — Culturescape

Culturescape is the tangled web of rituals and beliefs, and ideas that come from the culture. Whether we live in a tribe in a developing part of the world or in modern tribes such as a corporation, all of us are part of Culturescape.

We believe in what our parents, teachers, priests, politicians, media, advertisements, authors, books, and thought leaders tell us. But we don’t see it just like fish swimming in water.

The rules by which each tribe lives do not apply to everybody, but they apply to that tribe. The problem with Culturescape is that it feels real. We become a victim of it.

At this level world happens to us. We suffer breakups, business failure, being hospitalized, book launch failure, newsletter failure, not-being-able-to-build-a-subscriber-base failure. You get the point.

A vast majority of people exist at level 1.

At this point, we give this kind of answers to Alan’s questions:

Who am I? — I am a writer. I am a three-book author. I am a bestselling author.

What do I desire? — I want to get better at writing. I want to make a living from writing. I want to write a book. I want my book to be a megaseller. I want to earn big royalties.

What do I know? — I know I am a kind person. I know God is on my side. I know if I put in 10,000 hours, I will get better at writing.

But at a certain point, people start waking up. That is when they go to level 2.

Level 2 — Awakening

At this level, people start going back to the childhood nature of questioning. They question their parent’s expectations; they question religion, they question the social- norms, and they realize they can choose their own experiences in life.

Life doesn’t happen to them, but it starts happening from them. It emerges from them. This is when they start creating their own rules.

They don’t follow society’s so-called normal professions and start following their passion. They do that because it is fulfilling. They might become a coach, or set up a business. They still identify themselves by what they do but their desires are in line with their inner being.

At this level, they really start embracing personal growth.

When they do that enough, they go to level 3 — Recoding Yourself.

Level 3 — Recoding Yourself

This is when you realize the world is not just outside you; the world is inside you as well. And you start paying attention to your inner world. You start listening to that tiny little voice inside you.

When you start going within yourself, you start recognizing that you are more than just a physical body.

At this level, the big shift happens at question #1. The answer to that question becomes:

I am a soul having a human experience.

Level 4 — Becoming Extraordinary

As soon as you start going within, it opens you to level 4. And level 4 is when you start becoming extraordinary. An important shift happens that really transforms how you live your life. It puts you in 1–5% of human beings who are truly fulfilled and happy.

You realize you are so much beyond your body. “You” extend to all other human beings and all the life on the planet. “You” become a part of a great “whole.”

The more you expand your circle of compassion to other people, the greater the opportunity the universe gives you.

At level 1 our society teaches us to have goals and the goals are given to us by Culturescape. At level 2, the goals come from our soul. But when we get to level 4, the goals come from a completely different place.

According to Vishan Lakhiani, they come from Inspiration.

Call it Inspiration or God, or Universe, or Supreme Being, or Higher Power, but when we become a part of the “whole,” Inspiration leads to intention.

Inspiration leads to intention.

We might think we came up with the brilliant idea for that book or that song or that business, but we are simply a conduit.

When we say we got inspired, what we really mean is Inspiration whispered in our ear.

When someone gets an idea in a dream (John Lennon) or in the bathtub (Archimedes) it was Inspiraton whispering. And when Inspiraton has your attention, and you are receptive, it clears the roadblocks and starts moving you towards it. I gives you the intention.

That is how inspiration leads you to intention.

But you got to be listening. Your antenna needs to be attuned to hear the whispers. Whispers can come in any form. As an idea in the shower, or a nudge in a seminar, or as a YouTube video. You never know.

You got to be ready.

As soon as you show that you will take the nudge and act on it and you have the confidence to make it happen, luck starts being on your side.

The Inspiration doesn’t just whisper to you. It clears the way for you.

Your job is to listen.

And if you chose to ignore it, the Inspiraton goes to someone else.

I like this idea.

To me “Four Levels of Consciousness” is like a roadmap for growth.

I like that at fourth level of consciousness your goals, your purpose is assigned to you by a higher power.

At level 2 we keep looking for a purpose for life, a way to make contribution to this universe and most of the time we have no clue what that purpose is. So we pick one thing, something we like and enjoy and declare that this is the purpose of our life.

And when we don’t achieve success in our endeavor, success as defined by the society or culture, we give up.

