How Does the Online Idea Party Work?
You have a dream or a wish, and an obstacle to getting there. (If you don’t think you know your wish, work through my kick-starter and read this post. To learn why you must put logic aside to find your dream, read the following.)
The online Idea Party is here to help you – and the other fellow party goers – with your wishes and obstacles.
Voices from Success Teams and Idea Parties:
Having a team to report to and hearing what everybody did each week is very exciting. It’s kept me moving all year. In the past I made some good starts on my own, but found, every time, when the energy ran out, I ran out. Now it doesn’t run out.
Jade G.
Children’s Playroom Therapist, New York Hospital
I would do a painting a year, a sketch a year. If it was only me I know I would never do it. Having to tell you makes all the difference. It’s crazy why I didn’t do this years ago, it’s so easy all of a sudden.
Caroline R. Personnel Executive, Macy’s Dept Store
Post Your Wish and Your Obstacle Here!
And help your team mates out when you can. Use the Reply link to help, the form below the comments to add your own Wish and Obstacle.
(Your first comment below has to be approved, so it may not display instantly depending on the time of the day. Once your email address is approved you can post instantly. If you want your own profile photo to show up beside your comments, instead of the cute little design, upload your photo on Gravatar.com and give them an hour or so to make it happen.)
Wish: to attend a workshop in San Jose CA in April
Obstacle: funding to get there and spending money.
I am a person who, kind of late in life,has discovered that I am not only a good writer but I have found my niche as well. I believe an important next step for me would be to write a book, and I have a great idea for one! Coincidentally… I also learned about an online program that will guide you through the process of focusing your ideas and actually producing a book. But! It costs $1,000. I do not have this money. What can I do, or how can I raise it, when the prospects for that look…well… Slim!
Are you sure the obstacle is lack of money for this program? Sounds to me that the thing is that you’re not sure about how to get the book written.
There is LOTS of free information on the internet when it comes to writing! Most of it is about writing fiction. But there is some about writing non-fiction also. There is also a lot about getting stuff published, and publishing it yourself if you want that.
Tell us more about what you want to know, what skills you want to develop and so on, so we can come up with ideas!
Let me offer two options.
(1) You could write informative and how-to booklets and sell them on Kindle for 99 cents each. You should be able to follow the free instructions Kindle offers, and you’ll learn quite a lot that will help you write and promote your book while you raise the money for the course.
(2) Barbara Sher offers an online course for writing and promoting a non-fiction book of the sort intended to help others like yourself (as opposed to those books intended solely to entertain or relate history). New members will be welcomed in September, as the current members (located on three continents) are launching their books. You can read all about it at http://barbarasclub.com/writespeak/
Barbara’s course offers no silly promises that you can write a life-changing book in a 3-day weekend. She expects a year of 10+ hours a week to get your book written, set up your promotional channels, build an audience, and prepare to speak about the book’s topic (because that’s how authors like her make most of their income).
I am a graduate of the course and the coach for this new online version. I could arrange a friends-and-family discount on the course for someone able to upgrade a bunch of old, wysiwyg-generated html to html 5 and css 3 before the course begins (part-time, paid work for anyone with the know-how to do the job). Given the number of Scanners attracted to Barbara’s work, it seems worth a shot to look here for a writer who’s also a coder.
Dream: I’ve been writing ‘literary fiction’ and poetry most of my life. I’d finally like to gain some prominence as a writer, and eventually make a living off writing, as some writers around the world do nowadays (such as Haruki Murakami, Yann Martel, Zadie Smith, etc). The first step— as I’m still underway in completing a long novel— would be publishing some of my poems and shorter prose works in magazines and literary publications with name recognition. (Note: I have indeed shared some of my writings with various literary, informed, perceptive acquaintances over the years for feedback, and have confirmed that they are of high, or at least certainly publishable, quality. Suppose you’ll just have to take my word for this.)
Obstacle: About a year ago I started sending out some of my writings for publication, and no one will publish them. They seem to get summarily rejected— apparently mainly because I don’t have ‘name recognition’ and they simply go into a slush pile. However, I learned that if one publishes one’s writings on one’s own blog— or even on facebook— they become disqualified from appearing in other publications. I really need help to ‘think outside the box’ here.
Jason:
It sounds like you’ve been talking to the traditional publishing houses, which are struggling these days. You usually need an agent (and they cost money) if you want to be published that way. You can always self publish. Some writers develop a fan base on their blogs, Facebook, Twitter, etc., then serialize their novels on their Web sites. Start by investigating not only what the publishing houses are doing but also what other writers are doing. Find out if there are any classes or writers groups in your area. If you live in a big enough metropolitan area, there might be classes you can take through adult community education or another organization.
In the meantime, here are some sites to get you started:
Poets and Writers magazine: http://www.pw.org/magazine
Freelance writing info: http://writersweekly.com/
http://www.makealivingwriting.com/
http://www.therenegadewriter.com/2010/07/
Preditors and Editors has lots of info on how to avoid scams: http://pred-ed.com/
Good luck!
Dear Carla,
Thank you for your suggestions. Deeply appreciate it. Would like to clarify a little, though, in case anyone else wants to respond. I’ve been sending out short pieces (poems, stories) for a year to magazines and other literary publications, and they always get rejected. At the same time, if I publish them on a personal blog- which gets little attention- they become disqualified from appearing in literary publications. I feel that at least some of these writings deserve to be seen by a wider audience. So it’s a bit of a Catch-22, and I’m looking for some creative suggestions I might not come to on my own. Cheers
learn to sing while playing the guitar. How do in a short time learn to sing while playing the guitar at the same time?
Does it work for you easily when just singing or just playing?
In that case there is no problem at all!
It’s all about focusing on enjoying your singing, and building up your guitar accompaniment from super easy to complexer playing techniques.
The secret is to to take it one step further only when the previous step has become easy and fun.
Start with songs you love and know well.
Step 1: Start singing a simple song (2 or 3 chords) after just playing the first chord (so you know the pitch). Just focus on enjoying your singing!
Step 2: This time play all chords just once in the simplest way (1 simple strum, no techniques, no rhythm) and in the right tempo. When that works smoothly, repeat and sing along.
Step 3: Add a simple rhythm.
Step 4: Add more complexity to your accompaniment.
Remember to only move on once you are happily singing and playing together. If it takes too long, take a step back.
From step 3 on, start playing before an audience. First your best friend(s), spouse, children. Let them sing along if they want to. Remember: it’s all about practicing and enjoying the music, not about perfection.
Try it out and let me know if it works for you!
Roel
My Wish: to find my purpose & joy for life
Obstacles: Scanner? Time? Patience?
I look forward to the Idea party….just experienced my first party here in Germany and it was fabulous !!
I’m 43. I want to become a TV host . Because I feel myself the best under the camera especially when it’s live. I have good appearance for a TV. I’m thin and worked in my yourth a model.
The obstacle – is that I don’t know the way to get the job on TV. I asked several people and everyone said you must have some good connections to get the job. I don’t.
Lisa, please check out “Live and Work Anywhere”, one of Chris Guillebeau’s (www.theartofnonconformity.com) unconventional guides. That might be of help.
That url didn’t work for me, http://chrisguillebeau.com did work fine. 🙂
Lara, try LA garment district. Should be able to find someone there, I think. Also look on Makersrow.com
All the best.
Hello everyone.
My name is Andrea and my wish is to live and work in Spain, Marbella being my first choice .
I’m a dog groomer, which i would like to continue and I also would like to be a life coach.
Would appreciate all ideas and thoughts.
Currently residing in Arizona. USA, though I’m British.
🙂
Thank you.
Andrea.
Hi Andrea
I think to work in spain, you have to be fluent in spanish. So maybe start with that. This will help build connections to people from spain.
Good luck!
B.