In my case it was writing. I picked it up and made it my vocation. I have pursued it for a number of years without getting much success as in terms of making money, having a big subscriber base, building a business on it.

But the truth is I don’t need any of that. I write because I see it as a means of personal growth.

I can’t give it up. It is the reason I get up each morning, energized and ready to work. My drive to write is so strong that even if I want to give it up, I can’t.

So there is a possiblilty that universe might have a purpose behind it. Or maybe it has something completely different and I haven’t even got a clue.

How can I find out.

Listen, I suppose. Wait and listen.

How to listen? I will write about it in my next article.

Image by Comfreak from Pixabay

3 Questions To Ask Yourself Before Starting A New Project

Neera 1 Comment

Two years ago, when I started my creative life, I wanted to do so much. I wanted to start a blog, write for online magazines, write short stories, finish my memoir and write the first draft of a novel.

I also wanted to sketch, paint, and make rock mandalas. And I was committed to starting an online business. 

So I embarked on all those projects straight away. I made plans. I bought courses after courses. I scheduled my day so that I can allocate time for each project. 

I had worked as a project manager during my working life so I knew how important all that planning was. But I was missing one big thing. 

I was the only resource. 

There was no way I could do all that I was allocating myself to do in a day. 

Damn.

I was in a deep sh*t and had no idea what to do.

One day I was listening to a YouTube video by a young artist by the name of Struthless (real name Campbell Walker) who went through the same agony as me.

In his early days, he was into many things, songwriting, poetry, drawing, animation, video making, etc., etc. Like me, he wanted to pursue them all. 

He had a mentor Marc Schattner. Marc and his wife Gillie make dog and rabbit face human sculptures, paintings, and sketches. 

That is all they make. 

Struth was in awe of their work and constantly whined to Marc. I want to be as good as you. When will I be able to get to your level?

Then one day, when Struth’s complaining got to an all-time high, Marc sat him down and gave him some tough love.

You know what your problem is Struth, one day you write a song, the next day you write a poem, and the third day you do a drawing and none of it adds up to anything. All you are doing is laying a single brink of million different houses and hoping one day it will magically become a mansion. It’s not going to happen.

Marc’s advice hit Struth like a ton of bricks. Marc had identified correctly. Struth was scattered. 

So was I. 

I was doing several things and making zero progress with anyone of them. 

We live in a world where there is too much to entice us. Spoiled as we have become, we think we can do everything. But the reality is that we have only a limited amount of time.

I am a multi-passion creator. I get excited easily. A soon as I hear something interesting I want to do it. But how can I choose which interest to pursue and which one to park for the time being?

It is not an easy decision. At least not for me.

So I came up with three questions to ask myself to help me make a decision.

Will it enhance me, or will it diminish me?

You got to have a guiding principle in your life. Mine is growth. So this is the first question I ask myself. This thing I am going to commit to, will it just make me happy or will it make me grow. 

Oliver Burkeman, a journalist and writer framed it perfectly:

We are terrible at predicting what will make us happy: the question swiftly gets bogged down in our narrow preferences for security and control. But the enlargement question elicits a deeper, intuitive response. You tend to just know whether, say, leaving or remaining in a relationship or a job, though it might bring short-term comfort, would mean cheating yourself of growth. 

— Oliver Burkeman

That doesn’t mean I don’t do anything for pleasure. In fact, all the things I do are for pleasure. But the pleasure I get from doing the things I enjoy is much deep-seated. 

What it means is that I don’t choose anything that doesn’t give me pleasure. The activities we enjoy are also the activities that make us grow.

Still, there are so many things that I enjoy and most of them can lead to self-growth. That leads to the second question.

Do I have time for it?

We have somehow led ourselves to believe that we can fit everything we want to do in a day.

A mentor of mine Sean D’Souza has a theory. He calls it Chaos Theory. It works on the basis that sh*t happens in life on a daily basis. Praying that sh*t doesn’t happen, doesn’t work. 

Instead, you need to make time for sh*t. 

I have started following the Chaos Theory. I now leave enough time in my day to deal with day-to-day happenings. 

So the second question I ask myself is, Will adding this new thing will leave me enough time to handle the daily sh*t?

If the answer is no, then I ask the third question.

What will I give up in order to take it on?

When my children were young they wanted to do all those after-school activities their friends were doing — swimming, basketball, piano, dance lessons, chess, netball, the lot. 

But I didn’t have time to drive them around to everything. Both my husband and I worked.

So I made a rule.

They can join two activities at a time, and when they have made their decision, they will have to stick with them for six months. They can’t just pick and let go of activity as soon as they decide they don’t like it. The rule worked beautifully for all through the school years of both my daughters.

Now I apply the same rule to myself. 

I work only on two projects at a time. 

The next one can only start if one finished or six months have passed and I have no intention of pursuing it. 

Applying 3 question strategy has worked well for me. Earlier this year I submitted the first draft of my novel for workshopping. 

Now I am writing an article a day and drawing a sketch a day.

I am getting faster and better at both. 

In six months’ time, I will evaluate whether to replace them with a new project or continue with them.

Action Summary

  • Focused energy moves mountains. You have to say no to a lot of random things to be able to say yes and focus your energy on things that matter.
  • You only have enough time to concentrate on one or two things at a time. So just pick two.

Photo by Jr Korpa on Unsplash

I Am Over The Moon, Happy As A Larry, Overjoyed, Buzzing With Excitement

Neera

I couldn’t believe it when I opened the email.

I thought it was a mistake. A prank? Or worst one of the fraud emails?

It was not until three other writers reported in a SLACK group that they too got a bonus check of $500 that I realized that I had made my first real money from writing.

I am one of 1000 writers to get a $500 bonus from Medium.

I have been publishing one article a day for about 27 days now. Before that, I was averaging two articles a week. I have put an insane amount of hours into learning the craft of article writing in the past two and half years.

It feels good to be recognized.

It is not the money, but the recognition, that someone took notice of my work that feels good.

This $500 will go a long way.

Many writers like me needed this proof that we can develop a career by writing online.

This money is not enough to pay bills for many, but it is enough to give us the taste of online work. And it is a world with abundance. Thousands of entrepreneurs are building millions (nee billions) of dollars worth of businesses online. We just needed a tiny proof for ourselves.

I quit (I don’t like the word retired) a job where I earned $175K per year to start my writing career. This money is the first proof that the world is changing. That blogging could not only be intellectually satisfying but a means of earning a living.

I won’t be fully relying on Medium, but I want to thank them for the gesture.

I think they are going on the right track.

Most Medium members are interested in each other’s success. We want to hear each other’s views and learn from each other, not just about making money but also how to live this life better.

At Medium, we are part of a “scenius.”

Brian Eno, a musician, record producer, and visual artist, came up with the term “scenius.”

The word conveys the extreme creativity that a group, place or “scene” can occasionally generate. His actual definition is:

Scenius stands for the intelligence and the intuition of a whole cultural scene. It is the communal form of the concept of the genius. — Brian Eno

Image from Austin Kleon’s blog

I first learned about scenius from Austin Kleon, who wrote in his book Steal Like an Artist, “What is great about the idea of scenius is that it makes room in the story of creativity for the rest of us: the people who don’t consider ourselves geniuses.”

It is not about how talented and how smart you are it is about what you have to contribute, the idea you can share, the quality of connections you can make and the conversations you start. — Austin Kleon

If we can forget about the geniuses and concentrate on how we can nurture and contribute to a scenius we can lean and grow much faster. Internet is basically is a bunch of seniuses. Blogs, social media sites, email groups and discussion board forums are the platforms where people hang out and talk about things they care about and share ideas. — Austin Kleon

Medium is that scenius.

Individuals immersed in a productive “scenius” blossom and produce their best work. When buoyed by scenius, you act like a genius. In addition, your like-minded peers and the entire environment inspire you.

At Medium, we are a whole scene of people supporting each other, looking at each other’s work, learning from each other, sharing and comparing and contributing ideas, and growing together as a group.Ev Williams, if you can keep Medium as a scenius for readers, writers, and thinkers, it will become a realization of your vision — Where good ideas find you.

I believe in Medium’s vision statement.

Medium is an open platform where readers find dynamic thinking, and where expert and undiscovered voices can share their writing on any topic.

In the meantime, that you for $500. They will pay for my next ten year’s subscription.

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